Episode Transcript
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Music.
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Welcome to the Gays Against Groomers presentation of The Dark Side of the Rainbow. I'm Robert Wallace.
This program is dedicated to showing the ugly side of the community's efforts
to come for the children, to indoctrinate the children,
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to sexualize the children in the name of equality, and yes, to mutilate or medicalize
children children under the guise of LGBTQIA plus inclusiveness.
We see that with the queer theory that's moving into schools all over the place.
We see that with the trans ideology that is being popularized.
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One of the other issues that we have, though, seems a lot less serious than
that, and that's the drag queens.
But it's not. It's not a lesser issue. Yes, indoctrinating kids in school and
showing them pornography, whether it be straight or gay pornography, it's all wrong.
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Yes, encouraging kids to begin puberty blockers and hormone replacement therapies
and gender reassignment surgeries.
Yes, this is a very pressing problematic issue in society also.
But one of the cultural issues that we're having right And this may fall under
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a type of indoctrination is the normalization of drag.
Now, if you were a child, all right,
and you were in an environment where we had a drag queen in front of you,
this would be a performer that at that age, at such a young age,
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we wouldn't even know really understand what is what that is.
We hear the words drag queen, but what is drag and why are they queens and what
are they queens of and why are they doing what they're doing?
Why are they undulating on the stage?
Why are they pumping the stage?
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And that is something that actually is happening wherever family-friendly drag shows are happening.
Of course, and hopefully it's not happening as much at those family-friendly
drag shows, yet we still find it is.
And how can we blame the people?
How can we blame the drag stars who are doing this?
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Because they are, after all, drag queens, and this is their nature.
What do I mean by this is their nature? Well, if you ask me,
a drag queen is really a sexual clown.
And I state that in the nicest possible way because...
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It's so. I think it is so. I think it's objectively so.
The nature of these caricaturizations of a woman, or in the case of drag kings,
of men, that certain female performers might try to represent themselves as male and vice versa.
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There is very much an adult sexual culture that's coming through with their
behavior. We even have kids who are moving into drag.
You can go online and find kids performing at drag shows,
not just being a spectator, but performing with the approval of adults who are
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cheering them on, doing the splits,
doing all the things, and getting the applause.
I don't even think that the kids could begin to process the sexuality behind
the dance moves that they're imitating.
Until you hit puberty or you enter into a phase where you can even process things
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like that, behavior like that may seem innocent and fun and at play.
But for those whose sexual fetishes and lustful glances are never satisfied,
certain content like this could be found to be exciting, arousing.
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This is the problem with bringing kids into sexualized environments,
doing sexualized behaviors in front of adults who practice and praise such sexualized activities.
Activities as you enter into the dark side of the rainbow you enter into a gray area where certain.
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Unscrupulous actors and situations may occur and we want to prevent that a lot
of times and this is the nature of grooming right is you prepare somebody you
you make them believe that a little little bit further, a little bit further.
This is okay. You're safe. You can do this with me.
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I'm, you know, in getting these environments around these types of people.
And I'm not saying that kids are going into, you know, gay nightclubs and taking
up residency there and hanging out behind the scenes and, you know,
becoming these, you know.
You know, porn, drag, mini-me's, okay?
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But I am saying that the culture and to have that sort of leadership or mentorship
around you as a child with maybe a parent who's permissive of such activity
is definitely going to be an influence.
And you're probably thinking, And how is this going to be an influence if somebody
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just wants to do their little dance?
Well, be careful of the company you keep, okay?
Your life is going to be the average of your five closest friends.
What we have right now is a culture that is giving the drag queens an audience before children.
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And there are so many who don't see anything wrong with that.
And I want to go through just a couple points before we get into the interview
because, and I hope it's just kind of like you already know all the reasons.
You can originate the reasons. Nobody should really have to tell us the reasons
for keeping kids away from those environments.
And yet, we have bills that we have actual politicians,
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actual adults who are, you know, from the community who are standing against
provisions of safety, regulations to keep kids safe from these environments.
Requirements there is a number one
a perception among some that the gay
culture drag is gay culture and
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gay culture is drag in part and so then it's allowing all the common sense to
escape one's mind as to whether there's any inappropriateness that would not
be a fit for a a child, they move right over into,
okay, let's educate the next generation.
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Let's expose them to a more open experience,
a more closer arrangement with these factors that exist in the world,
will keep existing, and are going to be part of the future.
And hopefully they'll be part of that future. We're going to raise the next
generation of drag kids.
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That's kind of like like the mentality behind those people who support these provisions.
They think it's harmless. They think it's fun. They think it's educational.
They think it embraces equality, understanding, love, diversity.
Those are the noble qualities that they believe are to be found at a drag show for kids.
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The fact is, it's a very horrifying thing. I have to say, from personal experience.
Having been exposed to sexualized adults in various activities.
You can't help it. You're a child.
