Drag story hour is “nothing apart from indoctrination and sexualisation of youngsters”, claimed Sweden Democrats politician Jonathan Sager throughout a session of the native parliament in Kalmar, southern Sweden, in 2022. He was reacting to plans to organise a drag story hour occasion on the native library, the place drag queens would learn to youngsters, difficult norms of gender and sexuality. He referred to as (unsuccessfully) for the occasion to be cancelled.
For somebody not acquainted with current political tendencies in Sweden, Sager’s view could seem out of character for a rustic recognized for its tolerance and progressive method in the direction of sexual minorities. However identical to different nations, Sweden is experiencing a backlash towards drag story hour occasions. Public libraries have repeatedly been the goal of hatred and threats from radical proper actors, together with politicians. Tradition wars, usually related to the polarised political local weather of the US, have now firmly taken root in Scandinavia.
Within the US, objections towards drag queen story hour kind half of a bigger wave of protests towards LGBTQ+ content material in libraries, additionally manifested in makes an attempt to have sure books banned. Though ebook bans should not as frequent in Sweden, tensions have arisen over what youngsters learn and who reads to them.
Because of this, public libraries, and particularly their studying promotion actions for youngsters, at the moment are on the centre of polarising conflicts between the unconventional proper and its opponents.
Sweden is way from resistant to the worldwide progress of far-right affect. Sweden Democrats (Sverigedemokraterna or SD), grew to become the second largest celebration within the nationwide parliament following the newest election in 2022. The present authorities depends upon their help to perform. The celebration has neo-nazi roots and, regardless of cleansing up appearances, its representatives nonetheless push overtly anti-immigration, white supremacist viewpoints.
Like many events of the unconventional proper, SD promotes a conservative view on tradition, gender and household, so its opposition to tug story hour isn’t a surprise. Nevertheless, there’s a deeper battle over the way forward for Swedish society at play right here, too.
We checked out 5 situations of political battle round drag occasions at libraries in Sweden, discovering frequent themes of dispute over tradition and what constitutes a great society.
‘Defending’ our youngsters
In Kalmar, in addition to in Trelleborg, one other municipality in southern Sweden, native Sweden Democrats have (unsuccessfully) tried to dam drag story hours at libraries by arguing that they had been “defending” youngsters. In Kalmar, the organiser was accused of “sexualising youngsters”, as if there’s something inherently sexual a couple of drag queen sporting a costume. Sager argued that materials that’s “gender artistic, gender essential or norm essential” shouldn’t be used for occasions involving youngsters.
Traditionally, studying promotion actions are a part of this concern of dangerous affect. As an example, sure kinds of fiction have been portrayed as having a demoralising impact, resulting in initiatives that encourage youngsters to learn “high quality literature” as an alternative. In Sweden, there may be much less of a debate across the content material of youngsters’s literature, so there aren’t US-style arguments about banning books. However there are heated conversations across the act of studying, particularly with youngsters.
Studying collectively teaches youngsters to help democratic values, similar to by fostering empathy and understanding. Drag story hour suits effectively with this angle as a result of it promotes values of acceptance, variety and constructive self-identification. These are values which can be expressions of the attribute emphasis on fairness and pluralism in Swedish cultural coverage.
However by ticking these packing containers, drag story hour clashes with the politics of the unconventional proper, making the battle emblematic of a bigger tussle over the route of Nordic cultural coverage.
The dilemma of the secure area
The dispute round drag story hour has additionally infected arguments in regards to the which means of security in a contemporary society. Is the most secure choice to deliver safety right into a library or does that very safety compromise the library as a secure area?
Within the municipalities of Älmhult and Olofström, in southern Sweden, libraries determined towards holding drag story hours due to security issues. They felt that bringing in guards was not an possibility as a result of that will be “utterly at odds” with the openness of the library. Seen safety measures had been seen as incompatible with being a secure area.
In Malmö, drag story instances went forward with safety guards in place. Right here, a choice had been made that safety measures enabled the library to be a secure area by way of drag story hour.
The controversies over drag queen story telling occasions at public libraries in Sweden continues. Lately, a drag queen story group filed a cost towards 106 individuals – together with 5 SD politicians – for hate crimes. On the identical time, public libraries in lots of components of Sweden proceed to report profitable story telling preparations within the face of opposition from the unconventional proper.
