BOB BARR: 'Drag Queens' Pushing America Into a Cultural Void

There was a time long ago in America’s civic institutions, where men and women who had accomplished great things for our country and for mankind, were studied by students of all ages — George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Jr., Albert Einstein, Marie Curie, Jonas Salk, and many other notables adorned classrooms and textbooks in schools across the country.

Now, in an increasing number of public schools children are presented with a far different role model. The age of the Drag Queen has arrived.

This loony phenomenon, presented as lessons in “diversity” and “acceptance,” has even found its way into churches, and not just fringe religious sects, but mainstream denominations – Lutheran, Methodist, Catholic, and Episcopal — presented not only as lewd sideshows, but as official religious services. The United Methodist Church, for example, has accepted as a candidate for full pastoral ordination, a “Drag Queen Pastor” who proclaims himself a “dragavangelist” and laces his sermons with profanity and gibberish about “divine queerness.”

It might be argued in defense of such activities that if adults wish to attend religious services extolling men dressed as women who prance down the aisle like court jesters, they are free to do so, as long as attendance is voluntary. Disturbingly, this lunacy goes beyond consensual adult activity, as with a Lutheran Church in Chicago recently hosting a “Drag Queen Prayer Time” for children during its Sunday service.

As frequently happens with contemporary cultural phenomena, they tend to bleed across national boundaries, and churches in Canada reportedly are witnessing the same “Drag Queen Evangelism” infecting the U.S. Such expansive reach is made easy through social media, including the Chinese-controlled Tik Tok platform, which recently carried a video of an Episcopal church school event featuring a “Drag Queen Activist” in New York City.

Even in “red” states such as Texas, drag queen religious programs are being featured, including some being packaged with Critical Race Theory and lectures on the evils of “whiteness.”

More troubling than churches encouraging Drag Queen Evangelism, however, are Drag Queen activities paid for by taxpayers in public schools, which are by their very nature, not voluntary institutions.

In New York, non-profits have tapped into the drag queen movement in public schools. One report notes that in June 2022 alone, “Drag Story Hour NYC,” took in $46,000 for drag performances in the City’s schools, libraries, and “street festivals.” This apparently is not something new in the Big Apple, which reportedly has wasted more than $200,000 in taxpayer money on just this one drag-oriented non-profit since 2018.

Not to be outdone by New York, schools in California are muscling in on the drag queen education craze, with one middle school presenting a show featuring a drag queen named “Nicole Jizz.” When criticized, the school principal merely offered a weak apology for the lewd name of the “queen,” but not for featuring the performance itself.

Indeed, rather than condemning such activities, especially those involving the use of taxpayer funds for these types of programs in public schools, some top public officials are praising them. This was the case in June, when Michigan’s Attorney General, Dana Nessel, said publicly at a civil rights conference that “drag queens make everything better” in schools.

In some cases, as with Michigan’s attorney general, support for drag queen programs appears to stem from officials who have been elected as openly gay, who then use their office to push their personal agenda on constituents.

It goes deeper.

Notwithstanding that drag performances by vaudevillians and early theatrical actors date to the late 19th Century, taking such fringe activities out of bars, movie houses, and private clubs, and forcing them into the public square, including churches and schools as “mainstream,” illustrates a disturbing trend that has taken hold in our society over the past three decades.

In this movement, every attribute or achievement formerly admired and emulated has been stripped of value in the name of “equity.” Valuing one accomplishment over another, or one person’s achievements over another’s, is considered inequitable and therefore condemnable. Thus, everyone is a winner and every action, no matter how bizarre or extreme, must be praised equally, if not prized over traditional measures of value.

In such a culture, positive achievement is no longer valued and, sadly, will become increasingly rare. This is the very dark cultural void into which we are headed.