Jackson herald. (Jefferson, Jackson County, Ga.) 1881-current, September 27, 2023, Image 4

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Jackson herald., September 27, 2023, Image 4

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Newspaper Page TextPAGE 4A THE JACKSON HERALD WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 2023 Opinions “Private opinion is weak, but public opinion is almost omnipotent. ”- Henry W a i d Beeche r A cultural clash from Drag Queen Story Hour ••• I must have been asleep when the fad of Drag Queen Story Hour began. I’ve been to library story hours before where someone reading tries to engage youngsters in the world of literature and books. I may have once or twice read a book to kids at a school or li brary. But not in drag. So I’ve been confused over the last few years as controversy has grown over Drag Queen Story Hour events. Turns out, there’s a lot more going on than just glitter. • •• Drag queens are nothing new, of course. Depending on whom you be lieve, men dressing up as women goes back to Shakespeare’s plays where men played women’s roles. There are some reports of a few men regularly dressing as women in Britain in the early 1700s as well. The modem “drag” movement as we know it today report edly began in the late 1800s in New York at underground drag balls in Harlem. Throughout the 20th Century, drag performances became a regular aspect at gay bars across the country. More recent ly, television drag shows such as RuPaul’s Drag Race have brought the flamboyant drag queen culture into the main stream. • •• According to some media reports, the birth of Drag Queen Story Hour began in 2015 in San Francisco and quickly spread to libraries and bookstores across the country and around the world. The world of drag performances had moved from bars to libraries, albeit with a milder tone and different message than the risque barroom shows typically have. One could argue that having a man dressed as a woman in brightly-colored clothes is captivating for children. Drag queens are, after all, performers who use their flamboyant attire and attitude to get attention. They have become a new subculture of storytellers. Staid librarians they aren’t. Drag queen storytellers must have proven successful giv en the growth of Drag Queen Story Hours since 2015. If nobody came to hear them, they wouldn’t be there. As one person said during an online discussion about drag story time: “So why is drag queens reading to kiddos a thing? Because people come to it. Because it is a fun twist to get your kid interested in reading.” But over the last few years, these drag story hours have been catching a lot of hell from parents and right-wing groups, sometimes drawing protesters to public libraries. The controversy is also linked to an uptick in parents chal lenging books on library shelves. As with drag queens, many of those challenges today revolve around books that have LGBTQ themes. Some critics of Drag Queen Story Hour events do so on religious grounds — they’re against anything that portrays LGBTQ people as being “normal.” Other critics go further and claim that the drag queen events have a subversive intent — to groom children for sexual exploitation, or at minimum, indoctrinate children into gay culture. • •• To a large extent, this issue is another aspect of our clash ing cultural institutions. In many ways, public libraries have been leading the charge in attempting to create a public fo rum for those whose voices have been previously ignored. In addition to traditional minority voices — black, Hispanic, Native American among others—libraries have also opened their doors and bookshelves to the LGBTQ community. In that regard, libraries have become champions of di versity and inclusion in addition to their traditional role as champions of intellectual freedom. The American Library Association isn’t shy about their goal in all this. Their website about Drag Queen Story Homs states: “ALA, through its actions and those of its members, is instrumental in creating a more equitable, diverse, and in clusive society.” In addition to carrying more LGBTQ books, the inclusion of Drag Queen Story Horn adds a new dimension to those efforts. • •• So what is the goal in all that diversity and inclusion? Supports of those efforts say it’s to normalize people to children who are typically outside the mainstream. The main focus of that today is to help normalize members of the LGBTQ community. The inclusion environment is also an effort to connect with children who, at some point in their youth, might ques tion their own sexual identity. The message to children via drag queens is supposed to reflect a “be who you are” theme. While efforts to be diverse and inclusive might be laud able, are drag queens an appropriate “vehicle” through which to promote diverse viewpoints to young children? Are they more appropriate for teen and adult audiences in that respect? Critics would say that while drag