On February 18, Shanna Banana and Brandy Snap, two drag-queen artists from Toulouse, were to lead a reading workshop for 3-year-old children at the José-Cabanis media library in Toulouse, during a series of meetings as part of of the month “Queer”. But, under the pressure of a campaign on social networks, the municipality decided to “reschedule” this meeting and reserve it for an adult audience.
Launched by the far-right group Furie française, born from the ashes of Génération identitaire, dissolved in March 2021, the campaign denounced a spectacle “hypersexualized”, “political propaganda paid for by your taxes”. In addition to the distribution of flyers, a petition collected nearly 4,300 signatures, and comments on the networks flourished: “ignominy”, “leftist pedophiles”, “mistakes of nature”, “depravity”…
Tuesday, January 24, in a “appeasement concern”the town hall announced “the deprogramming of a reading workshop for children, to finally accommodate only an adult audience”. In a press release, she states that “this choice of programming, which did not give rise to any visa or endorsement from elected officials, can destabilize part of the public. This is obviously not the will of the community.
“Deplorable setback”
In the aftermath, the mayor Jean-Luc Moudenc (ex-Les Républicains) however requested the dissolution of the group from the Ministry of the Interior in “Strongly condemning any form of extremism, threat or discriminatory expression towards Shanna Banana and Brandy Snap, who operate in the workshop in question”. The group Furie française, on its Instagram account, welcomed this deprogramming: “Mr. Moudenc therefore recognizes that this workshop is a disgrace, but he nevertheless seeks to intimidate those who denounce his compromises with wokism. » Before promising “other victories of this type”.
The municipal opposition, for its part, reacted through the voice of Antoine Maurice, from the environmental group on the municipal council, who finds “deplorable that Moudenc is backing down and giving in to pressure from the far right”. “We are far from the humanist values that he sometimes advocates and we ask him to reconsider his decision”he told the Monde.
The two artists, Shanna Banana and Brandy Snap, specify that they have been leading this kind of reading for more than five years in bookstores, associative places and media libraries, “for young and old, to promote self-acceptance, respect, tolerance, awareness of harassment and all forms of discrimination”. Shanna Banana and Brandy Snap have finally decided to cancel the scheduled reading. But several events around the theme “Queer: good chic, good gender” are still noted on the February agenda of the media library with the mention “All public” or “Adult”.