Is it a beautiful poetic scene if a gay man have sex with a priest right in front of the church alter? In Norway this action from Tooji, their 2012 Eurovision participant, is being heavily discussed. Broadcaster, NRK fired him and Olso’s bishop feel abused.
A new music video The Father Project by Tooji is under heavy accusations in Norway. In the video the 2012 Eurovision participant have sex with a priest at the alter in a church. The video is by many seen as a PR stunt that went too far, while Tooji himself tries to argue why that scene was needed for him:
The song and the video is about running from yourself, disown yourself, and yes, if God is in all and everyone, disown God. With this project I want to express that love between two of the same sex way too long has been destroyed by religion. And that religion has imposed unnecessary shame on too many people.
If anyone should be in doubt, yes, Tooji, also used this video to come out as a gay man. And he deliberately wanted to do something out of the ordinary:
I would not just go out and say “Hey, I’m gay” as that wouldn’t have the same effect. I wanted to ask critical questions to the society, the state, the religion and not the least, the church. It is them who have looked down on homosexuality and are the reason people commit suicide, is being bullied, outcast and is afraid to come out.
The past few years Tooji has been hosting the Norwegian Junior show which he was also planned to do this year, but broadcaster NRK has removed him from that position after this video. Charlo Halvorsen, Entertainment editor at NRK, says:
The video contain scenes which can not be combined with hosting a children programme. There was an explicit sexual content and we were told (a couple of months ago) that the video would be launched in the same week as the finalists of MGP Junior would be known. Tooji was given the option to chose between the video or the host job.
The video is recorded in Forgner church in Olso. Tooji and his team had been given permission to film what they described as a poetic, symbolic and beautiful scene with love between two men. As the bishop in Oslo was made aware of what specifically it contained, a press release was sent out:
Independent from the message and the person behind it, recording of intimate scenes in front of the alter is absolutely unacceptable. The church room should never be used as a visual backdrop for sexual scenes in a commercial production. A similar scene between a man and a woman would not be acceptable either. What happened here breaks the rules we have for the use of the church room.
Date overview: The 20th of April the church congregation received a request from Tooji to use the church for a music video. On the 22nd of April the request was approved. The recording was done in the days 27th and 28th of April – and later the congregation noticed that there are scenes in the film which doesn’t match the description which their approval was based on, but they were unable to stop the video, which was released on the 8th of June.
Norway is as the other Scandinavian countries known as a gay friendly country. A registered partnership with the same rights as a married couple have been allowed since 1993. And in 2009 same-sex marriage as well as homosexual adoptions and IVF insemination for Lesbians were granted as well.
The video can be seen below:
