I moved to Arkansas before I was a father, so I can’t say that I’d even be thinking about this topic ten years ago, that’s for certain. Recently, though, my state’s governor signed a bill that rolls back child labor laws to the point that my ten year old son could possibly work at the business my family owns and has run here in our small Arkansas town for the last five years.
The only problem? My family’s business is a drag bar.
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Every Sunday, we do the best brunch in town, regardless of whether you can also catch a great drag show while you eat. And you can most certainly do that at our bar. To be honest, we’d never thought about little Jakey coming onboard, not yet anyway. But when Huckabee Sanders said that he could work if he wanted to, I have to admit, the thought of having some extra help on our bouncer team was intriguing. Not many people would mess with a ten year old bouncer; hell they’d probably find him too cute to step to.
The problem is, though, I’m not sure if my kid is allowed to work at a drag bar. As much as I don’t think the time honored theatrical art form of drag is sinister or immoral, a whole lot of people here do, and they probably wouldn’t take kindly to my kid being at a drag bar, much less working for it. I guess I just don’t know whether my kid has the freedom to work whatever job the family needs him to, or if the state has now made all my parenting decisions for me, and has already determined what kinds of content my kid can see in public?
So if anyone out there knows, drop me a line. It seems odd to me that a kid would be old enough to work in a coal mine, but not old enough to see a man in a dress dancing to showtunes, but then again, I stopped trying to understand how America works a long time ago, and just try to make as few waves as possible, really.
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@jamboschlarmbo Interesting question here. Arkansas satire lgtbq🏳️🌈 childlabor politics political transrights dragshows politik
