Why are American tax dollars going to this? We need politicians who will put a stop to this nonsense.
U.S. State Department
officials defended themselves Sunday after awarding Ecuador a grant of over $20,000 for a cultural center to host drag shows for LGBTQ communities in the South American country.Earlier this week, Fox News
reported
the State Department began promoting “diversity and inclusion efforts” using taxpayer dollars to fund “drag shows in South America. Such efforts included a $20,600 grant to the non-profit Centro Ecuatoriano Norteamericano (CEN). The center would use the money on three workshops, a two-minute documentary, and 12 drag theater performances until Aug. 31, 2023.Doubling down on their stance, a State Department spokesperson told Fox News Digital in a statement that the grant funds programs in Ecuador to incorporate and conceptualize “diversity, inclusion, and representation to equity and accessibility.” Of the number of programs sponsored by American tax dollars, one aims to use the arts to raise awareness about diversity and inclusivity, which gives LGBTQ people an outlet “to express themselves freely and safely.”
“In September 2022, the U.S. Department of State awarded a grant to the Centro Cultural Ecuatoriano Norteamericano Abraham Lincoln, a U.S.-Ecuadorian cultural center in Cuenca, Ecuador, for a program that uses the arts to raise awareness about diversity and inclusion,” the spokesperson said. “The program’s goal is to promote tolerance, and the arts provide new opportunities for LGBTQI+ Ecuadorians to express themselves freely and safely.”
The spokesperson said that facilitators and artists in Cuenca would collaborate with a local theater company to create workshops and plays, which would be video documented.
“LGBTQI+ people across the globe deserve to live in societies free from targeted violence and discrimination,” the spokesperson said. “Recent data suggest an alarming and deadly rise in violence against LGBTQI+ persons in Ecuador.”