Texas: The problem is, should drag show venues be classified as a sex business?

FRISCO, Texas – Three North Texas Republicans are pushing for a ban on children from drag shows.

Frisco Rep. Jared Patterson wants to go even further by forcing businesses to reclassify as sex-oriented businesses.

Rep. Patterson: If you want to put on a blatant drag show in your business, you need to be able to do so. But you shouldn’t be allowed to have kids there, and you shouldn’t have the same organization as any other business that doesn’t put on overt shows in your business.

Dial: I know that Republicans often say that the Republican Party believes that parents can make the best decision for their children. Whether it’s the choice of school or something else. Why can’t a parent make this decision for their child?

Rep. Patterson: This is an excellent question. I’m a big supporter of parental rights, I’ve been fighting for this for the past year as far as sexually explicit material in the school library is concerned. But we have a number of laws in place to protect the physical well-being of children in the state of Texas. Whether a child cannot buy a gun, a child cannot buy alcohol, tobacco, etc. We must take their mental health as seriously as we take their physical well-being.

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Dial: Your bill, as written right now, says that anyone with a drag show must classify their business as a sex business. [PATTERSON: Yes]. It’s like a strip club. [PATTERSON: Yes]. Do you think it’s too far?

Rep. Patterson: Well, you know it will be discussed and we will decide as 181 legislators in Austin this session. I think we have to find where this line is and where it should be.

Dial: So why not just ban kids from drag shows? Why force a business that can do this once a month to completely reclassify its business?

Rep. Patterson: We’ll see how it ends up in the session, but I’ll tell you that there are certain reasons why we have rules about sexually oriented businesses where you can’t be near a school or a museum, some of those things on certain occasions. communities. I think we just don’t need companies that even regularly or semi-regularly post explicit content. We don’t want this on the paths where families walk, where there will be small children.

Dial: I know, as a conservative Republican, you might have opinions about people who do drag shows, but for the purposes of this interview, are you against drag shows? You are against having them in front of children and you find them overtly sexual.

Rep. Patterson: Look, I don’t want to interfere with theater or professional wrestling or anything else where people can dress up and pretend to be something they’re not. But when it comes to sexually explicit content, we need to keep our kids away from it. Whether it’s in the school library, whether it’s in the curriculum, whether it’s at a drag show, no matter where it is in society, we need to be focused on protecting our children, protecting their mental health and well-being, and protecting them from it. explicit content.

Dial: We’ve seen a lot of these bills lately, you mentioned libraries, now drag shows. Is it just tossing red meat at your base?

Rep. Patterson: I’m passionate about protecting our children, whether it’s in the library, whether it’s a drag show, online on social media. I have filed a number of bills related to this topic, the sexualization of our children. I think that will be an important topic that we will discuss in this session, work to protect our children. I think it’s going to be a big fight and we’ll see what happens.