Credit: Scene Archives Photo
Meeting with student leaders last week, John Carroll University president broke the news that the annual campus drag show would not go on as planned this semester.

The JCU event, which was known to showcase local drag talent and feature a question and answer session post-performance, has run yearly since 2013 and reportedly attracted around 150 people last year. 

After that performance, a viral student opinion piece stirred controversy with its anti-LGBTQ rhetoric. The author Declan Leary, op/ed editor of the Carroll News at the time, even called upon school president Michael D. Johnson to end the campus drag show and “purge this place of the evils which have invaded it in the names of tolerance and progress.”

Following the article’s publication and subsequent backlash, various school officials spoke with Leary and his editors, but the Carroll News stood by the piece, citing the First Amendment. The newspaper later printed letters to the editor that supported the drag show and LGBTQ students.

In the recent meeting with students, Johnson reportedly said he wanted to take a neutral stance on the whole debate and that not having the drag show could help accomplish that goal. 

Students in both student government and LGBTQ groups on campus plan to protest the decision in the weeks to come as well as offer various educational forums surrounding the topic. Plans for drag queens to be a part of the school’s diversity week are still in the works.

Sign up for Scene’s weekly newsletters to get the latest on Cleveland news, things to do and places to eat delivered right to your inbox.

9 replies on “John Carroll University Officials Put an End to Annual Campus Drag Show”

  1. Now if we can get the drag shows off tv, that would truly be a blessing. Fine entertainment for a club or even the circus, but definite scarier than the clowns.

  2. PUSSIES! Afraid maybe some gay germs and gay cooties might be catching?
    Jesus Christ! (Yeah, that, too…)

  3. Congratulations, you’re all idiots. Mind ya damn business and dont attend the event if you’re to close minded and judgmental of what people, who got nothing to do with you, do. Let people be happy. Find something better to do with your time.

  4. When theY added the TQ+, they no longer represented me. The TQ+ should get their own movement and stop dragging down gays.

  5. It’s been going on longer than that, but perhaps not annually. I graduated in 2008 and it occurred a couple of times during my years.

  6. Perversity NOT diversity was the hallmark of this disgusting LGBT circus. God made two Genders: Boys and Girls.Period.
    Navyman

  7. Maybe they can replace the drag show with a panty raid, since JCU seems to be still stuck in 1959.

Comments are closed.