When Nemo won last year’s Eurovision for Switzerland with “The Code,” a catchy track with an operatic chorus, the pop star had a goal: to raise the profile of nonbinary people in their homeland.
Nemo, who is nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns, said in an interview that they had had some initial success: Surveys showed a decrease in negative attitudes among Swiss people toward transgender and nonbinary people after Nemo’s win. The performer also said they hoped Switzerland would introduce the option of a third gender on government-issued documents rather than having only male and female.
But this year, Nemo said, the atmosphere has changed.
Swiss news media coverage, and social media chatter, increasingly focused on divisive topics like which bathrooms transgender women should use, Nemo said. Many transgender and nonbinary people now feel like “a target in a political debate that was blown all out of proportion,” Nemo added.
Given the tenor of public discussion, Nemo said, there was little chance of new legislation recognizing a third gender option.
A spokeswoman for Switzerland’s federal justice ministry said in an email that the Swiss Federal Council, the country’s governing body, would this year publish a report “outlining measures that could improve the situation of nonbinary persons.” But she said the council would not recommend “abandoning the binary gender system.”
During Saturday’s Eurovision final, Nemo is set to open the event by performing “The Code,” and later will perform a new ballad, “Unexplainable,” in which the chorus ends with a question: “What if I’m unexplainable?”
Nemo said the song was about being nonbinary and that it “feels like the most vulnerable song in my career.” But it wasn’t “a call for pity,” Nemo said: It was “rooted in confidence,” and “a way of saying, ‘I’m here. Listen to me.’”
