Public Schools Bring in Drag Queens To Teach Kindergartners About Gender Ideology
Today in “Your Tax Dollars at Work,” public school liberals are bringing in drag queens to read to children in order to teach them, um, something.
Most conservatives probably don’t have the Drag Queen Story Hour on their radar. But it’s a program in which said drag queens in full regalia read to your kids.
According to the Drag Queen Story Hour website, the program “captures the imagination and play of the gender fluidity of childhood and gives kids glamorous, positive, and unabashedly queer role models. In spaces like this, kids are able to see people who defy rigid gender restrictions and imagine a world where people can present as they wish, where dress up is real.”
Well, whatever. These events usually take place in a library or a book store. While the former is a taxpayer-funded institution, I generally can’t get myself worked up over Drag Queen Story Hour at either venue. After all, you have to bring your children there. I might fervently wish that any parents who wish to indoctrinate their children in this fashion would forever be cursed with brown avocados on their artisan toast, but that’s more or less where my caring ends.
Public schools, however, are a different matter entirely. Not only are schools funded by taxpayer dollars, but children are generally roped into such presentations without significant parental input.
And, in classrooms such as those of the Maurice Sendak Community School in Brooklyn, Drag Queen Story Hour is flourishing — at least, according to a video by Stop K-12 Indoctrination and the David Horowitz Freedom Center. After bringing in the program during the last school year, Sendak School first-grade teacher Alexis Hernandez is planning to bring it back when school resumes, according to The Daily Caller.
“Drag Queen Story Hour gave my first graders a fun and interactive platform to talk and think about social and emotional issues like acceptance, being yourself, and loving who you are,” Hernandez wrote.
“During our debrief … (students) were preaching the incredible lessons they had learned, like ‘it’s OK to be different,’ and ‘there’s no such thing as ‘boy’ and ‘girl’ things.’”
Yes, well, try that out on your kids and see how that works. I’ve spent enough time around children to know that if you give a boy a doll and a girl a toy car, in most cases the Barbie will be quickly launched from a slingshot onto your roof and the Hot Wheels will probably have dandelions sticking out of their die-cast wheel wells. But I digress.
It’s also unlikely that Drag Queen Story Hour is simply limited to the Maurice Sendak Community School, either. The program advertises itself as being for schools as well as libraries and book stores.
According to The Daily Caller, books include “Jacob’s New Dress” — about a kid named Jacob who wears a dress to school, so pretty much exactly what it sounds like — and “Red: A Crayon’s Story,” in which a red crayon gets itself successfully labeled blue. (It might be too much to suspect a political motivation behind turning “red” things “blue,” but just because you’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean everyone’s not out to get you.)
Consider that these were likely being read aloud at a school named after one of the greatest children’s book writers of all time, the man responsible for “Where the Wild Things Are.” I’m fairly certain that even Mr. Sendak — who was gay himself — would probably gag at the prospect of these didactic pieces of kiddy lit being pushed on children in hopes of teaching them a Valuable Lesson.
Speaking of LGBT individuals, weren’t we supposed to be looking at drag queens with some circumspection? After all, they’ve been banned from one major pride event in Glasgow, Scotland, according to The Daily Wire, because transgender and non-binary people would be “uncomfortable with having drag performances at the event.”
“It was felt by the group within the Trans/Non Binary Caucus that some drag performance, particularly cis drag, hinges on the social view of gender and making it into a joke, however transgender individuals do not feel as though their gender identity is a joke,” a statement from Free Pride Glasgow read, according to Pink News.
“This can be particularly difficult for those who are not out and still present as the gender they were assigned at birth. While it was discussed whether we could have trans drag acts perform, it was agreed that as it would not be appropriate to ask any prospective drag acts whether or not they identified as trans.
“It was therefore decided that having no drag acts perform would be the best option as it would mean no-one would feel pressured to out themselves.”
And if it’s good enough for Scotland, shouldn’t it be good enough for all of us? After all, these are adults who are feeling “pressured to out themselves.” These drag performers have privilege these poor youngsters don’t have, having perhaps never even considered whether or not they believe they are “the gender they were assigned at birth.”
As previously stated, if you want to keep this in a library or private bookstore, fine. Even if my tax dollars are being used for indoctrination as they would be in the case of the library, as long as there’s choice involved I can’t work myself into too much of a tizzy.
However, the fact that this is being done in school — where it likely isn’t voluntary and put before children who aren’t fully informed about the social, political and religious forces at play in this debate — is beyond inappropriate.
But something-something-something gender fluidity, yadda-yadda-yadda defying rigid gender restrictions, etc. etc., and therefore, love Trumps hate. Wonderful.
Meanwhile, good luck trying to bring a Christian pastor into a public school for story time. That kind of indoctrination isn’t viewed with such unequivocal warmth, for whatever reason.
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