Elementary Schools Using Drag Queens to Teach Kids about Gender

Some teachers and schools have utilized a program called “Drag Queen Story Hour” to teach children about gender identity.

Videographer Sean Fitzgerald and the David Horowitz Freedom Center released a video explaining the program and highlighting testimonials on the program’s website from teachers in public schools. Fitzgerald drew attention to this issue, not because of the existence of the program, but because public schools have used it to teach children about gender issues at a tender age.

On its website, the Drag Queen Story Hour describes itself as, “drag queens reading stories to children in libraries, schools, and bookstores. DQSH captures the imagination and play of the gender fluidity of childhood and gives kids glamorous, positive, and unabashedly queer role models. In spaces like this, kids are able to see people who defy rigid gender restrictions and imagine a world where people can present as they wish, where dress up is real.”

The New York Times described one of the events, hosted by a branch of the New York Public Library, in 2017.  A six-foot-tall performer named “Harmonica Sunbeam,“ wearing a neon camouflage bodysuit and a purple tutu read to the children. She read “from ‘Morris Micklewhite and the Tangerine Dress’ by Christine Baldacchino. The book is about a boy who wore a beloved dress to school every day. At one point, Morris’s friends inform him that he isn’t allowed to play on their imaginary spaceship, because ‘astronauts can’t wear dresses.’”