To be LIVID at the National Theatre?

[helpmeunderstand04]

I was at the National Theatre festival this Saturday which was advertised as outdoor live music, dance, performance, workshops and family fun. I thought great, perfect way to spend a Saturday.

We were there from 6:30 and the drag act on stage was promoting inclusivity and had, what started as a great message. They said...

'We need to teach our children to open their hearts, teach our children to open their minds and to teach our children to open their legs'. The last line was said with the same tone as if it was a risque joke.

Both me and DP are just disgusted by what we saw. We couldn't believe it. This act had a short dress on and their bulge was showing through out. It was just plain weird. Fine in a club, not at a festival literally targeted as being good for families.

From then the evening just got weirder. There was a drag queen and a drag king contest. Great! I literally had never seen drag king acts and was really excited and thought it was great representation and diversity.

However, with every single drag king act they took their clothes off. No drag queens take their clothes off, but the drag kings did and were showing their scars from their mastectomy/gender affirming surgery. I do get the message that they are proud and don't need to hide and really I do agree with that. But it just felt weird that women who now identify as men are still having to take their clothes off, where as the drag queens didn't remove one item of clothing.

AIBU in feeling angry at the marketing team at the national theatre?

No, the DM picked this up from MN because they are too lazy to get their own stories. Then they made a mountain out of a molehill

Did they by Jove? Funny how they only reported it after the National Theatre took action.

How nice to hear that comment described as making a mountain out of a molehill and how odd if it is all so acceptable neither The Glory nor the performer have rushed to defend it or justify it and have accepted the decision of the NT without a murmur.

It sounds very sinister to me, part of the movement to legalise paedophilia springs to mind here.
One thing for certain, it’s very wrong.
Complain!

I’m so pleased to hear the National have taken action. I love the NT and was gutted by this thread. A victory for safeguarding.

It is and it isn't. Safeguarding isn't meant to be retrospective. This shouldn't have happened.

I absolutely agree. But it did happen out in the open in a hugely public way and they have drawn a line in the sand that this is wrong.

I know WE knew it was wrong already but the boundaries have been so blurred in recent years the lines need drawing again in the sand publicly.

Here we go again. So joking about pedophilia is okay as long as no kids are present? The joke was disgusting in any case.
As others have said previously, if you market drag to children (drag queen story time and so on), don’t be surprised when parents bring their kids along to such events.
And why should parents not be out and about with their kids at 7 pm on a summer’s evening or even attend an open air event? Nothing “sadly” about it.

Funny how the identity politics mob only discovers its well-hidden sense of humour when it comes to the issue of sexualising children.

Was it recorded?

Quite @Mascia if someone said to me that the "joke" from this act was entertaining for them I would be highly concerned!

Some very concerning people here on mumsnet. It's primarily a forum for parents. And if parents think jokes about CSA and paedophillia are acceptable, they really shouldn't be parents.

So on the one hand we have the normalisation of drag for children with the likes of ‘drag queen story hour’ and its cheerleaders shouting down those who raise concerns with ‘OMG you phobes, what’s wrong with a bit of harmless drag storytelling?!’

And then once all the boundaries are blurred we the parents who see no harm in DQSH visit adult drag shows advertised in amongst family-friendly festival events, are shocked at the content - about CSA no less - and the same cheerleaders go ‘OMG why did you think drag would be suitable for kids! What’s wrong with you!!?’’

You can’t have it both ways.

Here’s a fiendishly simple idea. Stop normalising drag as suitable for children.

You can’t have it both ways.

Quite.

Here’s a fiendishly simple idea. Stop normalising drag as suitable for children.

And selling it under the cover of 'Diversity', pushing DQSH - how does that come under diversity? But not, for example, getting people with disabilities or people from ethnic minority backgrounds to read to children to promote diversity, inclusion and acceptance.

Stop removing the boundaries of what is suitable for children - Pride, DQSH, - otherwise this is where we end up with stuff like this, the Rainbow Dildo Butt Monkey and the Family Sex Show.

But not, for example, getting people with disabilities or people from ethnic minority backgrounds to read to children to promote diversity, inclusion and acceptance.

Now that sounds like a wonderful idea 🙂

when are adults allowed to be entertained?

Never , when the jokes are so disgudting, about children.

Never. The standards are now set by the new moral majority.

Some very concerning people here on mumsnet. It's primarily a forum for parents. And if parents think jokes about CSA and paedophillia are acceptable, they really shouldn't be parents

I've sometimes thought it can look worse than it is, because it's generally the same posters who infest every thread to insist how phobic everyone's being and they shout louder than most

Noticeable, though, that the point where they backed off was when several remarked that daylight on their activities is actually a good thing

The "16 year olds are still children and they have sex, sometimes with adults" person really gives me the creeps.

The epic Get Your Tits Out event was not "FREE".

"FREE" is being paid by the taxpayer, by the Theatre's choice to allocating taxpayers funds and resources to a number of acts.

If you are going to try tapdance on a pin head, make sure your facts are factual.

The "16 year olds are still children and they have sex, sometimes with adults" person really gives me the creeps

The one with PIE in his user name.

It’s like people who want to sexualise children all hang out together, and send each other signals to join the thread.

"FREE" is being paid by the taxpayer, by the Theatre's choice to allocating taxpayers funds and resources to a number of acts.

Good point, bet the overwhelming majority of taxpayers would NOT be happy about their taxes funding this.

It's really important to note there is historic precedence for this. And the LGBT community should be vigilant about it. it's not a case of gay people being erroneously classified as perverted or paedophilic (when that happens, and i know it does, it should be strenuously denied) - it's a case of depraved perverts - who we all know exist - sneaking in under the inclusive banner of LGBTQ.

PIE did it in the 1960s and 1970s when homosexuality was rightly beginning to be decriminalised. PIE thought, great let's decriminalise sex with children while we're about it. People weren't vigilant and the two got lumped together with all sorts of household names campaigning for PIE without thinking through what they were suggesting.

People love not to have to think, not to have to untangle right from wrong. This intellectual complacency is pernicious and dangerous. It is up to all of us who bother to think independently to stop and say: this is not OK. Saying a Drag Queen's paedophilic joke is repulsive is not an inherently transphobic or homophobic statement. It is an anti paedophile statement. That is all. Some drag queens, like some straight and gay men and women are paedophiles. You don'tt stop calling out attitudes of casual brutality just because they come out of the mouths of the fashionable crowd. That is clear to anyone who engages their brain.

I do get the message that they are proud and don't need to hide and really I do agree with that.

You think they should be proud of removing their healthy breast tissue?

Especially in connection with that “joke”.
It’s one thing to say that 16+ teenagers sometimes might choose to have relationships with adults - that’s not the same as saying “we (adults) need to teach them to open their legs”. Can’t believe people are defending that comment.

Pup play fetishists at Pride, Rainbow Dildo Butt Monkey, DQSH twerking in kids’ faces or getting kids to put money in their underwear, the Family Sex Show with adults getting naked in front of children, “jokes” about child sex abuse. It’s Queer Theory in action.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=n-NseFg2kno