There’s no such thing as a family-friendly drag queen nightclub show for kids
Parenting is a challenge, but there’s a reason adults are better suited for the job than children: They’re supposed to have judgment about what’s appropriate for kids.
In Dallas over the weekend, the gay night club Mr. Misster hosted an event called, “Drag your kid to Pride,” a “family-friendly” drag queen show. WFAA-TV (Channel 8) reported: “Drag performers danced and walked down the aisle in the center of the room. At times, the dancers would take dollar bills from some children.”
The night club is obviously intended for adults. Drag queens danced in front of a neon sign in the club that reads, “It’s not going to lick itself.” Protesters gathered outside the event.
Hold up. Why is there a drag queen event for children at an adult night club? Calling a drag queen event at a nightclub family friendly is like a winery holding a tasting for kids with wine in juice boxes.
There’s no way to clean this up for kids, even if it’s less sexual than normal — and letting kids hand out dollar bills to the dancers put an end to the idea that such a thing could be family friendly.
Drag queens are an adult expression of queer communities. Combined with a nightclub, a show featuring drag queens highlights sexuality in a way that is so grossly inappropriate for kids, it’s stunning.
This is not isolated to just Dallas. In Indiana, a drag queen high school student took home the crown as prom king in May. A 10-year-old Canadian boy was photographed in drag with an adult drag queen who was almost entirely naked for a London-based magazine.
“Desmond is Amazing” is the stage name of a boy named Desmond Napoles who’s been donning drag since he was as young as 10. He’s often shown performing with drag queens and has danced for grown adults while men hand him dollar bills.
The crude, overt effort to introduce young children to sexualized activities like this is immoral and raises a vital question: Who’s responsible?
Of course, nightclub venues and the drag queens themselves are responsible for advertising this material and purposely targeting kids. That crosses a moral line that everyone seemed to have had just 10 years ago.
Still, the 10-year olds had to be taken to Mr. Misster’s with dollars in their hand, ready to celebrate drag queens soliciting money for “fun.” Parents encouraged their participation.
I’m a huge advocate of parental rights and parental authority. But even if parents wanted to teach their children to be accepting, loving, and open to Pride month and the LGBT community, it’s not clear how a nightclub blurring the lines between strip dancing and sexuality toward kids who can read “It won’t lick itself” on the wall accomplishes this.
State House Rep. Bryan Slaton, R–Mineola, said he’d pursue legislation to make taking kids to drag shows illegal.
“The events of this past weekend were horrifying and show a disturbing trend in which perverted adults are obsessed with sexualizing young children, Slaton said in a written statement. “Protecting our own children isn’t enough, and our responsibility as lawmakers extends to the sexualization that is happening across Texas.”
This is disturbing, and kids must be protected. But the recent Republican reflex to legislate every single thing they don’t like will backfire. What will Democrats legislate when they’re in power? Government overreach happens on both sides of the aisle.
The best way to extinguish these kinds of events is to do what people did this weekend: They made noise. Government is not the first resource for cultural issues, but it is a last resort to a culture in decline.
If parents stop taking their kids to drag queen events, there won’t be anyone in attendance. If nobody goes, maybe they’ll stop hosting them. If neither of those work, that’s when calls for legislation should occur.
This story was originally published June 7, 2022 at 5:01 AM.
