July 25, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – Drag queens reading kids stories about homosexuality and transgenderism appears to be the latest craze sweeping public libraries in the United States and Canada.

On July 21, the “Intellectual Freedom committee” of the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) published a blog post detailing highlights from the American Library Association (ALA) annual conference in New Orleans. ALSC is a division of ALA with the stated mission of “build[ing] healthy, successful futures for all children.”

“Interested in bringing Drag Queen Storytime to your library?” one of the bullet points read. “ALSC Committee Members received tips for optimizing success from library pioneers who have already done it. We also had the chance to meet a Drag Queen who talked about the value of offering this program, including fostering empathy, tolerance, creativity, imagination and fun.”

It refers readers to the official website of Drag Queen Story Hour (DQSH), a program centered around “drag queens reading stories to children in libraries, schools, and bookstores.” It was created by drag queen Michelle Tea and RADAR Productions in San Francisco.

The group’s express purpose is capturing the “imagination and play of the gender fluidity of childhood” and giving children “unabashedly queer role models,” so kids can “imagine a world where people can present as they wish, where dress up is real.”

The website quotes Brooklyn Public Library youth & family services director Judy Zuckerman as endorsing the program because it “celebrates diversity” and encourages children to “embrace unfettered exploration of self.”

San Francisco librarians claimed to the Guardian that no taxpayer funds are involved, as the privately-run nonprofit Friends of the Library pays a $250 stipend to DQSH’s production company for every event. Regardless, the events’ content features a great deal of content most parents would deem offensive and, at the very least, not age-appropriate.

The group’s photos depict men wearing fake breasts and a wide variety of garish women’s clothing reading with children as young as infants, highlight two drag queens with the sexually-suggestive names Lady Busty and Miss Shameless, and promote the upcoming “children’s” book Born Bad by C.K. Smouha. Born Bad is about a wolf who doesn’t want to be a wolf, meets a variety of animals who can change their physical characteristics, and ultimately dresses up as a sheep.

The website cites a variety of favorable media coverage that contains several revealing details, such as a Guardian report revealing that one drag queen read a “book about how families can have a mom and a dad or just one mom or two dads,” Tea’s admission to LA Weekly that the “books we choose are about social justice,” and the New Yorker’s account of drag queen Lil Miss Hot Mess attempting to get an audience of kids to repeat, “When I grow up, I want to be a drag queen.”

DQSH also sells a “Dragtivity Book” targeted at children between the ages of four and twelve. It “gives kids an inside look into what it’s like to be a drag queen,” encouraging “children and the adults in their lives to continue exploring drag and gender together” through activities such as “Create your own drag name” and “Circle your pronouns.”

As LifeSiteNews reported last week, similar events are taking place in Canadian libraries, as well, promoting similar “stories of acceptance, diversity and all different types of families” to expose small children to LGBT concepts and “non-binary” people.

“LGBT activists are determined to teach their ideology to children, and have focused their efforts on infiltrating the public school system, influencing the sex education curriculum, and ensuring that the concepts such as gender fluidity are taught from the earliest possible age,” Jonathon Van Maren wrote. “Drag queens and children’s stories about transgenderism are in—and so, again, at yet another venue—Christian parents must be out.”

In May, children’s book author Amelia Hamilton argued at Acculturated that giving DQSH time on library grounds still ultimately constitutes taxpayer support for “hyper-politicized story times that teach kids to fall into line with left-wing values.” She also contrasted liberals’ embrace of drag queens with their hostility to exposing kids to any form of conservative thought.

“As the author of two patriotic (and apolitical) children’s books, I can attest to the fact that the left is highly suspicious of exposing children to anything that could potentially be considered conservative,” Hamilton wrote. “The hate mail I received for educational books about America’s founding proved that liberals were extremely uncomfortable with patriotism, which they see as political.”

“What sort of outcry would there be if there were a children’s event promoting American exceptionalism or traditional values? An event with books about gun rights or the value of life in the womb?” she asked. “No, that would never do.”

ALSC was in the news last month after it decided to drop “Little House on the Prairie” author Laura Ingalls Wilder from the name of its annual award for children’s book authors.

The association declared that Wilder’s literary legacy “includes expressions of stereotypical attitudes inconsistent with ALSC’s core values of inclusiveness, integrity and respect, and responsiveness.”