A two-man protest of “Drag Queen Story Hour” at Hoboken’s Little City Books has drag queen Harmonica Sunbeam firing back.
The protesters stood outside of the bookstore on Saturday, when Sunbeam had a 4 p.m. event scheduled, with signs reading “God made them male & female” and “Honk to protect our children.”
“It’s surprising that two men would take a beautiful Saturday afternoon to go to another town and protest, instead of living their own lives,” Sunbeam told The Jersey Journal.
Drag Queen Story Hour — as described, events where drag queens read books to children — started in San Francisco in 2015, its creators say, to give children “glamorous, positive and unabashedly queer role models." Sunbeam reads to children both in Hoboken and at Word in Jersey City, saying the events allow her to teach children about “diversity and acceptance” and "embracing who you are.”
Sunbeam once had an appearance on Long Island met with protesters, but she said none had shown up at her New Jersey events until Saturday.
"It's been overwhelmingly positive,” Sunbeam said. “It's a very simple situation. If you don't like it, don't come."
The protesters identified themselves as representing conservative Catholic group the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property. A request for comment from the group was not returned.
Public officials in Hudson County are coming to Sunbeam’s defense. Hoboken Councilman Mike DeFusco, who is gay, characterized the protest as the “kind of divisive language and intolerance” that “has no place in Hoboken, Hudson County or anywhere in our country.”
“We should be teaching children to embrace diversity and acceptance, not spreading hateful rhetoric that aims to set us back on the strides we have made to get closer to full equality,” he said in a statement.
Hoboken prides itself on its friendliness to the LGBT community. It is one of three New Jersey towns with a perfect score on Human Rights Campaign’s Municipal Equality Index, which the group says measures how cities and towns support LGBT rights.
Sunbeam will appear next at Word in Jersey City, 123 Newark Ave., at 11 a.m. on Saturday, May 11.
Terrence T. McDonald may be reached at tmcdonald@jjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @terrencemcd. Find The Jersey Journal on Facebook.