NBC reporter Ben Collins said on Peacock’s “MTP NOW” that parents take children to all-age drag brunches to meet a drag queen “just to show them they’re human beings.”
Host Kristen Welker said, “What are you seeing online in the wake of this shooting? Is anything standing out to you?”
Collins said, “I will say that the months-long campaign of targeting trans and gay rights events and supports and things like drag brunches, that has been a persistent narrative by the anti-LGBQ right in the last six months to the last year. One of the main drivers of that hate is an account called Libs of TikTok.”
Welker said, “You said this, but we I think we can’t emphasize this enough. This was during a drag night.”
Collins said, “And also hours before what they call an all-ages drag brunch which is probably the number one target of these anti-LGBTQ events recently. For example, the Proud Boys will go and protest any drag brunch, any drag story hour, anything that a child might go to meet a drag queen, just to show them they’re human beings and people. They go there, and they read Dr. Seuss there. They read regular books, but it is read by a drag queen, and they have breakfast. It is not some hypersexual event, but that’s what it’s viewed as on the far right.”
