Row over FlowJob drag act invited to speak at Scottish primary school

A Scottish local authority has apologised after an adult drag act with the stage name FlowJob was invited to speak at a primary school event marking LGBT History month.

By Chris McCall Monday, 24th February 2020, 4:18 pm Updated Monday, 24th February 2020, 4:46 pm

Glencoats Primary in Paisley

Renfrewshire Council said today it would not have invited the artist, who visited Glencoats Primary in Paisley last week, had it been aware of sexually explicit images shared on the performer’s social media profiles.

The actor had been introduced to pupils as “Flow” while appearing at an educational event, which was also attended by local MP Mhairi Black.

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The class was intended to discuss the legacy of the notorious Section 28 of the 1988 Local Government Act, now repealed, which was introduced by the then UK Government to ban “promotion of homosexuality” in schools.

Glencoats headteacher Michelle Watson said pupils had been keen to hear from members of the LGBT community.

“Top of the list was to invite a drag queen into school to talk about her experiences growing up and her job,” the teacher told the Paisley Daily Express last week.

“Flow met with (pupils) and parent council members and Mhairi Black to discuss what it was like growing up during Section 28 when it was illegal for school staff to talk about anything LGBT.”

But concerns were raised after images from the drag artist’s social media were brought to the attention of parents over the weekend.

One said: “While I don’t agree with the abuse being given, my kids go to this school there was no information fed to parents about this happening. Surely that’s a parents choice?”

A Renfrewshire Council spokeswoman said: “The school pupils at Glencoats Primary are currently organising a series of activities and events to mark LGBT history month.

“In discussion with pupils in their Rainbow Club, one of their requests was to invite people from the LGBT community to hear about their own experiences growing up and they wanted to invite a drag queen to talk to this group to hear about their own personal experience.

“Learning about values including equalities and diversity has an important role in the school curriculum.

“All school visits are arranged and managed with the wellbeing of pupils first and foremost however it is clear in this case, the social media content associated with the speaker’s stage persona is not appropriate for children and had we been aware of this, the visit would not have been arranged.

“We are sorry for the concern this has caused and are investigating.”

But SNP MP Black defended the event.

“You just know that the people pretending to be livid that a drag queen read a book in a school are also the people who run out to buy their kids the latest Grand Theft Auto on release day,” she said in a Twitter message. “Your homophobia is transparent.”

She added: “If my school had invited a gay MP and a drag queen to visit during LGBT History Month, or even acknowledged that LGBT History Month existed, it would have made an immeasurable difference to the difficult childhoods my LGBT classmates and I had.”

Drag Queen Story hour originated in San Francisco and has since been adopted by several schools in the UK.

On Twitter, the performer invited to the school said: “Yes ‘Flowjob’ is my stage name, but I was introduced as ‘Flow’ and I’ll have you know when the children were asked what they wanted at LGBT+ History Month, the first thing they wanted was a ‘drag queen’.”

She added: “It was amazing to see what the kids have learned, we live in a time where kids will be going to school with two mums/dads or LGBT+ family, we are showing them that it’s normal.