On Saturday, January 14, members of Socialist Alternative joined four hundred supporters of Drag Queen Story Time at Coquitlam Public Library. All were there to reject discrimination and in favour of choice. This was the second time the library hosted a Drag Story Time event in support of accessible, diverse, and culturally-inclusive family programming. However, it was also the second time since November 2022 that anti-2SLGBTQIA+ protesters targeted a Drag Story Time event, with a similar confrontation taking place in Vancouver. This time around less than twenty protesters showed up to denounce the event.
The Battle Lines Were Drawn
The small group of Drag Story Time protesters parked a truck across the street from the library and waved signs at nearby traffic. Many of them sported clothing, logos, and Canadian flags in support of the convoy movement. Protesters carried homemade signs likening the Drag event to child grooming, when an individual builds a trusting relationship with children to manipulate, exploit and abuse them. It was clear that their slogans and signs aimed to vilify drag performers and trans people. At the start of the demonstration, a protester climbed onto the flatbed of the truck, using a bullhorn to denounce the event as pedophilic.
The much larger crowd, rejecting hate, lined up outside the library. They moved across the road, surrounding the truck and blocked its signs of bigotry and chants of hate with pride flags and blasting Pride anthems by Britney Spears, Queen, and Bonnie Tyler through a giant speaker system. Drag queen Conni Smudge gave a short speech in the middle of the street before heading into the library.
What followed was a rally that was two-parts pride street party and one-part tense confrontations with right-wing bigots. Pride truly is a protest and a celebration! For two hours the small group of protesters tried to break out of the crowd and give speeches with their bullhorn, but each time they were immediately surrounded, blocked, and drowned out by community activists unwilling to give their hate any airtime. Socialist Alternative members participated in surrounding the protesters and led chants against the protesters, trying to get sympathetic honks from traffic. Eventually, the protesters gave up, with several of them retreating into a nearby parking garage, while others faded away. Conni Smudge re-emerged from the library; story time complete!
2SLGBTQ+ rights must be fought for, defended, and extended!
While the protesters’ message was easily drowned out at this event, activists need to take these kinds of bigoted protests seriously. Several protesters carried signs bearing the logo of ParentsVoice BC, a right-wing, school board election organization that seeks to oppose union-backed candidates. Its website has a favourable report about it caried by Rebel News, a far-right website that denies climate change, has anti-Jewish and anti-Muslim material, and reports favourably about racists and the far-right. ParentsVoice BC has remained ambivalent as to whether they would seek to overturn school districts’ sexual orientation and gender identity inclusive policies. Founded in June, ParentsVoice ran 28 candidates in the fall 2022 municipal elections, winning two seats in Nechako Lakes and one in Chilliwack. In Coquitlam, its three candidates were bottom of the polls, losing by 3,000 votes.
It is imperative that community activists shut down similar anti-2SLGBTQIA+ protests in the future, but they also must be wary of right-wing electoral organizing and the “Freedom” convoy’s future iterations. This includes the need to defend positive education policies, including Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity 123 (SOGI 123), which provides participating school districts with resources and support to make schools inclusive, safe, and welcoming for students of all sexual orientations and gender identities.
Defence is Not Enough!
According to the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, between 25 and 40 percent of homeless youth are 2SLGBTQIA+. This is a reflection not only of unsupportive families, or schools, but also of the capitalist housing crisis, which affects all working-class people. Despite laws, trans people can face significant discrimination and abuse at work. Mainstream capitalist political sometimes parties have nice words, but no solution for these and other crises. This can lead, and has led, to increased support for the anti-2SLGBTQIA+ right and the far-right.
The right’s survival depends on their ability to tap into social isolation and anxiety and direct it away from any sort of united struggle against the system. They’ve done this by scapegoating different groups whom they portray as threats. They’ve pointed to feminists, gays and lesbians, Indigenous people, immigrants, Jews, Muslims, and communists. Right now, one of their primary targets is the trans community. This must be resisted by organizing in the streets, in our workplaces, in our unions and at the ballot box.
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