Tipsheet

Muslim Lawmaker Condemns Anti-Catholic Drag Queens

Last week, California's first Muslim state legislator condemned an anti-Catholic horde of drag queens after one of its ranking members, a gay-pornographic director, was among the ultra-liberal legislature's laundry list of LGBTQ honorees for Pride Month.

Brandishing a "Religious Bigotry Is Bigotry" sign, Assemblyman Bill Essayli—the first Muslim American elected to the state legislature—walked off the Assembly floor Monday at the California state Capitol in protest of a Senate-led Pride recognition ceremony honoring an activist drag-queen performer from the "Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence," whose transvestite devotees cross-dress as Roman Catholic nuns and assume vile, sacrilegious names, such as "Sisters Porn Again" and "T'aint A Virgin."

"This group engages in outrageous displays of mockery and ridicule against more than one billion Catholics worldwide," Essayli, a Republican and the son of Lebanese immigrants, wrote in a scathing Instagram post on Monday night. "An attack against one faith is an attack on all faith. Bigotry of any kind cannot be tolerated, or worse yet, formally dignified by the State of California."

The so-called "Sisters," whose motto is "Go forth and sin some more!"—a perversion of Jesus's command from John 8:11 to "Go and sin no more," are known for their public denigration of the Catholic faith. This past Easter Sunday, the "Order" hosted a "Jesus and Mary-themed striptease" at San Fran's Dolores Park where a pole dancer was "writhing upside down on a large wooden cross," according to the San Francisco Chronicle. A viral video on Twitter showed a male stripper gyrating on another man pretending to be the crucified Christ. Shirtless men were also there competing to be crowned the "hunkiest" Jesus along with contestants vying to win the group's longtime "Foxy Mary" contest, in which a pro-abortion version of the Virgin Mary won.

The GOP freshman lawmaker also blasted state Sen. Scott Wiener in an Instagram story, where he photographed the Democrat escorting his guest of "dis-honor," Bay Area fetishist Michael Williams a.k.a. "Sister Roma," en route to the Assembly chamber.


Bill Essayli (Instagram) 

Caked in drag makeup, the longtime San Francisco-based "Sister" trotted out, wearing a black jumpsuit and a headset of feathery plumes in imitation of a nun's habit, to receive an award recognizing the drag queen's pro-LGBTQ career highlights.

What's excluded from the Assembly speech is Williams being a 20-year veteran in the "adult film industry" where he currently serves as the communications ambassador and "art director" producing pornography for NakedSword/Falcon Studios Group, the #1 gay-porn site with the most-watched gay pornos. A regular fixture at "adult entertainment" red-carpet events, Williams has presented pornography award shows across America like Chicago's Grabbys, GayVNs in Los Angeles, and the Cybersockets.

Promoting the 2007 "all-ages" Folsom Street Fair, where naked men offered oral sex on the streets and toddler-sized bondage gear was sold with pacifer ball-gags strapped to child mannequins, Williams was featured front-and-center for an ad alongside well-known LGBTQ figures in fetish attire recreating Leonardo da Vinci's "The Last Supper." In the controversial advertisement calling on fellow bondage-enthusiasts to "prepare your mortal flesh for the kinkiest weekend on Earth," Williams was seated at a table draped with the Gay Leather Pride flag and cluttered with sex toys, whips, and a hoard of various BDSM-style restraints.

At the festival itself, the "Sisters" were the gatekeepers, under a decades-long partnership, allowing entry to thousands of children as young as two-years-old, who found themselves "surrounded by strangers in fishnets and leather crotch pouches, semi and fully nude men." Even publicly masturbating attendees objected to the kids' presence at the sadomasochistic fair.

Echoing last month's Los Angeles Dodgers drag-queen drama involving the same Ru Paul rejects at the center of anti-Catholic controversy, statehouse Republicans had demanded that Williams be disinvited from attending Monday's commemorative Assembly session, hosted by the California Legislative LGBTQ Caucus as part of a daylong, annual Pride celebration.

Essayli's exit was in lockstep with a GOP walkout, spearheaded by Minority Leader James Gallagher, while hundreds of Catholics, including nuns, priests, and pastors, held a prayer vigil outside on the Capitol steps praying for the Sisters' salvation.

During the planned Republican protest, Williams was met with an eruption of cheers from the Democrat-majority room dotted with an assortment of handheld rainbow-themed flags and foldable fans signaling support for transgender, non-binary, and gay pride.

Wiener, who nominated Williams, accused his Republican colleagues of "caricaturing" the drag queen.

During the 2021 - 2022 legislative session, the state senator authored a Senate bill that made California a sanctuary state for child bodily mutilation. Wiener, who believes the term "groomer" is "categorically an anti-LGBTQ hate word" akin to "f*gg*t" and has suggested that "Drag Queen 101" be taught to school-aged kids in response to a Texas proposal seeking to ban drag shows in the presence of children, was also behind a law that allows judges to decide not to require child predators who statutorily raped minors 10 years their junior—between the ages of 14 and 17—to register as sex offenders. At the time, the openly gay Democrat argued that the move is a step toward "ending discrimination against LGBTQ young people on CA's sex offender registry."