Not Everything Is Bigger In Texas: Latest Dumbass Anti-Drag Bill Appears To Outlaw Breast Enhancements
from the assuming-this-will-be-enforced-by-the-gropiest-of-cops dept
I cannot even begin to understand the unfettered amount of dumbshittery being passed off as legislating in the public’s interest by politicians far more performative than any drag queen I’ve had the pleasure of observing.
Full disclosure: I never did live deep in the heart of Texas, which I assume is the cholesterol-clogged artery known as “Houston.” But I did live for 15 years in El Paso, Texas, which, to be fair, was far more Mexico and/or New Mexico than actual Texas. I mean, if you were going to develop an accent, it would be the one that uses a tilde rather than the one that simply jettisons hard g’s to allow words to just kind of sprawl out of someone’s moth.
I will reference Texas and my subjective experiences as an almost-Texan for a decade-and-a-half later in this post, but first let’s get to the text of this ridiculous piece of performance art [PDF] Texas state senators actually think is worthy of the governor’s signature. (h/t independent journalist Erin Reed)
It’s a blatantly unconstitutional attempt to ban drag shows. It tries to close any drag show-friendly loopholes by piling on even more unconstitutionality. It’s part-and-parcel with dozens of bullshit, playing-to-the-basest-of-the-voter-base pieces of legislation being pushed (and passed!) by people who are both incredibly stupid and incredibly selfish. These are the acts of sub-humans who are absolutely unwilling to engage with anyone that doesn’t adhere exactly with their preconceptions of “normal.” Fuck these people. All of them.
But here’s the text of the passed Texas Senate bill, which will outlaw far more than the “drag” people these hideous public “servants” so obviously and publicly hate:
AN ACT relating to the authority to regulate sexually oriented performances and to restricting those performances on the premises of a commercial enterprise, on public property, or in the presence of an individual younger than 18 years of age; authorizing a civil penalty; creating a criminal offense.
Reading only this part of the bill, one might think this is a common sense move meant to limit children’s exposure to sexual activity. But you only have to start reading the definitions and specifics directly after this opening paragraph to understand that this is meant to punish only certain people and, inadvertently, criminalize a lot of “sexually oriented performances” Texas politicians know and love.
To wit, the list of forbidden “sexual conduct” includes all of the following:
(1) “Sexual conduct” means:
(A) the exhibition or representation, actual or simulated, of sexual acts, including vaginal sex, anal sex, and masturbation;
(B) the exhibition or representation, actual or simulated, of male or female genitals in a lewd state, including a state of sexual stimulation or arousal;
(C) the exhibition of a device designed and marketed as useful primarily for the sexual stimulation of male or female genitals;
(D) actual contact or simulated contact occurring between one person and the buttocks, breast, or any part of the genitals of another person; or
(E) the exhibition of sexual gesticulations using accessories or prosthetics that exaggerate male or female sexual characteristics.
Wow. This list of things this outlaws includes (but is goddamn not limited to) all of the following:
- Any movie containing a simulated sex act, whether or not the depiction is explicit (a list that includes plenty of movies not restricted to people over the age of 17)
- Any sex education material depicting the aroused state of human genitals (hello, schools!)
- The display of any sexual/marital aids, like those commonly sold by “adult” stores
- Dancing anywhere at any time, especially when inebriated
- Breast implants, push-up bras, the old-tube-sock-in-the-pants trick, girdles, corsets, slimming/enhancing undergarments, swimming in cold water (women only), and god knows what else. (And not my god, btw. All glory to Bastet.)
And that’s only the low-hanging fruit this wording suggests. There’s plenty more this law could be read to outlaw. I’m sure our readers will find dozens of examples of activities/accessories criminalized by this legislation.
It’s not just badly written. It’s broadly, stupidly, vindictively written with the sole intent of inflicting civil and criminal pain on not just participants in drag shows, but anyone who doesn’t clearly define themselves as either male or female. And those who define themselves as either male or female but don’t fit the stereotype these legislators wish to perpetuate.
It not only attempts to curb protected expression, it seeks to impose a moral code that will be poorly defined by bigots and selectively enforced by lower level bigots wearing badges. It will be a permission slip for prosecutors to fine and jail people just because they’re the people the worst people in Texas don’t like.
This law certainly won’t survive a constitutional challenge. But the state’s politicians are playing with other people’s money. It will never cost them anything (perhaps not even their reputations) to bring bills like this to draw cheers from the most craven of the constituents. And it will cost them nothing personally to defend indefensible legislation in court.
In the end, they get to walk way with the love of people who love hating anyone they don’t immediately understand, which tends to translate into votes. And any loss they receive in court will be greeted as, at the very least, a Pyrrhic victory that further exposes the inherent untrustworthiness of any form of constitutionally-guaranteed check/balance that was erected for exactly this reason: to prevent legislators from engaging in their basest impulses.
This bill is going to pose problems for things Texans love. As a longtime resident of El Paso, I can state affirmatively there was a general public thirst for strip clubs and other forms of, shall we say, “alternative” adult entertainment. Most of the strip clubs got pushed to the outskirts of town, but a very long strip of Montana Street housed nothing but strip club after strip club for years, providing a one-stop shop for simulated sexual activity for all the years I lived there. Perhaps this is still the case. Even if it isn’t, stripping is big business everywhere, even in Texas, and this bill inadvertently targets the sort of sexual activity politicians (and their big business benefactors) have traditionally enjoyed as part of free exchange of mutually beneficial ideas.
I can also say I cannot understand the supposed threat posed by drag shows. While it does make sense to prevent children from seeing sexually oriented shows, drag queens, in and of themselves, are not sexually explicit. As a nascent drinker, I spent a lot of time at one El Paso nightclub in particular: one that had a few extremely beneficial qualities. First, the doormen rarely carded anyone, which worked out for me because I was still 18 and the drinking age had been raised to 21 a few years earlier. Second, the club played a shitload of good techno and house music, which was in short supply in El Paso. And third, the house-heavy nights involved drag queen shows, none of which made me fear for my soul, my sexuality, or the future of the state. They were entertaining as hell, and were undeniably acts of personal expression — the sort of thing that has always been protected by the First Amendment.
To sum up: the people pushing and passing these bills are the worst sort of people. They’ve already decided certain humans are on a lower plane. And not only have they decided they’re simply better than some people, they’ve decided to use their power to punish the people they feel are worse than they are. At one point, we could have just hoped these social dinosaurs would soon be dead. But every day, younger and younger bigots are gaining power and inflicting their morality on others by weaponizing the very government that is supposed to representing the entirety of the governed, not just the people those doing the governing prefer to associate with. We wouldn’t put up with these bills if they appeared to obliquely target certain races, or women, or religious groups. We certainly shouldn’t tolerate them just because they target certain expressions of identity.
Filed Under: drag show ban, drag shows, texas