You end up one day you're here. One day somehow you end up in a bar for two seconds.
You end up in this environment with the parents. And there's other unscrupulous
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adults or people doing their thing.
Or maybe it's stuff that you're exposed to online. line
and you see things that are weird and uncomfortable
and kind of nasty they're filthy you feel
dirty just for having seen it this is
the corruption of the soul this is how someone loses
their innocence and so to say
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that a kid going to a pride event or
a drag show and being exposed to this is
good for them it it completely overlooks the
sullying of their pure white
essence of bright white light that comes
with a new a child and you
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start to just attach all these corruptions on there
things that belong in a nightclub things that belong in your
you know fetish group that belong
in bathhouse that belong in you
know adult entertainment that belong in sleazy music
videos that belong you know there's no virtue in pride pride is not a virtue
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it's the opposite and furthermore as gaze against the groomers will remind us.
Pride and what it has become is nothing there to be proud of you know gay pride and who you know,
gay pride i see nothing i see that i see vendors okay i
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see the stripper pole i see a stage with certain
musical artists of you know varying
levels of you know morality and
stuff and of course we don't all have to have the same idea of morality
to understand that some things are just adult themed and
kids should not be troubled with them but then again nowadays
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the line's been blurred we have all kinds
of innuendo and sexually perverse
products and and you know things like that
but then you also have the people right you got the everyday person who comes
in there and so many people come to pride in order to show their pride for their
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particular fetish and in In that we see people dressed in wild and crazy ways,
half-dressed, maybe in some areas undressed.
And also we see the star of the hour in certain instances, you see the drag queens.
These are the performers, the people who put themselves into full-on production,
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female impersonation, or male impersonation in the case of those drag kings.
The drag queens is drag kings.
And then you also have, on top of all of that, the dancing, the performance
that goes with it, the words that come out of their mouth, the innuendo and
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the hand gestures and the on and on and on.
And it's all very sexualized and you can't get away from it.
And then you got some people say we can create a track friendly environment for kids.
I can strip on my huge double D's and I could do the splits in front of little Johnny.
And it's all cool because, you know, he's hanging out with his mother and,
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you know, she's got boobs. You know, I've seen him before.
Or maybe he's thinking, oh, these kids, they don't know nothing of sexuality.
Sexuality so they're not going to that's not
going to mean anything to them and in that way we'll do
it right under their nose and it's all innocent fun and
i really don't think this is any better it's any better to watch a movie
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designed for kids that has adult innuendo snuck
in for the entertainment of the
adults watching what you're doing is painting
the environment the language of
the child you're normalizing these things
early on receding into their mind
these perversions and i
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don't think the end result is all that
innocent as a matter of fact this type of music the type of dancing that type
of behavior it's all about losing one's innocence there's many songs about that
you know like that's the end goal it's like how devious can we be how stinky
dinky can we be? How low can you go?
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Can you rock it? Can you shake it? Are you going to love me all night long?
And if we don't pay attention to the use of language, the subversion of language,
these little insinuations and these things, we're not going to understand how.
Perverted ideas can enter into the mind of a young person and then lead them astray.
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And here he is that perhaps if they were raised a right and upright and disciplined
and, you know, behaving correctly and, you know, wholesome, a wholesome upbringing,
you know, as an adult, they could look at that and say, ah, I'm repulsed by that. That's not me.
I don't want to be around that. Or perhaps, uh, that's funny that they're doing
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that over there, but you know, I'm going to maintain my dignity over here.
We're tearing down those dividers so early that the kids are not going to have
much of a chance as adults at trying to maintain any kind of,
quote unquote, wholesomeness. And don't get me wrong.
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I would love if the whole world was just so heavenly and everybody was just
so perfect and beautiful inside and out and we were all little saints and everything,
doing the right thing. and wholesome.
That's not the world we live in. And I get that.
But it's one thing to raise a kid up as one would five years ago in this environment
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where they're naturally going to be exposed,
thanks to the media, thanks to the internet, to all kinds of themes at a young age.
And then it's another thing to actively allow them to participate,
to bring them in as audience audience or to
in any way create a entertainment venue
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or whatever for kids where that
the drag show okay is the product is the end result this is what they're going
for okay it's not that it's they've seen it on the peripheries of their living
it's that you've come here so i can show you this and that's very direct.
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I think it's important to note that a lot of these events that people are so
up in arms about with drag queens and so-called family-friendly events or drag
shows where people under 18 can get in,
I don't think that most of the time, maybe necessarily at all,
they are purposely, these drag queens are purposely...
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Seeking audience with a child to do
this thing there are absolutely cases of that we
see shows where there are only children audiences we
have drag queen story hour for instance i mean we've
got toddlers in there i mean drag queen that is the end goal but a lot of times
we have events where we have performers and they're for adults but hey we're
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just loosey-goosey about it kids kids can come in or maybe they promoted a little
bit to the kids of some sort of like lgbt lgbtq,
event after school thing they could do at the end of the day this isn't an attack
on drag queens okay so then attack
on the gay culture and if there's one thing that i wish i could just.
