HUNTINGTON WOODS, MI – Michigan has more than its share of important issues that you might think would be the focus of this year’s campaign for governor: The state’s declining population. Poor educational performance by public school children. The economy.
But at least two of the Republican candidates for governor are talking about something entirely different:
Drag queens.
Tudor Dixon, now the favorite to win the Aug. 2 primary, has vowed to make it a criminal offense for a grownup to take a child to a see a performer in drag. So has Garrett Soldano, a Kalamazoo chiropractor also running for the nomination.
Why is this even an issue?
Meet Joyce Krom, a warmly charismatic librarian whose life has been dedicated to getting children to read, to love books – and to feel good about themselves. Five years ago, she brought “drag queen story time” to her library in Huntington Woods, a liberal suburban enclave of about 6,300 mostly highly educated and professional adults.
Every few weeks, she would invite a drag queen — usually a gay male who dresses up and performs in exotic female costumes – to read books to children on Saturday mornings. It was an instant hit.
“We had 50 slots open and they filled up immediately. We had to add a second session and move it to the city rec center, and it still wasn’t enough.” The concept was wildly popular.
“For me, it has always been about literacy – not the shock value of seeing a drag queen,” she said. “What all this is about, is getting kids excited about reading. Not everyone can read a children’s book – you have to perform it, and drag queens are performers!
“Children are tactile. Put a book in their hands and they get excited about it. But you have to get them in,” their hands, she said.
However, Krom, a former elementary school teacher who decided to become a librarian a decade ago, does have a secondary agenda — to make kids feel comfortable with themselves, and to know it is all right to be different. One of the most popular books read by the queens is the acclaimed Be Who You Are, by Todd Parr.
“It tells them if you have red hair, it is fine. If you like different things or different people, that’s fine too”
Joyce Krom did not invent Drag Queen Story Time; it was started in 2015 by San Francisco author and bookstore owner Michelle Tea. But she was the first librarian to sponsor it in Michigan, though other librarians have since followed her lead.
But the idea is not universally popular. Recently, Krom took a job as a children’s librarian in Mount Clemens, a somewhat more conservative community in Macomb County, where she has continued to offer diverse programming.
Earlier this month, a longtime patron burst into the library, asked to see the director and cut up her library card because of what Krom was doing. “She said, ‘I have to know — is she a lesbian? Is that why she is indoctrinating our children?’”Krom said.
When he declined to answer, the patron stalked out, yelling “I’m never coming back here — tattooed lesbian trash!’’
That shook her up for a moment, but the library leadership is “totally supportive” of what she is doing for diversity.
Actually Joyce Krom, a proud 48-year-old Generation Xer, is married to manufacturing engineer Jim Krom, who designs assembly lines. They have two teenagers, “two cats, a betta fish, a turtle, a pond full of koi and a praying mantis with a broken leg.” They live in a suburban house, and one of their main hobbies is about as Detroit as can be, restoring a ’49 Cadillac and ’55 Chevy.
But she, and the bewildered drag queens, were caught in a crossfire of unwanted attention when Drag Queen Story Time became an unexpected political issue, when candidate Dixon said they “normalize the sexualization of children,” and Soldano said they were part of a plot to “indoctrinate and subjugate our children.”
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, who is openly gay, poured scorn on the idea of criminalizing drag queen performances for children. “Drag queens are fun. Drag queens make everything better. And I’ll say this: A drag queen for every school,” she quipped.
Predictably, conservatives went bananas.
Krom also wasn’t impressed with the attacks on her program, and didn’t mince words. ‘She should burn in hell,” she said succinctly of the GOP front-runner, after noting that such comments were hateful, ignorant and should have been beneath the dignity of anyone running for governor.
She noted that there is no evidence whatsoever that such performances confuse children about their own sexuality. And she said she isn’t about to stop doing programs that promote diversity, or whatever she can do to try to get kids to read. Much of the time, she is out in Mount Clemens’ poorest neighborhoods with the library bookmobile, trying to interest kids in books.
“You know, an Ohio State professor named Rudine Bishop said children should be exposed to books that are like mirrors that allow them to see themselves, and really great books like sliding glass doors that allow you to step into someone else’s shoes and see what it is like.
“That’s what this is about for me.”
