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?

if you know anything about the location of the national the only way you’d be just walking passed it would be from a very noisy Waterloo bridge.

What? I've quite often walked past the NT when walking along the South Bank. It's a very popular walk for people including families; you might be en route to or from the the Globe, the Tate Modern, the London Eye, the London Dungeon, among other places. There are sometimes child friendly entertainments along there. If this was a free entertainment which wasn't child-friendly, that should have been made clear, as anyone passing by might have stopped to look.

"Me & My Bee
Family comedy
12.00pm - 1.00pm
Our fuzzy little friends need our help, so we’re launching a political party disguised as a party party disguised as a show. There’s only one problem... The bees are dying and without them, we will too. A show for children & adults."

It is on a stage with an entranceway. You can not just walk by the stage.

Quite a lot of parents don't think it is a problem for their kids to hear swearing or watch tv shows that are pretty vulgar.

Many don't think it is a problem to take their kids to a Pride parade where they will see floats with some pretty sexualized fetish stuff.

A whole school in Scotland thought it was ok to invite a drag queen called Flo Job and the MP said people who didn't like it were transphobic.

Recently quite a few parents took their kids to a drag show for kids where the sign a the nightclub said "it's not going to lick itself". Some people thought this was inappropriate and were called transphobes.

So yeah, I think plenty of people don't have as clear of a sense of what's appropriate for kids as you seem to think they do.

River stage, not Rover Stage!

Nope they wouldn’t!!

honestly you can walk passed the front but can’t “just stop and have a look” at the river stage unless your stopping on Waterloo bridge.

even then I doubt you’d hear/see anything you know it being a payed for stage. The closest you’d get is possiably some festivities out by the kerb side eatery’s or around the understudy bar.

Pride has always had drag queens. Do not pretend otherwise.

That joke is not suitable for children but it’s also not suitable for adults.

Paedophilia in plain sight.

Since when did “adult content” become synonymous with joking about sexualising children?

I can’t believe people are defending this. It’s revolting. How is making a sexual joke about children funny? Who is laughing?

There were the odd one or two. Now it's wall to wall drag queens. What's it got to do with being same sex attracted? Fuck all.

It does not matter one fucking jot who the performance was aimed at.

The 'joke' was reprehensible. It doesn't matter WHO it was aimed at - that 'joke' took it from niche laugh to logging a report.

It's really academic who the intended audience was. I'm starting to get really pissed off with this stuff flying under any kind of 'Pride' banner.

As for the descriptions of the different weekends on the website the OP looked at:

uly 15-17: The Glory, featuring a drag queen contest, a party with DJs, drag life drawing, and a celebration of 50 years of Pride.

July 22-24: HOME Manchester – no programme yet but we’re promised ‘music, yoga, shows for families, drag and DJs’.

July 29-31: Hackney Empire Young Producers – ‘pure talent, pure energy and pure vibez’ in a weekend of new talent programmed by producers aged 14-21.

August 5-7: Hofesh Shechter – a weekend of dance (duh), including a look at the Hofesh Shechter Company’s latest work, ‘Contemporary Dance 2.0’.

August 12-14: National Theatre – programme tbc but expect ‘the very best in family theatre, dance, workshops, music, NT Live screenings and much more’.

Now it does say you can look for updates on the website but the fact is that people don't always do that.

But I am going to suggest that there is not a lot on the Glory description that might appear problematic to many parents. These parents already think drag is family friendly. So a drag event or drag life drawing does not sound adult. A celebration of 50 years of Pride - families are encouraged to take their kids to Pride events, kids learn about them at school.

The only thing that might tweak the parents is the name itself and it's entirely possible some won't realize what it means. And actually I think some might just think it is a clever thing that would go over the kid's heads.

Paedophilia in plain sight. Since when did “adult content” become synonymous with joking about sexualising children?

Since Pride become a corporate, drag-worshipping parody of its former self.

For those who are defending it by arguing it was clearly an “adult” event, or “it’s Drag”:

Who are the adults who find jokes about sexualising children funny?

What is funny about paedophilia?

It would have been quite easy for the 'Glory' event to add a basic age rating caveat for safeguarding purposes.

'Recommended for over 16s' would have covered it, if the organisers genuinely didn't want younger children, well below the age of consent, hearing 'jokes' about encouraging them to 'open their legs' as a positive.

I wonder why they didn't do that. Maybe they just don't understand the first fucking thing about safeguarding.

Obviously the optics on that are not great, & the whole sorry mess needs rather more scrutiny.

The alternatives to the organisers just being plain thick are...unpalatable.

Children should 'open their legs'?

You fucking disgust me. We see you.

'Recommended for over 16s' would have covered it, if the organisers genuinely didn't want younger children, well below the age of consent, hearing 'jokes' about encouraging them to 'open their legs' as a positive

So joking about paedophilia to adults is ok then?

Just part of your usual “adult” fun?

How odd. I've been to loads of drag king acts and never seen any take their clothes off. Then again they were all women, not transwomen.

Not even slightly, as far as I'm concerned.

I don't think it's acceptable in any context.

I was outraged by the suggestions that it was cheery 'adult fun' & that if dc were exposed to it, well, that's their parents' fault for not reading the marketing properly.

My point was that no, it clearly wasn't presented as 'adult fun', so even that disingenuous excuse, as made upthread, doesn't work.

Sorry - I obviously wasn't clear!

Sorry - I obviously wasn't clear!

I was probably just misreading, tone is so hard to interpret sometimes

I think these were transmen, since the OP describes them as having mastectomy scars.

That's why she found it a little disconcerting that they still seemed to be sexualized like women when she is supposed to think of them as men.

I would contact them and put a complaint in about the joke.
The whole event is open so impossible for it to be adult only the NT know this they have been running it for over 15 years.

Generally the after 7pm shows were always less child friendly but not to that level with the joke.
I would say its a fantastic event which show cases amazing dance artists, theatre etc don't be put off by this one and get the programme.
When I was a student I use to do stewarding at it. My finger still has a scar from the deck chairs we used to set up on the roof terraces for film showings for it!

Between a society that thinks that paedophilia is funny, that Pride is the perfect place to expect to be able to laugh about CSA and all the posters on here who think that anyone who doesn't think paedophilia is hilarious is a budding Mary Whitehouse, this thread is an eye-opener about modern England.

OP, the time out advert says
‘After two years off due to the pandemic, the National Theatre’s River Stage mini-festival returns to the South Bank for a month of outdoor live music, dance, performance, workshops and family fun.’

Over the course of the full MONTH there will be activities suitable for families!
You chose to attend a performance which was not.

Having said that, I’d hate to sit through the show you describe. NT obviously need to be more specific when marketing events.

Why?