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Overemphasize a little bit that i could even tattoo
across my forehead for those who are looking me
in the eye when i'm saying these things disbelieving my
motives that simply read it's about
dragging the kids into the situation but so
they could realize the crux of what
we're talking about here it isn't about you're
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a bad gay you need to change you gays
are bad people i don't like what you do in your nightclubs your
existence is invalid it's not it's not
about any of that if we would stop overlooking the
obvious point which is just to keep children
out of adult environment situations and i feel so silly to have to say it because
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it used to be for those old timers and by old timer i mean anybody who's like
older than five years old okay it used to be that it was unthinkable inappropriate
to have a kid at a drag show.
There's a time when that was so rare and unheard of.
It would have been awkward or weird to kind of tell that story,
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I imagine, or to see it happening.
But now, not only is it happening, it's happening with pride,
it's happening more often and with purpose, but it's become normalized in many
areas for many people in many different parts of the country and their communities.
So with that said, we need to address things legislatively,
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and we're able to do that when we work with our congresspeople and with our
legislators and within our local, state,
and federal governments in order to create and enforce policies and laws which
protect the innocence and the interests of these innocent ones.
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Ones the children and we
look through a lens of common sense not being manipulated by the emotional arguments
of certain activists who say that anybody who's against a drag show that's kid-friendly
has got to be homophobic or transphobic or this that and the other,
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that's the kind of argument we're getting from people who probably have their own.
Loosey-goosey attitudes, well, probably, I mean, that is the loosey-goosey-est
attitude I can think of almost, is to be okay with that.
Maybe like, you know, you're a straight person, you're kids,
you want them to be cool with the gays, you want to be cool with the gays,
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you want to show that you're not homophobe, transphobe, you know,
whatever kind of person that you're against, and you want to show that love is love.
And we're going to make a point out of that by just.
Now, even, even kids who are going to grow up like normal people and love and
respect and people who are all different cultures, they can do that without going to drag shows.
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These kids need to, you know, give her like as the, as the twig is bent. So is the branch.
Okay. In the formative years, in the first years, it matters what you put in front of a kid.
They can process everything that comes after that in later life if they've been
given a strong foundation to think of things correctly, to think wholesomely,
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to think correctly about things.
And from there, they'll be equipped to bring everything that comes to them in
life, process it, and bring it back to being centered, being true, being decent.
If the internal compass, if the core of our lives, which is installed during our formative years,
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is already twisted and tainted, it's going to be very difficult to go out into
the world and to do anything else but join in on the debauchery.
And that predisposition toward that type of behavior, it's not fair.
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It's not fair if it is something that was installed or influenced by activities
that occurred during childhood because of the negligence or the bad behavior,
whatever, of adults who should have been looking over these kids.
It's not it's not fair to them and they may never know what they could have
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been if they would have just been raised decent okay we're just going for decent
we're not going for perfect we're going for decent nowadays perfect's long gone
but we can still capture decency and we can do that by,
keeping the drag queens at bay we're about to have an interview you're about
to hear with Maisie Christensen.
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And she's a congresswoman for the state of Missouri, state congresswoman.
And I'm doing an interview here in just one minute, you're going to hear with
her and Chris Barrett, who's one of our chapter co-leads in Missouri.
And they will be discussing House Bill 1650.
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And that's what we're going to listen to right now. So I want you to listen
closely as you hear into the legislative process of trying to end this in one place right now.
Struggles are going through, and maybe there's something locally in your state
that you can do or some politician who's along these same lines who you can
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get involved with to get bills like this rolling.
So let's go into that now and enjoy the interview.
Music.
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So we have from Gays Against Groomers, our Missouri State Chapter of League
colleague, Chris Barrett.
And we also have Missouri State Representative Maisie Christensen.
And we are here talking about the Missouri House Bill 1650.
And this is a bill that would criminalize burlesque cabaret-type drag performances
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in front of children that occur inside businesses and establishments where children can see it.
So I want these guys to talk about it, to let everybody know what's happening.
And so with that, let's introduce Maisie. Do you mind if we start with Maisie, Chris?
No, sounds great. Yeah, Maisie. Hey, Maisie's the one who's,
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you know, really getting this going. I'm just helping her out.
Awesome. So how did you first come into this matter and start handling it?
Because I understand this isn't your first attempt to handle it. Yeah. So, yes.
So about, gosh, the first session. So last year it was me and another rep, Ben Baker.
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So this was kind of the same time as the Save Adolescents from Experimentation
Act. Act for people that don't know what that is.
That was passed last year in Missouri legislature.
And basically it put a sunset clause on four years of children not being able
to get gender reassignment surgeries, puberty blockers, and then be able to
get cross-sex hormones.
