MassResistance parents in Pocatello, Idaho, continue to win culture war battles against the leftists in power.
Radical library employee resigns after parents won’t back down.
Drag Queen event moves out of library – but its new venue gets “cancelled” by prominent non-profit.
The pendulum is moving the right way!
April 3, 2023
Pocatello, Idaho, is one of the few liberal-leaning towns in the state. In recent years the local leftists –particularly those running local Marshall Public Library – have been bullying conservatives into silence with their LGBT activism, pornographic books for children and teenagers, and sexually perverted Drag Queen events for young children.
But now that parents in Pocatello have formed a MassResistance activist group, citizens have started fighting back. They are pressuring the public officials to stop providing obscenity to children. Things are beginning to change.
Parents fight back and unnerve the leftists
On January 17, 2023, the Library Board got word that a large group of MassResistance parents were coming to the meeting to complain about the library’s pornographic books for children. So three of the five Board members didn’t show up, causing the meeting to be cancelled for lack of a quorum. But the parents proceeded to hold a meeting of their own!
On January 19, the Library Director held an internal staff meeting - which MassResistance exposed to the public - stating bluntly that "there's no pornography or obscenity in the library."
On February 11, the library held a Drag Queen reading time for children. But a group of MassResistance parents came early and took up all the seats in the room. It completely stymied the event!
Radical library employee resigns after parents won’t back down!
At the following Library Board meeting on February 21, more parents than ever before came and filled the room. Some leftist pro-LGBT activists also came to defend the obscene books and Drag Queen event in the library.
The Library Board continued its hostile (and undemocratic) reaction to the parents’ outrage. During the public comment section, the Board allowed testimony by only six people of the approximately 70 who came.
The MassResistance parents who were allowed to testify made the best of it and read aloud from the obscene library books. They made sure everyone in the room knew exactly how bad the problem is.
Rowan Smith, an employee of the Marshall Public Library, was called on to speak. Smith is a woman who “identifies” as a man and is also vice president of the Drag Queen group that had been coming into the library to read to children.
Her speech was an angry rant against MassResistance and the parents. She served up the tiresome LGBT talking point that those who disagreed with her are “haters.” She said that the Drag Queen event is meant to be “a vehicle for gay cultural expression” for children. She said she is tired of hearing parents say that it is “indecent, immoral, abnormal, or sexual in nature.”
She falsely accused the parents of handing out pamphlets in the library saying that "being transgender makes me a pedophile and transgenders should not be allowed to exist." There are no such pamphlets, and that never happened.
This is meant to intimidate parents from discussing the truth: Transgenderism is a mental illness. And pedophiles groom young children with sexual topics.
This led to another well-worn LGBT talking point – the childish (and absurd) whine that she is now unsafe. “Whenever I enter the library as a patron or an employee, I am scared,” she said.
But throughout the meeting, despite the fact that the Library Board did their best to muzzle the room full of MassResistance parents, the Board got an earful from those parents who testified. They were very upset and didn’t hold back.
Rowan Smith’s offensive remarks and outright lies outraged a lot of parents. She viciously labeled them as hateful and possibly violent. But none of them were backing down. Right after that Library Board meeting, MassResistance wrote to the library and demanded that Smith be placed on administrative leave and issue an official apology.
One week after the meeting, however, our local team learned that Rowan Smith had quit her job at the library. Good riddance! According to our sources in the library, she quit because she said she felt “unsafe” due to the “hostile working environment.” We suspect that the real reason is that she realized she could no longer intimidate the parents.
But unfortunately, other LGBT activists like Smith are still pushing their radical agendas in public libraries across America.
Drag Queen event withdraws from the library
March 9, 2023, two weeks after the Library Board meeting, the Drag Queen group in Pocatello, called “Reading Time with The Queens,” announced they would be moving their children’s event from the Marshall Public Library to Temple Emanuel, a local liberal synagogue. They again trotted out the phony LGBT talking point of crying about “safety”:
“Our priority is and always has been the safety of children and their family members. We are not interested in engaging in the theater of exercising our right to exist peaceably in public. It has become clear to us that Marshall Public does not have the ability to keep our participants safe.”
This is dishonest and misleading. There was never any issue of safety in the library or anywhere else. The parents had always been very peaceful, orderly, and unthreatening. But they would not back down from stating their opinions, which infuriates the LGBT movement.
The temple gets “cancelled”
For a long time, Christian groups in the region have provided funding and support to the local Temple Emanuel. But this latest move appears to have crossed a line.
One of our activists has been informed that a prominent Christian group (whose mission is to support Israel) has cut off contact with the temple – and has cancelled a planned 100-year anniversary celebration for them – after finding out that the temple was promoting a Drag Queen event for children.
Final thoughts
There's much more to come from Pocatello.
Word has certainly gotten out about these successes! As of this writing, other parents throughout eastern Idaho are asking for MassResistance’s help to fight the LGBT and Drag Queen push targeting children in their communities. We are eager to work with them!
Please help us continue to do our uncompromising work!
Our successes depend on people like you.
Your support will make the difference!