Article – Sophie Atherton & Ewan Somerville
Call drag queens ‘pantomime dames’ to fool protestors, librarians told
SOPHIE ATHERTON & EWAN SOMERVILLE – 30 July 2022 – The Telegraph
Council librarians attend training in how to handle conflicts with parents over children’s story hours hosted by drag queens
Drag queens should be called “pantomime dames” to fool protesters, council librarians have been urged in a crisis meeting amid embattled “story-hour” sessions for children.
More than 100 librarians attended the training earlier this month in how to handle the fierce row with parents over a country-wide summer tour by Drag Queen Story Hour UK (DQSH).
The webinar on “managing controversial events” was organised by the national body Libraries Connected, formerly the Society of Chief Librarians, and only for library staff.
It has been leaked to The Telegraph after the first week of DQSH’s tour, which descended into chaos as local authorities called in police to stop protesters storming sessions and drag queen Aida H Dee got a police escort.
Chants of ‘paedophile’ and ‘groomer’
Dozens of activists have picketed libraries in recent days chanting “paedophile” and “groomer”.
Aida H Dee, also known as Sab Samuel, performs in a tight sequined dress with heavy make-up. Samuel is a 27-year-old male children’s author who is autistic and has ADHD, also running DQSH.
In the forum, held on July 20, librarians from across Britain shared “war-game” strategies for dealing with “really distressing” drag criticism and being “bombarded by complaints letters”.
One speaker suggested the protesters could be fooled. “We’ve always said pantomime dame because we don’t want protestors outside our building,” Ian Anstice, a librarian from Cheshire West & Chester, told the seminar.
“Is that knuckling under pressure? Probably, possibly, but we find we have no protests, it’s a good event, we run the event,” he added, as he criticised how some protesters have “no politeness, no trying to see your point of view”.
Accused of ‘twerking’ in front of toddlers
He referenced a performer known as Mama G, who is unconnected to DQSH but who is also touring libraries this summer. Mama G was billed as a pantomime dame in Devon county council libraries in 2019, but was accused of “twerking” in front of toddlers.
Bristol Library Service’s regional engagement manager, Julia Ball, told attendees about a social media “pile-on” her team experienced over a tweet in May promoting DQSH’s summer tour, which runs until September.
“What we’ve come up with is a rough guide to if you’re holding a controversial event – in our case it’s drag queens – we would say that the best thing is to involve your comms, involve equalities, councillors and the safeguarding teams from the start,” she said.
This includes a “statement from our safeguarding lead [officer] that says about how much they support what we’re doing”, while “hiding” negative comments on Facebook and not using Twitter “because that’s where the particularly bad trolls are”.
She urged librarians to let police and council know about the “potential threat of disruptive protests”, but avoid defending drag queen events on social media on a Friday “as it could blow up over the weekend”.
Almost 70 events in 20 areas of Britain are being visited over the next two months by DQSH, a group that hosts sessions for three to 11-year-olds.
Some groups engaged in scuffles with police, chanting “paedophile” and vowing a “citizen’s arrest” of Mr Samuel at the first sessions in Reading and Bristol last week.
Separate parent groups, such as the Safe Schools Alliance and the Family Education Trust, have written letters to peacefully protest the tour, but they were criticised in the seminar.
Ms Ball said her library’s chief took the attitude of “template letter complaint, template letter response” and should report “anything abusive, offensive or aggressive” as hate speech…