And so during that same time, Missouri actually had school, had a school,
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Columbia School District, that actually took their kids to a drag show.
And so the question really pertains, can kids consent to drag shows?
Can they consent to watching them?
And that's what kind of started this whole transition. And you kind of saw throughout
Missouri and it's only gotten worse.
You had the, it was like the winter drag show that came through Missouri.
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It was a whole deal was in Wentzville and that's over in St. Louis area.
And the mayor actually stepped in and said, hey, you guys actually need to have
a age restriction on this. Like kids should not be be allowed.
Because currently, and as Chris can definitely attest to, you kind of have seen
these shows where you're kind of looking around the room and you notice that
there's minors in the audience.
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I thought it was really interesting. And Chris sadly had to see all of this
when we had our hearing this year because the bill didn't pass last year.
It got out of committee, made it to rules, actually. It was voted out of rules.
And then it was the end of session.
We're hoping the bill currently has been passed out of committee,
and we're hoping it makes it to rules.
One of the questions that was stated by some of the performers that came and
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testified against my bill was, we don't dress provocatively.
We're not dressing sexy in front of people.
I actually had a minor reach out to me and said that they had been brought to this show.
They had no idea what it was, and that the performers were so sexual in nature.
They still talk about it. They're like, I still honestly can't comprehend. It was so interesting.
This is coming from someone that was 16 years old at the time.
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And the biggest question that we have is the law should be applied equally.
Strippers cannot be stripping in front of minors. So why somebody that dresses
as a female that's masqueraded as a man get the same exception?
And so that's where the heart of my bill has always been. I'm not trying to
ban someone from being able to do something.
I'm just trying to apply the law equally. And the law should be applied that
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way in the state of Missouri, because at the end of the day,
I'm always gonna be on the side of children, right?
If we want to protect children and doing something in the name of protecting
children, I'm always going to sleep better at night.
And I think it's always number one, better be on the cautious side of protecting
children than on the side of an adult.
And so that's really, I think where this bill has happened. You know,
it's been awesome getting to be friends with Chris over the last two years during this bill.
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And, you know, I think as we, as tell, as time goes on, I think it's only going to get worse.
And I, and Chris can definitely attest to that. And I hope that he can speak on Oh, yeah. Yeah.
So before the show, we were kind of discussing kind of a little bit of my history
dealing with this sort of topic.
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And last year, I was all over the state of Missouri trying to go to city councils
to work on a local level to get council members to make sure that these drag
shows for kids can't happen.
I got nowhere, really, with them.
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These local politicians just weren't willing to, I guess, become a part of the
so-called culture wars.
So that was fine. But the thing is, I learned a lot.
And what I learned is we have these drag shows for kids going on across the
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state in communities big and small.
I like to use my hometown of Independence, Missouri, as an example.
That's a suburb of Kansas City.
Independence is a fairly large suburb, too.
We've got about 120,000 people that live there. So it's not a tiny place.
We've got we've got a.
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Group called West End Connection, which hosts drag shows for kids.
They like to post on their Facebook.
It's like, come see this drag queen and see if they can pull off sexy.
They're inviting kids into a show and asking this adult to be sexy in front of kids.
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Okay, it doesn't seem particularly child-friendly to me.
Then I think of Rolla, Missouri.
I learned all about what they were going through last year.
Rolla, Missouri is actually a fairly small town in comparison to where I'm used
to living in the Kansas City area.
And they had, during Pride, of course it was Pride, they had a drag performer go up.
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Go up i want to make sure to call
out this drag performer by name by the way this this drag performer is roxanna
rexia and so roxanna had thought it was a good idea to tell everyone that.
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Or to tell the kids because this was directed to the kids in the audience i
will be your drunken an auntie.
I will invite you into my basement to smoke cigarettes and drink wine coolers.
This was directed to kids. Now, I will say, to be fair, the drag queen said
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at a Raleigh City Council meeting that we both were in attendance at that it was intended as a joke.
Again, is this joke really appropriate for kids?
Not to mention that during that drag show, There is video of kids stuffing dollar
bills down the fake breasts of these drag performers.
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So this type of stuff is, you know, I think a lot of people think that they
might be immune to it because they're in small town Missouri or whatever the case may be.
That's that's not true. It's absolutely not true. It's going on everywhere.
Springfield has the issue. like Maisie said, you know, where Columbia deals with it. Last year.
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We protested outside of St. Louis Pride, and the whole reason was because they
were doing drag shows for kids at St. Louis Pride.
And of course, you know, all the usual suspects showed up as counter protesters,
you know, all the trans rights activists and all that type of stuff,
even though we weren't even really talking about trans people,
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you know, which was kind of an interesting thing going on there. there.
So yeah, that's kind of my background dealing with this.
And then ended up meeting Maisie.
I had helped with legislation in Tennessee, which to ban drag shows for kids in Tennessee.
