A 59-year-old from Västra Götaland, Sweden, has been convicted of incitement against an ethnic group and ordered to pay nearly 14,000 SEK (€13,000), following his social media posts targeting so-called ’drag queens’. Uddevalla District Court ruled that drag queens fall under protections for “persons with a gender-transcending identity or expression,” broadening the application of Sweden’s incitement laws.
The man admitted posting the comments but argued they were expressions of opinion within an ongoing public debate. In his Facebook posts, he characterized drag performers as having unhealthy sexual interests directed at children, referring to controversial ‘drag queen story hour’ sessions, in which transvestites read to young audiences. Supporters of the sessions argue they promote inclusivity and counter prejudice, even though the material is often inappropriate for children.
The court found that the posts expressed contempt rather than factual criticism and that publishing them on an open Facebook page constituted distribution under the law. The sentence included a suspended prison term, a fine of 3,600 SEK (€335) and damages of 10,000 SEK (€930) to LGBT activist Petter Wallenberg, the ‘artistic director’ of Bland drakar och dragqueens.
A similar case occurred in Switzerland, where Emanuel Brünisholz received a jail sentence for a Facebook post about biological sex, where he wrote
If you excavate LGBTQI people after 200 years, you will only find men and women among the skeletons; everything else is a mental illness that was fostered by the curriculum!