queens might be flam boyant performers who get the attention of children, it’s im possible to separate the historic drag queen culture in the gay community from their public persona. (Although not all drag queens are gay.) And even some from within the gay community don’t think drag queens fairly represent LGBTQ lifestyles. As far as I know, there aren’t any Drag Queen Story Hours in our immediate area. The only drag queen issue locally was a book challenge at the Jefferson library last spring when a parent objected to a children’s book that had an oblique ref erence to drag queens (the library board voted to keep the book on shelves and not have it removed.) • •• Not too many years ago, it was popular in local communi ties for men to dress up as women to perform a “womanless wedding.” Local men, many who were community leaders, would wear outrageous female outfits for the event. A lot of people paid money to attend these “womanless weddings,” which was the point — it was a fundraiser for various groups in the community. (Yes, I have photos from covering these events — I’m not making this up.) Given today’s controversial cultural climate, such an event would be impossible today. Can you imagine the uproar it would create if leading men in the community dressed up as women for a public event? • •• Drag culture may be rooted in performance art. But its over-the-top costuming and use of pancake makeup also reminds me of clown culture — both use costume ex aggeration and heavy makeup to hide the person underneath through gender mockery and imagined, created characters. Both clowns and drag queens can be funny and entertain ing, but there’s also something a little sad woven within all the exaggeration. It’s as if the person underneath needs to create somebody else, a new persona, to find acceptance in the world. I don’t have a problem with drag queen story hours; par ents can choose to take their child or not. I’m sure they’re entertaining. But I sense a disconnect in all of this. If one of the messag es to children is supposed to reflect “be who you are,” then how does the pseudo-reality of a drag queen do that? Does wearing outrageous costumes and pretending to be someone you’re not a valid platform from which to extoll the idea of “just be yourself?” Mike Buffington is co-publisher of Mainstreet Newspa pers. He can be reached at mike@mainstreetnews.com. Build relationships before giving advice in public Dear Editor: My compliments on Mike Buffing ton’s Sept. 20 “Advisory” piece for newcomers. I always referred to the scenarios he outlined as “free advice sessions.” Accompanied by the qualifiers he mentioned (Where I came, we always did etc.) many times the sessions feature a pointing finger, heightened decibel levels, and a facial grimace that would lead one to believe that the “new advisor” had kicked their dog at sunup. “Free” incorrectly assumes that there is no cost. That’s where first time public meeting podium storm- troopers miss the point. The cost is a RELATIONSHIP. I ask the subjects of your column (newcomers) to consider: 1) Have you ever introduced yourself personally to those whom you are about to advise? 2) Ever asked them privately the ques tion you are about to pose publicly? Wow, Gary you mean I should get to know someone before I scald them on social media? I think these sugges tions are worth considering. My experience is that the surname of the ruling family of policy and poli tics in America is “Somebody.” Why? Because all of us keep that person busy with requests. “Somebody should do something about....” “Somebody should stand up...” “Somebody should lead....” The list would circle the globe sev eral times, don’t you think? Can just “Anyone” (that’s “Some body’s cousin”) step up and help “Somebody”? Of course, with preparation. But why would the growing number of “Anyone’s” be hesitant? Politics is a contact sport. It always has been. The good ‘ole days of the Founders included harsh partisan pamphlets and, if you were not care ful, trips to the “field of honor.” Now, we retreat to the public mi crophone, podcast, or the field of 140 characters and in milliseconds fire our shots, or to your point, begin offering “free advice” before the moving van gets out of the driveway. For leaders, part of the responsi bility is taking the heat. Forget about three verses of “Kumbaya” if you have abused the public trust or made a dumb decision. The electorate de serves honorable service and straight answers - all of the time. But today, the speed of informa tion and the chasms left by partisan and personal rhetoric are harmful. We should do better. A “hand in hand” form of dialogue would serve everyone well. Toss in a dash of listening before speaking, and five gallons of courtesy, and relation ships in the policy arena would im prove from the grassroots up. Is our community perfect? Nope. Will we all always agree? Let me state that I think we can all agree that we will not. Should we all — newcomers