Unfortunately, that got overturned by courts.
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So we had to be very, very, very specific. And I remember our initial conversations about this Maisie.
I was like, Hey, you know, it's like, Like, I'm very familiar with what they did in Tennessee.
It's like, yeah, it's like, we need to make sure we get this right in Missouri.
And I really do think that you have done that because it's not banning drag
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shows altogether, you know, which is what people like to say.
I mean, I actually had someone at a gas station who is a drag performer come
up to me and he recognized me.
And was like well you're the one who wants to ban drag altogether and I'm like.
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No, no, that's not what we're doing. You know.
Exactly. I think if you just read the legislation and if you go over that hearing,
it's so funny because they go over the main point of our entire bill.
Number one, of course, if you are, it's an adult cabaret performance in a period of interest.
That was the one word they didn't want to say, maybe because it's hard to pronounce,
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but that was like the most important part of the entire bill.
And it was really funny when Representative Brad Hudson, he's running for state
Senate, he did an incredible job defending the bill. He was on the public policy committee.
And that was the one thing he kept kind of reiterating. So he's like,
okay, when you are doing a performance, do you think it's okay to have children
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put dollar bills down your breast?
Or do you think as an organization, that's appropriate?
And they were like, well, no. no. So he's like, so then you're fine.
He's like, if you're, if you're not, you know, dancing provocatively and he's
like, and you're not, you know, dancing and performance and appearing interest,
like what, like, what are you so upset about?
And I think the reality is like, there must be something more sinister here
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than what I think what we're both realizing.
The other reality is they have the public property portion, which I think as
you've seen at pride events,
a lot of people have even announced, like the more pride events have gone on,
a lot more children have come around which is kind of an issue nope looks like a lost your audio.
Okay well i'll pretty yes okay can you can you go back a second yeah wait your
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audio cut out there i know you're on the road right now yes it's gonna move out so i'm in the boonies.
Where did where did i where did i leave off at,
My short-term memory, I had it just a second ago, and actually,
maybe we could tie in what you were saying to this, because I'm kind of stuck
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at this term, apparent interest.
Could you define that? Yeah, so apparent interest has actually been defined
by the Supreme Court, but basically, the definition itself is of lustful thoughts.
So it goes kind of back into stripping, right?
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When somebody is stripping or doing something that's going to pertain to lossful
thoughts, they'll talk about, in the definition, it talks about getting like an erection.
The reality is in just a short short
term it's if you're dancing in a
very sexual way that is trying to produce
something right if you are dancing so a child can put dollar bills down your
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pants that might be a period interest right and so it's a very narrow term and
the reality is you have to put that so in tennessee they had put that causes
harm to a child way too broad right Right.
What I probably think is harmful to a child might be different than someone else.
But period interest has already been defined in statutes and by the Supreme Court.
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And it really kind of goes back into that vested interest of,
OK, if you are an adult cabaret performance and it's of a period interest,
so you are trying to provoke,
you're trying to be sexual in nature, then you can't do it in front of children.
Yeah, that seems like a pretty fair consideration. And yeah,
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there's always going to be somebody who has a problem with it.
And it seems like a lot of times the opponents of these bills take the language
and the aim of the bills to be something other than what they are.
And, you know, sometimes I can't tell if they're simply projecting,
if they are truly ignorant or uninformed about what's being discussed,
(36:48):
or they are in a very passive, clever way,
trying to prevent measures from going into place that will prevent what they
know, you know, is ultimately trying to be prevented by these things and just playing stupid. it.
Well, and actually you're hitting on something very well there, Robert.
(37:10):
I'd like to make sure that everybody understands in Missouri, the.
The popular notion among our opponents of this bill is completely wrong.
I mean, they've said things like it'll ban trans people from being able to walk down the street.
They've said it'll ban drag altogether, which, like I said earlier, it does not do.
(37:35):
And I don't know for sure if it's misinformation, but that drag queen that I
was talking about that actually saw me in the gas station and was like, hey, I know you.
You're the guy that's trying to shut down drag in the state of Missouri, you know?
That after Ashley talked to him, here's the funny thing,
(37:59):
and explained exactly what was going on, and I was, you know,
told him the gist of the language of the bill, he was like, oh,
well, I'm not wanting to perform in front of kids.
You know, I was like, well, good for you. I mean, that's awesome.
You shouldn't want to do that.
And anyway, I think a lot of this is about education because our opponents here
(38:26):
in Missouri are intentionally,
at least in my opinion, intentionally trying to twist the nature of what this bill actually is.
And so that's something that at least on a day-to-day basis,
I'm coming across, you know, I mean, I even have friends like Chris,
why are you against drag? Why I'm not.
(38:51):
So it's all just kind of funny.
We're in a very interesting place in society because 100,
200-something years ago, now granted, there's always been probably some form
of cross-dresser performances or something, clandestine activities behind the scenes in society.
