Kam Baldwin, better known by the stage name Kam Kam, is pursuing a great life as a drag entertainer in Hoover.

But Kam Kam, who uses they/them pronouns, feels that people are more comfortable harassing queer people now than ever before because of the volume of legislation that targets trans and non-binary people.

“These bills give them the ammunition to be homophobic and transphobic,” Kam Kam said. “And also tries to use their faith, their Christian belief or whatever that looks like for them, against you.”

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A drag entertainer since 2019, Kam Kam’s performances blur the lines between male and female, much like their gender identity.

Kam Kam identifies as non-binary, a term used to describe a person who doesn’t fit into the categories of “man” or “woman,” or “male” or “female.”

About a month ago, two individuals – Daniel and Mary Rusk on Facebook – began harassing, maliciously trolling them on social media. They even recorded one of their public performances, yelling “wicked pervert,” and uploaded it to their YouTube page.

The two individuals called Kam Kam a pervert and made it seem like they were dancing in front of children, which Kam Kam was not.

“It was a whole big thing,” Kam Kam said. “None of those things are true, but they were trying to make me appear that way.”

They posted pictures and videos of Kam Kam, insinuating that a “poor little boy” didn’t feel comfortable, even though it was “hard to see,” followed by “Shame on these child corrupters!”

Soon, the two went after Kam Kam’s friends.

Daniel made a banner using a picture of one of Kam Kam’s friends, who was dressed in drag, with a baby. The banner, which Daniel held out on a public street, read “SHOW THE WICKED CITY HER ABOMINATION!” Daniel even brought his banner to the “Drag Me to the Capitol” march as a counter-protest.

The community fought back with facts, Kam Kam said. Any time the two individuals posted something that the community considered hateful or incorrect, they responded to the trolling.

Kam Kam said that the two individuals eventually blocked them on social media. The community stood behind them, and they said the individuals didn’t get the reaction they were hoping for.

Mary and Daniel Rusk did not respond to an emailed request for an interview.

“So I guess they just moved on to the next ones,” he said.

Targeting LGBTQ+ people

The harassment comes amid a surge of anti-LGBTQ+ bills filed in the states, including Alabama, and increasing harassment of LGBTQ+ individuals.

According to the Trevor Project, a national suicide prevention organization for LGBTQ+ youth, more than 150 anti-LGBTQ bills were filed in the first two weeks of 2023 across 23 states, representing the highest number on record for this early in a legislative session.

According to an analysis from GLAAD, an LGBTQ+ advocacy organization, there have been at least 166 anti-LGBTQ+ attacks since early 2022 targeting drag events across the U.S. Two happened in Alabama: one in Huntsville and another in Florence.

Those attacks are taking a toll. According to data from the Trevor Project, half of transgender people aged 13-24 have experienced cyberbullying.

A poll conducted by the Trevor Project in January found that 86% of transgender and nonbinary youth have had their mental health negatively impacted by recent debates on state laws restricting transgender rights. The majority (55%) said it had a “very negative” impact.

Those polled reported experiencing cyberbullying or online harassment (45%), severed relationships with family members (42%), feeling unsafe seeking medical care (29%), loss of friendships (29%), bullying at school (24%), removal of LGBTQ-friendly symbols in schools (15%), and physical assault (10%).

Wave of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation

Alabama has been in the forefront of attacks on transgender individuals. In 2021, the state approved a ban on transgender athletes participating in sports of the sex with which they identify. Last week, Gov. Kay Ivey signed a bill extending that ban to college sports. The bill was sponsored by Rep. Susan DuBose, a Republican from Hoover, where Kam Kam lives.

Last year, the Legislature approved legislation making it a felony for doctors to prescribe puberty blockers and hormones to transgender youth. The law has been blocked by a federal judge. That same year, the Legislature approved a bill banning transgender individuals from using the bathrooms of the sex with which they identify. In a last-minute move, the Legislature extended that to a “Don’t Say Gay” bill, banning discussions of sexual orientation or gender identity up to the fifth grade.

Dillon Nettles, policy and advocacy director at Alabama’s American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), said that the 2022 legislative session was a significant setback for equal rights for queer people. Even when these bills don’t pass, they have an effect, he said.

“I know that there are lots of people privately struggling with this wave that just continues to grow,” Nettles said. “These are more bills than we saw last year, and while fewer of them are getting to the finish line this session, it is clearly a priority of our majority in the legislature to continue to infringe upon the rights and access and liberties of LGBTQ+ folks.”