and 53-year residents like me - com mit to improving public discourse? Absolutely. Sincerely, Gary W. Black Commerce Managing Partner On Point Strategies Scattering cotton By Loran Smith This time of the year, I always relate everything to hurricanes, football, cotton picking, and the 1951 play off game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants. Recently, I rode through the countryside in northern Madison County, east of Georgia Highway 106 and saw a small cotton patch where there will, soon enough, be a mechanical cotton picker doing work that for so many years was done by hand. There are no burlap cotton sacks anymore which means there are no cotton pickers who toil in the hot sun and live with a lingering backache. I immediately flash- backed to the fifties when a father with a grade school education wanted his offspring to get an education. Even with a high school diploma he could have better provided for his family, but he had to quit school to help his daddy work the land to save the farm which carried a heavy debt. With the coming of October, there was debilitating worry that a hurricane would come up from Florida and ruin the cotton crop. He listened intently to the weather reports each day on an old radio with the weather reports barely audible in constant static. He made sure that I stayed in school when the kids in other farm families dropped out to help get the cotton harvested. In 1950, the National Hurricane Center start ed naming hurricanes. First, the hurricanes were given phonetic names and then in 1953, the trend of coming up with female names for hurricanes came about. Political correctness did not surface until 1979 when the dastard ly storms were given male names. While the worry from farmers was constant and seri ous, I don’t remember a hurricane getting to our corner of Johnson County, but there were a lot of prayers of fered up as a defense. In the growing season, there were unceasing prayers for rain. Rain was necessary for the crops to mature, and when that came about, those prayers turned defensive—keep the hurricanes in the Caribbean and Miami and away from the farms of Middle Georgia. Many times, our prayers were answered. We got enough thunderstorms and precipitation to make a crop, and the hurricanes didn’t wreak havoc in October. Looks like we have more to worry about when hurri cane season comes around these days. There seems to be more of them, and they seem to start forming ear lier. Just last week, when there was good news—that hurricane Lee was turning north and that we would be spared from a path of destruction. But then we learned that another one was not far behind and then more likely to follow. If we put those rocks back on the moon, would that help? About that playoff game to determine the 1951 Na tional League pennant—the regular season ended in a tie and the Dodgers and the Giants met for a one game playoff to determine which team would advance to the The Jackson Herald Jefferson, Ga. 30549 Founded 1875 Merged with The Commerce News 2017 The Official Legal Organ of Jackson County, Ga. Mike Buffington Scott Buffington. Alex Buffington. Co-Publisher Co-Publisher .News Editor Postmaster: Send Address Changes To: MainStreet Newspapers, Inc. PO Box 908 Jefferson, Georgia 30549-0908 Web Site: www.JacksonHeraldTODAY.com Email: mike@mainstreetnews.com Voice: 706.367.5233 Periodical Postage paid at Jefferson, GA 30549 (SCED 271980) Yearly Subscriptions: $45 / $40 for seniors MEMBER • Georgia Press Association • National Newspaper Association • International Society of Weekly Newspaper Editors Letters to the editor may be emailed to: mike@mainstreetnews. com World Series. The game was played at the Polo Grounds and Bobby Thomson hit a three-run homer to win the game and the NL pennant for the Giants. I had gotten home from school and was reminded that it was important to get into my work clothes and go to the fields promptly. I turned on the radio and dressed for the cotton patch but was desperate to listen to the play off game which had reached the ninth inning. It was agony, enjoying the big sports moment on radio but knowing that stem discipline would be meted out when I reported to the fields too late. Nobody wore a wristwatch, but all knew by the sun what time it was. I was going to be bad late for work. But when I arrived, the bearer of good news, I was saved from harsh discipline. What saved me was deep rooted prejudice. It had to do with the fact that Jackie Robinson had become a star player for the Dodgers, the first black man to play in the majors. Most Southerners hated the Dodgers because Robin son was a member of the team. Although my favorite team was the Red Sox, I liked the Dodgers but could not say so. Not in Middle Georgia in 1951. The negative reaction would have been like a Category 5 hurricane. We are far from a perfect society, but I am happy we are past those times. Loran Smith is a UGA commentator and columnist for Mainstreet Newspapers.