But, you know, since it's really come up and become very, you know,
(39:14):
more mainstream and more like of a protected sort of entertainment class,
it just seems like, you know, we are so far beyond the conversation of whether
drag is acceptable or okay. decaying.
And for as many people that still find it, you know, wrong for so many reasons.
(39:37):
Religious reasons or philosophical, moral reasons or whatever,
we're not even at a place where we're even in, you know, going to that level.
We're simply saying, keep kids out of it.
And, you know, we're at a place where it's like, it's become so comfortable.
People become so comfortable in society with it and.
So open and proud about it that it's now
(39:59):
almost like offensive to start to
have that conversation and that makes me
that makes me worry it's kind.
Of like what we see in like other places like i was
watching this video footage from like san francisco or something.
And you know how we have a problem with homeless people and.
Rampant drug abuse and things like that happening there and these
(40:20):
people are basically getting paid to stay on the streets you
know know here's money i'm spending it this and that and there's people
running around saying things like you know
we want total control we want more and it's
like how much more can you can
you give a person you know but there's all they all there's
some people always want more no matter how much they've
(40:40):
already upended society or how crazy and disastrous
things have ever gotten and so you
give give an inch and they take a mile but right now yeah you
got to pull back some yeah and you
know the funny thing is when i was talking about like
the you know local politicians who turned
(41:01):
out to not want to really touch this
issue whatsoever and thank
god for maizey i mean i am so glad that i came across you
i mean seriously because it's so
funny it's almost like god intended for
paths to cross you know and the
the thing is though is we're dealing now
(41:23):
even on a state level with
people who are afraid to touch this and maizey might want to speak on this with
you know we did get a house special committee on public policy that was good
but now it's going to rules but there's going to be a hold up why don't you explain that maizey.
(41:45):
Yeah. So the way the house now works. So currently, if you got a bill passed
out of committee, then it goes to another committee called rules.
But the speaker has set up this process. Now, this is going to sound like an arcade.
You have to have a slot. It's a slot system. So every committee gets so many
slots to be able to put that bill into to be able to go to rules.
(42:06):
It's just a good way for the speaker to be able to honestly figure out what
bills he doesn't want going to rules before they go to the house floor.
Of course, my bill has been stated that doesn't I have a slot.
Another way you can get a bill out of committee is if you get a token.
So there's certain ways. I will never be able to get a token, but I'm not joking.
It's like you can't see my hand here, but it's a gold coin that you can take
(42:30):
into the clerk's office and they have to put it to rule to be able to go to the House floor.
I'm not sure. I've never heard of this in the the legislative process.
I don't think I've ever seen this ever, but two people like the slot system
because it only helps a few people.
So we're just hoping that Speaker Plocker, who's running for Lieutenant Governor,
(42:54):
you know, wants to be able to make sure that he's protecting Hill's children
and also the children of Missouri and put this bill to rules.
It's passed out last year.
It needs to pass this year. It's equally as important.
And I think this is an issue that we need to be worrying about,
especially in this day and age where our children are the ones that everyone's going after.
It's not even about my age group anymore. It's about the kids that are below the age of 18.
(43:18):
And I hope that, you know, since he's running for office statewide,
that he deeply cares about that.
And Maisie, you know what? I always refer to him as Dean Plotcher.
Is it Plotcher or Plocker?
I hate to... Plocker. I'm pretty sure. I guess I could be calling his name wrong.
I just wanted to make sure. Well, let's put it this way.
(43:41):
It's Dean, and the last name is spelled P-L-O-C-H-E-R.
He is District 89, which is a suburb of St.
Louis. We're looking at town and country and De Pere.
Those are the cities that he represents in the state of Missouri.
But I think most importantly, everyone who is listening to this podcast needs,
(44:06):
I don't care where you live, you need to call his office.
And I'm going to give you his phone number right now. Now it is area code five,
seven, three, seven, five, one, one, five, four, four.
Again, that is five, seven, three, seven, five, one, one, five, four, four.
(44:31):
Tell him to stand up for Missouri kids to do the right thing and make sure that
this bill makes it to the floor of the house of representatives.
Excellent. Great work, you guys.
So i want to go back and i know this might be
a little bit off the rails what we're talking about but it's related
to what you were just talking about this coin situation maizey it's
(44:54):
kind of like it just reminded me of like i don't
know monopoly like your get out of jail free card or
here's your one like wild card you know and it's
like man politics is really getting getting gamey
like a game yeah it's a
trivialized matters that surround public safety
(45:15):
and health with a system like
you can pick one you know everybody gets you know use your vote you know on
one issue but anyway that's neither here nor there so what we're talking about
is a bill that's specifically designed to keep kids out of areas where drag
performances are taking place within businesses.
