Drag queens staging all-day show with ‘kids dance party’ in Wisconsin public park Saturday; protest planned

Drag queens are putting on an “all ages” show in a Wisconsin public park Saturday that features not only the usual raunchy burlesque and drag story hour but also a “kids dance party.”

“That’s a new one we’ve never heard before. We’re kind of really interested in seeing what they mean by that,” Rocky Rodriguez, Wisconsin chapter leader for Gays Against Groomers, tells The Lion regarding the drag dance party for kids.

“We’re used to seeing drag queen story time. We’re used to seeing kids at Pride events. That’s natural to see that now, with what we’re protesting. But the one thing that caught my eye was ‘drag-queen-and-kids dance party’.”

Gays Against Groomers has organized a protest against the daylong drag event hosted by the Watertown Unity Project at Riverside Park in Watertown. The organizations Parents on Patrol and No Left Turn in Education are joining in the peaceful protest.

The event lasts from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Drag story hour is at 10 while the “kids dance party” is at 10:30. Adult drag performances are at 11 and 4.

Alexandra Schweitzer of No Left Turn Wisconsin says protestors will be offering their own “classic” story hour, replete with a reading of Little Women “by real women.”

“I’ll be there in the morning,” she says, “because if the dance parties are like what I’ve seen before, these men dressed as women are grinding on children and shoving their genitals in their face. So I’ll be there to record all that.”

Schweitzer told an incredulous Lion writer that, indeed, social media are replete with videos of such lapdance-like acts by drag queens on children. “If you search Twitter, you see these men that are dressed up like women. They put the child on a chair, like it’s a bachelor party strip show, and they grind on the children.”

Rodriguez confirms the existence of the videos.

“I have plenty of them right now on my phone, actually,” he says. “Yes, it’s all you see on Twitter, on Instagram, on Facebook, on YouTube.”

One video made international news when a drag performer at Adventure Island family theme park in England made thrusting motions toward his crotch with a phallic-shaped power tool, setting off sparks from a metal plate on his loins. The performer, a veteran of famous queen RuPaul’s Drag Race, swayed to the graphic and pornographic song Filthy/Gorgeous by American band Scissor Sisters – which is, itself, named for a lesbian sex act.

The park’s horrified owner apologized profusely and banned future Pride events.

“All of the footage, all the videos online that we’ve seen recently from these Pride events this last year are very over-sexualized, very adult-themed,” Rodriguez says. “There should be no children at these events; it’s not a safe one for them. They’re being exposed to a bunch of sexualized acts and things that are going on around them they have no comprehension of what is actually going on. 

“And to sit there and have to explain that to a child – I don’t think any parent should have to do that. But the bigger issue is the parents that are bringing their children to these events.”

Schweitzer agrees wholeheartedly.

“I do not believe that a child should be subjected to (anything) sexual – I don’t care if you call it deviance, education, I don’t care what it is. I don’t think that a child needs to know any of this. I think that a child’s right is to an unencumbered childhood, and the decisions need to be left to the parents. 

“And they’re presenting this in a way that seems harmless and seems like fun. They’re having story hour. They’re having a dance party. But these are men driven by an agenda of wanting to recruit children. And it just doesn’t need to be.”

What’s the goal of the protest?

“Our purpose is to actually educate (parents) and let them know, ‘Hey, you’re doing this because you want to be inclusive and want to show love to different groups,” Rodriguez explains. “But what you’re actually doing is allowing your child to be in a situation where they shouldn’t be, and being exposed to certain scenarios no child under the age of 18 should be exposed to, to be honest.

“We don’t really care what you want to do as an adult, like drag shows and the whole LGBT community and their events – that is, very adult and very sexualized events. No child should be there. Our goal ultimately is to make these events child-free, and in the process educate parents on why you shouldn’t bring your children to events like this.”

Schweitzer said she’s seen the new movie Oppenheimer, about the development of the atomic bomb. She said at least parents are warned about adult content in the film, including a sex scene.

“They made that an R rated movie,” she says. “Yet here the Watertown Unity Project wants to have grown men dressed up like women dancing and gyrating in front of toddlers. So, on the one hand, they’re telling us it’s an R-rated movie to have this woman be topless in this gratuitous nude scene, but these men dressed as women can do this.

“There’s no continuity there. And we’ve gotten to a point where we’re trying to dumb down sexualizing our children and make it OK.”

“The goal,” Rodriguez says, “is to not have children at Pride. It’s honestly no place for them. I mean, there’s alcohol, and performances are very sexualized – people that are basically nude and just covered up with paint and pasties.

“Ultimately the whole purpose for Pride events was to fight for our rights and to have equal rights and be able to not get fired for being gay, to be able to buy a house, to be able to see a partner in the hospital if they’re sick. We have all our rights now. There’s nothing left to fight for. So we should have packed up and been gone a long time ago.”

Rodriguez, noting the tragic case of an 18-year-old young man who died trying to have a vagina surgically created on him, warns of “radical trans activists and the whole mission on trans and kids.

“The kids get introduced to stuff like this and they start thinking. And when they get a little bit older and they start going through hormones, every teenager, every child, feels awkward in their body, and then these people are catching them and telling them, ‘Oh, you feel weird because you’re not the same sex. You’re opposite of what you are.’ And they’re leading these kids down a road where one wrong turn can ultimately lead you to life-altering decisions. 

“And it could lead you to death too. …

“It’s just so widespread, and it’s gotten so crazy within the last couple of years that if we don’t get a rein on it, who can tell what’s going to happen next?”