The nice young man in the library had told us he was worried about protests when I booked tickets for Drag Queen Story Hour. We only began to hear the chants halfway through the show; they drifted up from the courtyard in front of St John’s Hall, the council building that houses Penzance library, through the window behind where my son and I were sitting. They got louder and louder – the children started looking round, puzzled, and the drag queen gesticulated at me to close the window. It took me a few moments to realise what the gestures meant – I had assumed that it was what they call ‘vogueing’ – but I eventually pushed the sash closed. But not before I heard what they were chanting: ‘Drag! Is! For! Everyone!’
It had been clear when we arrived that the counter-protestors outnumbered the protestors. There were one or two unsmiling women holding A3 placards – ‘This is not pantomime! It’s political indoctrination!’ – surrounded by a larger number of local activists.
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