(45:38):
And the biggest argument against that is it's,
it sounds like one of the arguments is people just making this blanket rebuttal,
basically saying, you know, this is what homophobia, transphobia,
anti-LGBT, are people making claims like that or are they simply just trying
to defend the art and craft of drag performance?
(46:00):
When we were at that hearing, I would say it actually was both things,
really. Don't you think it would be amazing?
Yeah, you know, I think it was funny because they contradicted themselves.
One, and Chris maybe can affirm this, they said, okay, we are not dancing sexually in nature.
Okay, so they said that. but then two well if
(46:24):
it's of appearing interest or cabaret performances which had
a lot of stuff had dogo dancers and it says male and
female impersonators but then now they're
mad because now they're going to follow the same regulations as strip
clubs because that's how you keep minors out and
so it's like okay so if you're not dancing you know adult
cabaret performance in appearing interest okay you don't this doesn't
(46:45):
apply to you and you say that you're not doing that but now
they're like well now we're gonna follow these regulations well it's
like well you don't have to if you're not doing that and so that's where i think
that was the whole thing that said stayed over and over and over again and then
they were mad because drag like a drag queen was not it was not included as
(47:06):
a definition which as we all know is is way too broad oh yeah.
And so I thought that was funny. They just kept bringing that up.
And my original bill that I had last year, gosh, I can't remember the number.
It was like 523 or 527.
And I had that. But then going back, when I was combining it with Representative
Ben Baker, I was like, OK, we need to make this, of course, not broad,
(47:28):
not vague, as clearly defined as possible to do what we wanted to do.
What we wanted to do is make sure that children, of course, couldn't
attend these sexually explicit performances and make
sure it's not done on public property we weren't trying to
ban drag shows or applying the law equally and so
i thought that was really interesting we're not dancing we're not
dancing sexually but then well now we're mad because now we're gonna have to
(47:50):
follow those rules since we're dancing explicitly so i don't you can't win you
can't and they are so all they are so over the place all over the place i i
was it i i like to jokingly call him the blue thing that made it to Blibs of TikTok.
I think you saw, well, you were there, Maisie, but I mean, did you see that
(48:13):
that guy made it to Blibs of TikTok? It was hilarious.
I did. I did. I actually had even messaged the founder of Blibs of TikTok, who does an awesome job.
I mean, talk about somebody that has a ton of courage, a ton of guts to continually speak the truth.
I mean, it's always, you're always, every time you're speaking the truth,
(48:34):
you're were always on the good side and i just kind of laughed and i said i
should have clipped the part last year where he said that his tax dollars are going to my botched hair,
oh my gosh but didn't he isn't he the one that also said that when he was called
out about whether you know something was appropriate for a specific age wasn't
(48:57):
he the i thought it was him that that basically said that age is a relative thing. Yeah, right.
And he also talked about how kids can be considered an adult at 13 years old.
Right, yeah. Can you say that again, Chris?
Well, so what it was is one of the members of the committee said.
(49:20):
I was questioning him about whether, you know, something was appropriate for a kid or not.
And he's like, you know, if I remember correctly, the member said,
it's like, you know, at what age do you think this is appropriate?
And basically this drag performer kind of came up with the response of age is relative.
Relative so you know you know of
(49:44):
course you're not going to satisfy someone like that who basically is
telling you that they don't really care
what age someone is but of course you know without getting myself into any sort
of legal trouble here you know it doesn't take too much imagination to figure
out where that's actually going that line of thinking yeah and in i have a I
(50:06):
want to say something to Maisie.
I thought that was really funny that you said, and that is that,
that contradiction that they have.
It's like on one hand, they say they're not of a period nature.
They're not of a sexual nature, these drag performers. And on the other hand.
This is going to obstruct my ability to perform given that it,
(50:30):
you know, it puts restrictions on events or performances of a period nature.
And so you know what i see here
is there's a real toying on the threshold because we
could have a man with the fake boobs
and the leotard and the whole thing and
maybe it's even an outfit that intends you know they intend to keep on okay
(50:52):
like it's not something they're going to be stripping off per se in some like
seductive sort of burlesque fashion however these performances Performances
are always one hand gesture away from them becoming sexual, right?
They start to touch themselves or they make allusions to, you know,
they allude to, you know, sexuality in this way.
And that is very common for drag performances, right?
(51:15):
Because they're always like acting like.
You know, they're in the middle of a sex dance performance. And so
I think that's a really interesting area to catch them up on and maybe an area
that needs to be like more firmly delineated because if they find that the sexuality
can't really be like divorced or from the inherent sexual nature of the drag queen performances,
(51:40):
then they're going to have to agree to the characterization of drag as an adult sexual performance.
I think of drag queens as sexual clowns because they are, first off,
they're often clownish, you know, entertaining in that way, but they are very sexual in nature.
