Attacks on the LGBTQ+ community are on the rise, fueled by the MAGA movement and right-wing groups that claim to be Christian. These groups argue that LGBTQ individuals and drag queens are grooming children and sexually abusing them, Texas Governor Gregg Abbott wants to label gender-affirming treatment for transgender kids as child abuse, and books featuring queer and LGBTQ subjects are being banned from schools.
More than 50 members of the far-right white nationalist groups Proud Boys and the Patriot Front marched in the streets of Columbus, Ohio last Saturday, protesting a local school’s Holi-Drag Storytime event, where three local drag performers were to read children’s books and sing holiday songs (the event was canceled due to safety concerns). This was just weeks after a 22-year-old gunman entered an LGBTQ nightclub in Colorado Springs, Colorado, killing five people and injuring 25 others.
The attacks also resonate in Washington. While hearing arguments for the Respect for Marriage Act, Rep. Vicky Hartzler (R-MO) tearfully begged her colleagues to vote against the bill. She claimed that the legislation was “misguided and dangerous,” and would punish religious institutions opposed to marriage equality. Her gay nephew promptly rebuked her plea in a video posted on TikTok. A total of 169 House Republicans voted against the bill (not one Democrat voted no), including notable reps such as Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Yvette Herrell, Paul Gosar, and Jim Jordan.
Fortunately, the bill passed and awaits President Biden’s signature.
Even the conservative-led Supreme Court is on the attack and poised to rule that a Christian web designer has a right to refuse services for same-sex couples. This would set a dangerous precedent allowing businesses to cry “free speech” and refuse service to anyone they don’t agree with.
Why the focus on drag queens and LGBTQ+ groups?
Extremist ideologies held by groups such as the Proud Boys, the Klu Klux Klan, the Aryan Brotherhood, and the Oath Keepers (and their enablers in political office), all have something in common: They oppose the fundamental principles of democracy and human rights by advocating political, social, racial, economic and religious supremacy. Perhaps these groups think they’re better than drag queens, trans, gays, and queers, or maybe they’re more afraid of individuals who don’t share their myopic views of sexuality and gender.
We are all too familiar with the gender roles imposed upon us by our culture, how women are expected to look, walk and talk, and how men are supposed to be strong and in charge. Extremist groups think that these roles are natural, but they’re not: Gender roles are a social construct.
Trans, queer, gay, and drag queens upset the black-and-white gender myth, creating not just queerphobic rage, but misogynistic insecurity among right-wing groups who suffer from homophobia and transphobia.
The recent attacks on the LGBTQ+ community expose the dark, misogynistic underbelly of conservative and far-right groups. Most fascist groups recruit new members by appealing to straight male insecurity and grievance over gender equality and gay rights, and they motivate each other with the promise that they can return to a mythical past where men were men and women were subservient.
The sad thing about this is that extremist groups won’t just settle for attacks against drag queens, gay marriage, and trans youth, as history has shown, they always expand their assault to other groups.