• 3 days ago
"This is an attempt to erase drag in Tennessee."

On April 1, Tennessee will become the first state to enforce restrictions on drag performances. Here's what Bella DuBalle, a local drag queen, had to say about the law ...
Transcript
00:00On April 1st, public drag will now be criminalized.
00:04This is an attempt to erase drag in Tennessee.
00:08Tennessee has just become the first state to pass a bill restricting drag performances.
00:14On March 2nd, Governor Bill Lee signed a law
00:17which makes a person who engages in an adult cabaret performance on public property
00:22or where it can be viewed by minors a criminal offense.
00:26The law also states that those performances include male or female impersonators
00:31aka drag queens and drag kings.
00:34There's this idea that if you expose a child to a drag queen
00:39suddenly they're going to become queer.
00:42It's not vampirism. We cannot turn kids queer.
00:45We're not trying to turn anyone.
00:47We just want the queer kids to survive.
00:50Bella Duval is a Memphis-based drag queen.
00:53This is how she says the law will affect her when it comes into effect on April 1st.
00:58This bill seeks to state that all drag artists are indeed adult cabaret performers.
01:04Drag is just like any other art.
01:07There is comedy that is appropriate for children and there is comedy that is not.
01:11This is true of music and film and every other media.
01:16Just because a movie theater shows G-rated films and also R-rated films
01:21doesn't say that the kids can't go to the theater at all.
01:24We've had public drag performances here in Tennessee for over 50 years
01:28and these kind of performances that we're talking about would be anything in the public eye
01:32which includes our annual pride parade and festival.
01:35It would include the drag queen story times that the library asks me to come lead.
01:39The Tennessee law comes as Republicans across a dozen states are pushing for similar bills.
01:45For me, the religious right is always looking for a boogeyman.
01:50When this law was proposed, I asked the governor to provide any evidence
01:56of a child ever being harmed or abused at a drag show and he could produce none.
02:01It's because no such evidence exists. Kids haven't been harmed at drag shows.
02:06Conversely, here in Tennessee, we have 700 Southern Baptist ministers on the registered sex offender list
02:13and we don't make any attempt to regulate whether or not parents can take their kids to church.
02:18All we ask is that people continue to uphold parents' rights to decide what's appropriate for their kids.
02:23For Bellage Bell, drag story hours and all-ages brunch drag performances
02:28also act as a safe space for the younger queer community.
02:32This argument about protecting the kids, to me, discounts the existence of queer children.
02:39Growing up as a gay kid, I knew I was different from a very young age
02:44and it would have done me a lot of good to have been able to see representation in my world
02:49that said that there was a place for me.
02:51Also, a lot of their parents do not have a lot of knowledge of the trans experience or the queer community
02:57and they come to us seeking.
02:59They look to older trans elders and they're like,
03:02do you have a doctor that you trust? Do you have a therapist that you would recommend?
03:06I'm just trying to learn how to love my kid right, but I don't know anything about this.
03:10If I go into a space and read a story to a child that is going to grow up queer,
03:16that child sees a future.
03:19If I read a story to a kid that is straight and is never going to be queer,
03:24the worst that can happen is that it exposes them to the idea that the world is full of different people
03:30and not everyone is just like you and you have to learn to get along with them.
03:34On the same day the law restricting drag performances was signed,
03:38Governor Bill Lee also signed a law that imposes a total ban on gender affirming healthcare for transgender children.
03:45I've had a lot of people suggest, they're like, just move, just move.
03:49And there are a couple of problems with that.
03:52First off, there are similar legislations on the books in 18 other states.
03:58This is not a Tennessee issue, it's spreading across the nation.
04:02So the number of spaces that would be safe for me is dwindling.
04:07Not only that, if I go, who will fight for the future queer kids that have to grow up here?
04:15The law received further backlash as a newly unearthed photo of Governor Bill Lee emerged
04:20showing him in 1977 dressed in a girl's cheerleading uniform.
04:25Do you remember dressing in drag in 1977, Governor?
04:28What a ridiculous, ridiculous question that is.
04:31Do you remember it?
04:32Conflating something like that to sexualized entertainment in front of children, which is a very serious subject.
04:40I agree with him that it's ridiculous. Those aren't the same thing.
04:44But he does not seem to agree that he signed into effect a law that makes no such distinctions.
04:50That law is so vague about what a male or female impersonator is.
04:54Does it apply to cosplayers? Does it apply to wrestlers?
04:58The ACLU has vowed to challenge the law if it is used to punish a drag performer
05:03or shut down a family-friendly LGBTQ event.
05:06However, expressing concern that the law could be used to censor people
05:11based on their own subjective viewpoints of what they deem appropriate.
05:15When I first heard that he had signed the law, I was very afraid, a lot of anger.
05:22But as soon as the law was signed, the cavalry started to show up.
05:26Very shortly thereafter, the White House press secretary made a very similar statement
05:30how the governor was concentrating on non-issues and passing legislation that was, quote,
05:36dangerous to the LGBTQ plus community.
05:39This is draconian legislation.
05:41This is running so far back in time and so against the idea of freedom and liberty.
05:47I don't understand how it became freedom of speech for those that agree with me.
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