(52:01):
And so just their nature,
like it just doesn't come out of like children playing dress
up you know with the clothes that we found in our our chest and i'm going to
be a doctor and you're going to be this it's like no everybody's going to be
a stripper hoe and you get a name and you get a name and we're going to dance
(52:21):
around but this is no different than you know but mommy and daddy they go to
work i go to work you know i'm going to work it so,
yeah i think it's i think it's important maybe we do get some language that
really does and they're They're not going to be able to remove the sexual part,
you know, again, from the characterization of the drag performers, I don't think.
(52:45):
You know, yes, you could say that's one drag queen standing there being non-sexual, but not for long.
Well, you know, every time that I have seen these hosts of these drag events,
you know, try to say that it's going to be sanitized for the kids.
And so therefore it's going to be, you know, age appropriate for them.
(53:09):
I honestly don't care how sanitized you make it. I mean, why on earth are you
as an adult so hell-bent on performing for a child?
You know, that's disgusting. You know, and the other thing is,
too, we're dealing with it.
(53:31):
We're getting into almost a crisis of gender identity in this country.
And the very fact that
you're going to trot out some man dressed up
as a woman or vice versa because drag works
both ways you know you're going to trot this person out in front of kids and
(53:53):
just confuse them even further you know because they're going at these kids
especially once they're teenagers are going to be going on to social media they're
going to be told that you You know,
everything wrong with their lives will be made right if they transition or whatever the case may be.
You know, this drag stuff almost, maybe I'm going a little too far here,
(54:22):
but this drag stuff seems like almost like the gateway drug to that.
And I personally, because of that, would like to see this stopped.
Because if you're an adult and you want to do those sorts of things,
you want to go to drag shows, you want to transition, or whatever the case may
(54:42):
be, that's your business. You go right ahead and do that sort of stuff.
But as we say in Gaze Against Gremlins all the time, leave the kids alone.
Hey, Robert, I'm not hearing you. Thank you.
I was on mute to make sure that I keep my table nice. I know Maisie has a tight
schedule today, and she's going to have to get going.
(55:04):
And so I just want to offer her the last few minutes here to say whatever you
want to say about this bill, about the matter in general or anything else.
Yeah, I'm really proud of the people that have came to testify in support for this bill.
You know, Chris and his friend from Kansas endured a ton of ridicule.
(55:27):
I have never seen people be so disrespected in front of the legislature of a
body of people going to testify for truth.
And the reality is, you know, I have to there's a phrase that I say in the legislature all the time.
You know, they're eating well or sleeping well and working with,
you know, people like Chris. and all the people that came and wrote in testimony
is that at night, we know that we are doing the very best that we can for the
(55:50):
state of Missouri, for the state of our children.
And I'm just so thankful for groups like Gays Against Groomers.
You know, this has been like the foundation and pinnacle all across the United
States. And it is just been an astronomical group.
And I'm so thankful for all the work that you guys do because the fight is never going to end here.
It's a continual fight. But as we say, you know, we have many battles that we
(56:12):
need to win. but we're still trying to win the war.
And I appreciate you guys having me on. And hopefully we'll see 1650 to the house floor.
And we're going to work hard to get there. And I appreciate you,
Robert. And of course, Chris, I always appreciate you. I appreciate you too, Maisie.
I mean, it's been great working with you and we have a great friendship.
(56:32):
And, you know, I'm looking forward to what other crap we can do in Missouri
that's going to make everybody- There's more steak houses to go to.
Too how else are
we going to make missouri mad exactly wow thank you very much maisie and thank
(56:53):
you chris for your time here today and so where can people follow you maisie
social media or anywhere else you want them to look you up,
I'm a boomer. I like Facebook. That's where all my people are.
So if you want to follow me, Maisie Christensen, follow my pages.
And I have rep Maisie Christensen. Also on Twitter, it's Christ Maisie.
(57:17):
Christensen doesn't fit all the way.
But I'm also on Instagram as well as Maisie.Christensen.
Excellent.
And Chris, where can people find you? Yeah, yeah.
I'm funny. I'm Gen X and I'm all over X. And I don't care about Facebook that much, though.
You can find me on Facebook. Just look me up. I have a public account on there.
(57:39):
It is just search for Chris Barrett.
But I am primarily on X and I go by the handle Midwest Homo 77.
Excellent. That tells us everything we need to know about you,
your birthday, your location and your status.
Right, right, right. You're right. Well, these people know who I am at this point.
(58:04):
Awesome. Well, thanks for joining us, everybody. If you are not already subscribed to the podcast,
you can follow us or like us on Spotify and Apple iTunes or Podbean anywhere
podcasts are heard. We're also on YouTube.
The video format of this is available on YouTube if you're listening to this.
And if you have any questions or suggestions, please email me at podcast at
(58:30):
GaysAgainstGroomers.com.
Please visit GaysAgainstGroomers.com. Feel free to donate there,
sponsor the show, contact us. We can make that happen.
Thanks again. Have a great time, guys. Thanks for your time.
Thanks, Robert. All right.