Idaho Bill Would Ban Drag Shows In All Public Venues

The Idaho Capital Sun reports:

A bill that would ban drag performances in all public venues will be introduced in the first days of the next session of the Idaho Legislature in January, Idaho Family Policy Center President Blaine Conzatti told the Idaho Capital Sun.

Conzatti and other conservative activists around Idaho and across the country have protested against events in public spaces that feature drag queens, including drag queen story hour events at public libraries.

“No child should ever be exposed to sexual exhibitions like drag shows in public places,” he said. Conzatti also cites a drag performance in Coeur d’Alene in June as another example of public indecency, when a performer was accused of exposing himself during a Pride in the Park event.

The Coeur d’Alene Press reports:

A drag performer has sued a blogger who falsely accused him of indecent exposure and posted doctored footage of him online. Eric Posey, a Kootenai County resident whose stage name is Mona Liza Million, performed June 11 at the Pride in the Park celebration in Coeur d’Alene. The next day, blogger Summer Bushnell published an edited video of Posey’s performance on her Facebook page. Posey’s pelvic area is blurred out in the edited video, implying nudity.

Bushnell claimed that Posey exposed himself to the crowd. She called for Posey’s arrest in her Facebook post, urging the public to contact police and the Idaho Attorney General’s Office. The Coeur d’Alene City Prosecutor’s Office reviewed the edited video, as well as other unedited videos and photos. Prosecutors announced in July that the evidence shows Posey did not violate any state or local law.

Vice News reports:

Idaho GOP chair and state Rep. Dorothy Moon did not address questions about whether the state party supported the proposal, but she told VICE News in an email that the Idaho GOP is “opposed to the sexualization of children, including ‘family-friendly’ or ‘all-ages’ drag shows.”

The events she is referring to include drag queens reading children’s books to kids at public libraries; Conzatti’s comments, moreover, indicated the proposal would apply to drag shows in public spaces even for adults.

Idaho, like much of the country, has also seen an uptick of violence towards LGBTQ+ people in general. In June, Coeur d’Alene police arrested dozens of white supremacists who allegedly planned to disrupt the city’s Pride festival,.

The Idaho Family Policy Center, an affiliate of the hate group Focus On The Family, is also the main driver of an abortion ban in Idaho. Conzetti knows his claim about that drag performer is a lie, but happily parrots the lie to local media in the name of Jesus.