“The drag queen story hour plays right into their fears that the children are going to be led astray by evil or satanic or alien ideas,” Balmer said. It’s a strategy conservative candidates are using to motivate white evangelical Christians to vote, according to Randall Balmer, a Dartmouth College historian of American religion. “Now they’ve just switched that to groomers. “The term they used at that time was recruitment,” Haider-Markel said. “But I mean, it did scare me enough that I had that conversation with myself.”įraming LGBTQ people as endangering children builds on the same playbook anti-gay crusaders used in the 1970s, said Don Haider-Markel, a University of Kansas political science professor. “That would be a bad show of faith if my own kids weren’t even there,” Michele said. But Michele said it's important to be visible. The protest campaign - as intended - is giving some parents pause about bringing their kids to a space where they could be harassed. But Angel Lauriano, who performs in drag as Honey Marie, weathered protesters and showed up anyway Monday - in long sleeves - to talk to kids about cats, dogs and their dreams in life. In Mahwah, New Jersey, a flyer disseminated online and left on doorsteps and in condo lobbies misrepresented a drag performer as a “known PORNOGRAPHER” who “normalizes PEDOPHILIA AND ABUSE OF CHILDREN.”ĭetractors called local government offices and the Mahwah Pride Coalition in attempts to shut down its storytime event, said Susan Steinberg, the nonprofit’s director. The event was interrupted by protesters who tried to film children and yelled at their parents, Michele said. “A lot of, you’re a groomer, stop grooming children, groomer, groomer, groomer, you’re a pedophile,” Michele said. ![]() It resulted in dozens of angry calls and messages, said Nikki Michele, executive director of the nonprofit LGBTQ+ Center Lake County, which ran the event. ![]() The same account shared a promotion for a “Kiddie Korner” at a Pride event in Waukegan, Illinois, that was to include a drag storyteller and dress-up bin. The library event was mentioned on a right-wing Twitter account that, along with other social accounts, has framed drag queens as abusive, depraved “groomers,” Chadwick said. ![]() The Alameda County Library, which continues to receive threats, now plans to host a Pride event each month for the rest of the year, Chadwick said, and the sheriff’s office will provide security. The episode is being investigated as a hate crime. The kids were afraid of them, and the kids were there with their parents who had brought them to this event,” Chadwick said.Ī spokesperson for the county sheriff's office said the men, who identified themselves as members of the Proud Boys, are all residents of the Bay Area. “The horrible irony of it was they said over and over, ‘We’re here to protect the kids.’ And it was the kids they were terrifying. Last weekend, as the library hosted its second such event, at least five men - one of them wearing a T-shirt showing a rifle and the words “Kill Your Local Pedophile” - walked in and began hurling insults at Panda Dulce as she read to children and their parents, Chadwick said. When the library in San Lorenzo, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) southeast of San Francisco, held its first Drag Queen Story Hour four years ago, people prayed across the street in protest, said Alameda County librarian Cindy Chadwick.
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