City council brands drag queen story hour branded ‘vulgar’

Michigan’s City Council has voted to cut drag queen story time from the Pride Festival’s lineup.

The Madison Heights City Council called a special meeting on June 1 to discuss whether it would be appropriate to hold a drag queen storytime event at a local park. According to WXYZat the meeting, some city council members called the event “vulgar” and “overtly sexual.”

This storytime was originally scheduled to be part of the lineup for the town’s Arts and Pride Festival, which will be held at Civic Center Park on June 7th. The council ultimately voted 4-3 to cancel the event.

Jennifer Nagle, a member of the Madison Heights Arts Commission and Arts and Pride Planning Committee, said the committee has been planning the festival for five months.

She also shared that the drag performers booked were carefully vetted and no one on the council had raised any concerns about them prior to the event.

Mr Nagle said all elements had been approved in advance, including the books the queens were scheduled to read and the costumes they were expected to wear, which featured dresses highlighting autism awareness.

“This year was the first time we had a budget to book drag performers, and it was clearly too much for some people,” she said.

The drag performer in question is Jadyn Black, a K-12 teacher who often performs at family reading events like Story Hour.

Following the news, Black took to Instagram to try to find a new venue to help Madison Heights kids celebrate Pride this year.

“Let me be clear: Drag performers are not groomers,” Black said. I wrote. “We are educators, neighbors, friends, community members, and human beings. We show up to create spaces where children can learn about kindness, literacy, inclusion, and self-expression.”

“I feel like drag is my armor,” Black told WXYZ of the last-minute cancellation. “And I feel like all these people don’t really understand or have even experienced me or other drag queens. So it hurt a lot.”

Ray Stroff, a Pride festival volunteer, told the outlet he was trying to fight back against claims that it was inappropriate to host a drag queen story hour.

“For me, this is no different than having a magician come in and do one-sided performances for children and adults,” Stroff said.

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