Drag Queen Story Hour: Gone too far?

On April 1st, 2023, a law takes effect in Tennessee which controversially affects the transgendered community. That which was enumerated as House Bill 9 would criminalize drag performances in public places or anywhere within view of minors. Opponents are denouncing the legislation as illegalizing “being trans in public,” but effectively what we are witnessing in Tennessee is pushback against a concerted marketing campaign.

Fifty-three years ago the first Pride March was organized in New York City, which began a marketing campaign to induce mainstream society to accept homosexuality. Little by little, the marketing continued, with gay characters showing up in mainstream film and television. Sometimes unflatteringly, but gradually less so. This marketing campaign’s success is measured by the plain fact that most of the Western world now accepts homosexuality as being no bar to gainful employment, adoption and the like. There are instances of some people in some places who are less comfortable with it, but every marketer realizes that you never get everyone to accept a given concept.

The newer frontier on the continuum is transgenderism, defined as “possession of a gender identity incongruent with the sex assigned at birth.” This orientation often, though not always, manifests as persons donning drag and otherwise presenting themselves as belonging to a gender other than that in which they were born. As it is a more complicated concept than mere homosexuality, it has needed a more intensive marketing campaign. Thus events like Drag Queen Story Hour organized in libraries around the country, presenting transgendered individuals to children in seemingly harmless contexts which add perceived valued to that demographic (as kids always like to be read stories). More recently, these encounters have morphed into transgendered individuals performing burlesque or otherwise adult-oriented entertainment for kids, and often in schools or those institutions to which parents send their children under the presumption that said institutions will provide a wholesome environment for the children.

As would and should be expected, such aggressive marketing tactics have severely backfired, and the public is pushing back hard against the transgendered Agenda. Tennessee’s House Bill 9 joins a slew of legislation in states throughout the union which condemns what is perceived as attempts to sexualize children. Critics of the statute say that it will criminalize public expressions of transgenderism. We will have to wait for data about enforcement, but on the face of it, the statute only seeks to prevent overtly sexual performances – including those involving drag – directed at minors.

Let the final words on this matter be the following. If donning drag in private or public is an expression of who you are, then bless you for being admirably true to yourself. If, however, your orientation compels you to share your sexuality with minors… then that’s a very different pathology