SAN FRANCISCO — Protesters pray outside a library in New York City as Flame, a drag queen sporting a bright wig and a red gown, entertains the children inside by singing the ABCs, leading a coloring activity and reading books about how it’s OK to be different.
Outside Chicago, protesters harass parents attending storytime with their children and proclaim that the staff operating the event came “from the devil.”
And in a San Francisco suburb, men invade Panda Dulce’s reading at a library’s Drag Queen Story Hour, shouting homophobic and transphobic slurs.
After focusing on transgender athletes and youths, anti-LGBTQ rhetoric is now targeting drag storytimes - conceived as a way to educate and entertain children by appealing to their imaginations - with interruptions and other protests reported across the country in the past two weeks, since Pride Month began.