Freedom movement protesters descended on a Monash City Council meeting in Melbourne on Wednesday night to hurl abuse at councillors and demand the cancellation of an upcoming drag queen story time event.
The estimated crowd of 170 people continuously called the councillors “paedophiles”, accused them of parading “sex in front of our children”, and yelled for them to be sacked and arrested. Repeated chants of “shame on you” and “hands off our kids” forced Mayor Tina Samardzija to halt the already delayed meeting.
Victorian police were called in to help contain the “unusually high volume of people” at the council’s Glen Waverley office. In a statement to Crikey, they said that no arrests were made.
Monash Council said that security was enlisted and police alerted about the potential for trouble prior to the meeting following an influx of violent and abusive messages via email, social media and phone relating to the library drag event scheduled for May 19.
“Council is used to working and communicating with people in a heightened state, but the level of anger related to this issue has been concerning — with direct approaches to councillors and staff at times overstepping the line of what we believe to be appropriate,” the council’s CEO, Dr Andi Diamond, told Crikey.
The council was bracing for “more people than usual” and a flood of questions, with 30 questions lodged in advance.
The anti-trans protests, led by a group called “Voice for Kids”, stalled the start of Wednesday’s council meeting and temporarily suspended proceedings once they kicked off.
According to the group’s website, its remit is to “send a clear message to Monash councillors that drag queen shows are not appropriate for children”.
The group appears to be spearheaded by prominent anti-lockdown advocate Monica Smit, also at the helm of the group Reignite Democracy Australia that has spruiked conspiracy theories relating to vaccines, lockdowns, 5G, and extreme weather events.
Taking to Twitter, Smit denied any association with Voice for Kids other than helping to “create a basic website”.
The Reignite Democracy Australia and Voice for Kids websites share a designer (Coral Designs), while a domain search shows both are registered to Smit. The Voice for Kids author page also lists a “Perry”, which Crikey understands to be Perry Thorp, author and photographer for Reignite Democracy Australia.
In the lead-up to the event, Reignite Democracy Australia’s Twitter account posted a picture of anti-trans signage and declared: “Someone is ready for tonight 🙂 NOTE – we are not ANTI-trans…we are ANTI-using tax payers funds for ex porn stars to read books to our children,” before linking through to the Voice for Kids website.
Despite the campaign online and in person to pressure the council to scrap the event, Diamond said Monash was committed to delivering the event to support their LGBTQIA+ community and asked people to “respect this choice”.
There are two things I hate most, intolerance of any kind, and the Dutch!
What is wrong with these people? If you don’t want to go to a book reading because a fancy dress character will read the book…… don’t! Stay at home. Howl at the moon. Do whatever.
Cookers will be cookers.
This American style Alt-right garbage needs to be exported back to the good ol’ USA.
Terrible movie. But fabulous quote.
Hmmmmmm. Avi Yemeni was in the crowd. I’ll take a wild guess & say there’s a swag of protesters in attendance that aren’t from Glen Waverley at all. Anti Vax/Mask/Mandate types with nothing better to do.
Avi Yemini was in the crowd!!
God help us!!
Say no more!!
If people do not know what I am talking about, then ‘fish around’ on the internet and subscribe (for free of course) to his newsletters. (He works for an outfit called “Rebel News”.)
well i prefer, Convicted wife-basher, Avi Yemini,
as in I prefer to preface his name with the fact that he is a family violence offender and as such, a real possible danger to children
He needs something to take the attention from his behaviours/actions so why not turn it onto the trans community. There are enough other abusive POS’s that do the same to hide amongst.
Monash Council should simply proceed with the booking and put security in place. Meanwhile, LGBTQ allies nearby should be attending the event and/or standing outside in solidarity against all the nasty potentially violent fringe far right groups that the chopping board chucker’s video is likely to stir up.
The whole gambit of these synthetic outrage public meetings is to make fair-weather allies of corporations and government by intimidating them into cancelling events. The participants are only enraged because because bad-faith actors on the Internet misinform them that their kids are at risk. They go for councils in particular because they know these organisations don’t want to risk any WHS issues and are likely to cut some poor performer off from his livelihood.
Strange that blackshirts showing up and acting menacingly is A-OK but a man in a silly frock and wig teachin’ book-learnin’ is not.
It seems that the message this group is actually giving to the Monash Council is that they are not appropriate parents for children. I wonder how many of them are parents and how many of them reside in Monash.
It would seem they prefer violence and abuse than the reading of a book. I’m with you. The example they are setting their children is that violence and abuse is acceptable. Violence can shape young people’s attitudes. Very concerning.
Yes, I have also been wondering what goes on behind the closed doors of the homes of people so filled with hate.
We’ve now got a good, up close look at Steven Crowder and how he treated his pregnant wife. I’d be surprised if any of these “heroes” behave any better.
The crowd who gate-crashed the Monash City Council meeting are an absolutely despicable and ignorant bunch. The people who they (the mob), wish to persecute are entitled to be treated with respect until or unless they show that they do not deserve to be treated in such a way. I would be more than happy to allow any of my grandchildren to be read to or otherwise entertained by any member of the community that the mob disapprove of. Of course there are pedaphiles in our midst. But they can come from all sorts of backgrounds and should be weeded out, no matter what background they come from. But is is absolutely wrong to stigmatize one particular group.
Hear hear.
Let’s not forget that the paedophiles they are so obsessed with prefer to blend into society, hide, and try not to draw massive amounts of attention to themselves. They’re the least likely to put on a seriously flamboyant outfit, make-up, shoes, and wig then wander around looking for kids to fiddle. Also let’s not forget about “projection”.