February 27, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) – Last fall, writer and long-time gay “rights” activist Andrew Sullivan weighed in on the intramural conservative civil war over Drag Queen Story Hour, mocking the idea that drag queens were in any way a sexual phenomenon. Drag queens, he asserted, were rather like clowns, and thus having them come to public libraries and read to children is much the same as having any other costumed performer do the same. Anyone claiming that there is something sexual about drag queens, he concluded, was engaging in ignorant hysteria.
I’ve thought about Sullivan’s take fairly often as the Drag Queen Story Hour phenomenon spreads across North America (and elsewhere—in Ireland, parents were outraged to discover that a drag troupe called “Glitter Hole” specializing in sexually explicit performances was scheduled to read to children). I wonder what he’d think of a recent story in the Daily Star noting widespread backlash to the decision of Glencoates Primary School in Scotland to bring in a drag queen called “Flowjob” (introduced to the children as “Flow”) with a history of explicit sexual content on social media.
As any adult knows (or should know), one of the first things children and teens do after encountering someone is to look them up on social media. And if any of them decided to look up Flowjob (his real name is Nathan Mullen), who read a story to kids between the ages of four and five, they would have found photographs of him “simulating a sex act with a dildo, laying spread eagle in bathtub with a ball in [his] mouth, and simulating oral sex.” He also tweeted a photo of a man being throttled by another man with the caption: “I need a Daddy like this.”
The drag queen was brought in to teach children for “LGBT History Month,” but even parents who are generally supportive of the LGBT movement were furious at the school, calling the visit “outrageous,” “disgusting,” and “inappropriate.” One noted that parents had not been given any information about the visit, stating, “I’m happy my child is learning about LGBT but it’s overtaking the school now. Something every week…my 7 year old doesn’t need to know what a drag queen is and certainly not the one they had in.”
Others noted that a quick search for the drag performer, who is “a regular in [the] Glasgow LGBTQ+ adult entertainment scene” and visited the primary school alongside SNP MP and LGBT activist Mhari Black, would return a wide range of graphic and sexual images. Women and children’s rights groups also complained, with one demanding to know why a male who “dresses as a sexualised parody of a woman [and] goes by the name ‘Flowjob’” would be considered an appropriate “role model for primary-aged children.”
Predictably, a number of LGBT activists came out to defend Flowjob, and in no time flat they were accusing the concerned parents of being reactionary homophobes who didn’t understand how privileged their children were to be exposed to an “inspiring” drag queen and bemoaning the “homophobia, biphobia, and transphobia” directed at the school. LGBT Youth Scotland sent out a tweet of support, as well: “We're horrified to see the abusive messages and tweets targeting Glencoates Primary School for their bold and brilliant LGBT inclusive education practices. We are proud to work with their pioneering headteacher, and recognise the school as an example to others across the country.”
MP Mhari Black is also pushing back against criticism, saying that, “If my school had invited a gay MP and a drag queen to visit during LGBT History Month, or even acknowledged that LGBT History Month existed, it would have made an immeasurable difference to the difficult childhoods my LGBT classmates and I had.” She went on to tell those who disapproved that their “homophobia is transparent” and that the “Simpsons has been mocking your ‘won’t you think of the children!’ faux sincerity since the 90s. I don’t know why you think repackaging it now isn’t completely transparent.”
The headteacher also dismissed parental concerns by stating that her school’s “Rainbow squad,” an LGBT group made up of students, had done a magnificent job inviting various LGBT community members to speak to the students, and that their “number one priority was to fly the rainbow pride flag outside our school.” In short, if any parent has an issue with children being read to by drag queens and inculcated with the ideology of the LGBT movement, they can shut up and keep their bigotry to themselves. One wonders what they would have to say to Jewish leaders in the UK, who recently announced they would defy any government demand to teach LGBT programming in their schools.
The reason stories like this remind me of Andrew Sullivan’s take is because Sullivan is generally open to the concerns of Christians on issues like religious liberty. But on this issue, Sullivan and many others imply that anyone with concerns is engaging in hand wringing. They don’t understand why parents would not want cross-dressing caricatures of women to read to their children, and why Glitter Hole and Flowjob should stick to their cabarets and stay out of primary schools. And that is a sign of just how far we’ve traveled, and just how normal the idea of introducing these things to children has become.
Jonathon’s new podcast, The Van Maren Show, is dedicated to telling the stories of the pro-life and pro-family movement. In his latest episode, he interviews Norwegian pro-family activist Björn Korf, a Christian radio broadcaster who lives in Austria. Korf helps run Step Up 4 Children’s Rights, an organization dedicated to stopping what is essentially state-sponsored kidnapping in Europe. The Norwegian government, through its child welfare services called Barnevernet, takes four to five children away from their parents every day. Sometimes children’s names are changed so parents cannot find them. Once, a breastfed three-month-old was taken from parents along with older siblings – all because the older kids had been singing Christian songs at school.
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