When you hear that students at Grace Church School in New York City are required to attend chapel for one hour every other week, you may assume that it’s a devout religious institution.
You may think differently, however, when you hear that the prestigious, expensive school recently turned over its chapel to an LGBT “pride” event featuring a star drag queen who goes by the stage name “Brita Filter.”
According to a report in The Post Millennial, the event included “twerking” students in the chapel and people handing out “pride flag” stickers, telling students that if they didn’t take one, they were homophobic.
(Here at The Western Journal, we’re hardly surprised at this turn of events, as we’ve seen plenty of schools bring in drag performers under various guises as part of LGBT “pride” education. We’re opposed to this kind of grooming and will continue to oppose it at every turn. If you do, too, please consider supporting our work by subscribing.)
The Post Millennial article, published Tuesday, indicated the event happened on April 27. The author was Paul Rossi, a former math teacher at the school from 2012 to 2021. He was “relieved of his teaching duties” after blowing the whistle about critical race theory infiltrating the school’s curriculum.
It was the sixth annual “pride” event in the chapel — again, mandatory for students in grades 9-12 to attend — and the main attraction was the aforementioned “Brita Filter.” (Driver’s license name: Jesse Havea.) He’s appeared on “RuPaul’s Drag Race” as a contestant and keeps a high profile on social media.
Havea, who identifies as “pansexual,” danced at the event — and students said they were pressured into dancing along, as well, according to Rossi.
WARNING: The following tweet contains graphic language that some viewers will find offensive.
Students pressured to celebrate “pansexual” drag queen at school chapel as teacher resigns over misuse of pronounshttps://t.co/3zRewBhnwf
— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) July 26, 2022
“There was tons of social pressure to dance along and pretend like it was normal for sure,” one anonymous student said, “whether it be people tapping on shoulders and telling them to stand up or just a collective staring contest at whoever wasn’t totally participating.”
“Immediately upon entering there was a person handing out stickers with pride flags on them, unironically saying ‘take one or you’re homophobic.’”
The event was run by Spectrum, the school’s LGBT affinity group. The students forced to attend could only watch in horror as the drag queen’s plans for them were revealed — to be exposed to a tawdry, revolting performance aimed at normalizing bizarre sexual practices.
“I wondered, is this really happening in a chapel?” one student told Rossi.
The school’s website described the event rather tamely.
“The audience was treated to a surprise guest — world-renowned drag queen, Brita Filter,” it reads.
“After a performance of ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow,’ Brita sat with Director of Vocal Music, Andrew Leonard, to answer questions about drag, representation and what pride month symbolizes.
“Student members of Spectrum shared their own stories and experiences of identity and belonging at Grace, before the Grace Notes closed out the chapel with a performance of Rina Sayayama’s ‘Chosen Family.’”
However, as one of the students who talked to the Post Millennial noted, Havea certainly celebrated pride in more ways than one.
The student said that “it’s notable that this person consistently called themselves fabulous and talented and beautiful. Not just once or twice, but over and over this person reassured themselves that way.”
Here’s a Money magazine profile of Havea, tallying up the costs of being so “fabulous.”
“One student reported that as the performer approached the altar, he was joined by more dancing students, some of them ‘twerking,’” Rossi’s report noted.
Despite the fact the Grace Church School hosted this event, the program also featured a teacher who used the occasion to resign because the school allegedly isn’t inclusive enough in pronoun usage for transgenders.
Uyen Nguyen — who self-identifies as “The Gay Agender Teacher Nguyen,” according to Rossi — announced she was resigning over being misgendered. Nguyen, apparently, wants to be referred to as “they” in the third person.
Nguyen, a student told Rossi, told the students “how much they loved the gay kids at school, and how this has been the most inclusive and accepting place they’ve ever been, but it’s the administration she cannot work with.”
Should drag performers be allowed in schools?
“The administration is not supportive of their identity,” the student told Rossi. “They kept just saying that they were getting misgendered and people weren’t using their pronouns.”
In March, Nguyen told a reporter for the school paper, the Grace Gazette, that pronoun usage had been a “stressor” for her, since faculty had been “slower” to adopt to non-binary pronouns. (She conceded, however, that “almost everyone is trying” and were “well-intentioned.”)
The school’s environment, Nguyen said, “needs work … It has a ways to go before it is a fully safe and inclusive environment for nonbinary or trans people. … I don’t want the students to be feeling those things cause we’re supposed to be creating a safe space for them.”
The school — where tuition runs $46,000 a year — created a safe-enough space that it was willing to do all this in what’s ostensibly supposed to be a religious venue.
One student who attended told Rossi there was “tons of social pressure to dance along and pretend that this was normal for church.”
Even Havea apparently expressed surprise he was there, noting it was the first time he had performed in a church.
Sadly, with the way things are going, it won’t be the last, either.