But Nettles says that while the legislation has intimidated some, it has also been “catalyzing” in getting people involved to advocate against these bills.

“There’s a juxtaposition there that we are encouraged and inspired – there are more advocates and more people, especially with lived experience, and community who are willing to join us in speaking out and fighting these bills, but we also have to recognize that the bills are even sometimes just and what they threatened to do, are creating enough fear anxiety,” he said.

Shannon Minter, legal director at the National Center for Lesbian Rights, said that the LGBTQ+ community was caught off guard by a “sudden, vicious and rapidly escalating attack.” It took some time, he said, for the movement to organize a response.

“I feel like we are now pulling together and marshaling our resources and mobilizing to fight back aggressively,” she said. “That is happening, including in court. You know, many of these laws are being challenged in court. Many of them successfully, including in Alabama. We do need more resources. I think one thing this situation has revealed is that we need more attorneys in the movement, we need more litigation resources.”

A protest against the anti-LGBTQ+ bills in the Legislature, “Drag Me to the Capitol,” drew hundreds of people to Montgomery last month. And while the sports ban made it through the Legislature this year, other anti-LGBTQ+ bills failed to come to a vote.

HB 354, sponsored by Rep. Mack Butler, R-Rainbow City, would have expanded Alabama’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill to include students up to the eighth grade.

But after a public hearing where members of the LGBTQ+ community said the bill could exacerbate mental health issues among LGBTQ+ Alabamians and possibly lead to an increase in suicides, House Education Policy Committee chair Terri Collins, R-Decatur, said it would not come to a vote.

DuBose also sponsored a bill that would have put specific gender definitions in state law, based on the presence of gametes. The bill passed a House committee but had not come to a floor vote as of Monday. A bill sponsored by Rep. Arnold Mooney, R-Indian Hills, that would have targeted drag shows never came up for a committee vote.

Minter said the movement has challenged about 20% of the trans sports ban laws. Likewise, they have only challenged Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill, but there are several more that may become law, “and they all need to be challenged,” he said.

The attacks also target what is a relatively small community. According to a February Gallup poll, just over 7% of the US population identify as something other than heterosexual. For the youngest generation, people who are not straight made up 20% of the Gen Z population.

According to the same poll, transgender people made up just 0.6% of the entire U.S. population.

Schools have become a significant battleground for debates surrounding LGBTQ+ inclusion, including respecting students’ identities and pronouns, LGBTQ-inclusive curriculums, and book bans, which Nettles said clashes with the conservative ideology of small government.

“They believe in parental choice and they believe in individual liberties, and at the same time, they’re literally stripping away the ability for parents, and in some cases, even individuals to be able to enjoy exactly that – their individual civil liberties,” Nettles said.

Policies requiring schools to disclose a student’s LGBTQ+ identity or name change request to parents or guardians evoke anger (67%), stress (54%), fear (51%), nervousness (46%), and sadness (43%) among transgender and nonbinary youth, according to the Trevor Project.

Similarly, policies that ban teachers from discussing LGBTQ+ topics in the classroom cause anger (58%), sadness (59%), and stress (41%) among transgender youth. Additionally, policies banning books in school libraries discussing LGBTQ+ topics evoke anger (66%) and sadness (54%).

Ambrosia Starling, a drag queen from Dothan, said that she fears the queer community developed “bad habits” as they started finding acceptance, and that it killed a lot of activism and stifled progress.

In the past, Starling said she was able to get through the past anti-LGBT movements because the community was “extremely united.” Queer people weren’t accepted into other facets of society, she said, and they had to carve a space where they could support one another.

“That attitude also permeated the community,” she said. “If you wanted to be part of a group, even outside of the gay bar, you couldn’t do that. We just couldn’t. We couldn’t afford it. And we knew it.”

She said that while the “Drag Me to the Capitol” protest had a big turnout, that was something she has not seen in the last five years of advocating for LGBTQ+ rights in the state. What she saw at the protest – a united community – would have stopped “this dead in its tracks a year ago.”

“But you don’t have a united community to help you, and as much as I hate to say this, Susan DuBose has done more to unite the LGBT community than I have been able to accomplish in the last 10 years,” Starling said.

Kam Kam said that while people have been getting more and more comfortable with expressing their distaste for the folks in the LGBTQ+ community, they should be targeting more pressing issues, like gun violence in schools.

“The people I’ve been around, and including myself, we all just feel tired,” Kam Kam said. “It’s 2023. I feel like there’s no reason we should be fighting this fight right now when there’s bigger things that we could be worried about.”