The bill that’s gotten the most attention thus far in the Arkansas General Assembly cleared the House on Monday. But it looks a lot different than it initially did. Senate Bill 43, co-sponsored by Sen. Gary Stubblefield (R-Branch) and Rep. Mary Bentley (R-Perryville), originally would have classified drag performances as adult-oriented businesses, which are subject to all sort of zoning restrictions that keep those businesses far away from public life.
But despite sailing through the Senate, the bill got completely overhauled in a House committee after Attorney General Tim Griffin apparently signaled that it wasn’t likely to hold up in court. Now there’s no mention of drag anywhere in the bill. Instead, the bill defines “adult-oriented performance” as something that’s intended to appeal to the prurient interest and involves the exposure of genitalia or breasts either real or prosthetic, or the depiction sexual activity, and says that minors can’t attend them.
Bentley proudly told the House that before this effort it wasn’t illegal for a child to go to a strip club. But it effectively is because of alcohol laws.
Bentley read a letter from a man who said he’d retired from the military with his family to Batesville because it was far away from the corrupting influences of big cities. But then Batesville had a Pride event that included a drag show in which genital areas were exposed. (Yeah, right.) He called on Bentley to keep “small town Arkansas from becoming San Francisco.”
The bill probably does nothing at this point, but it might! Rep. Tippi McCullough (D-Little Rock) noted that “prurient” wasn’t defined in the bill. If people are going to get penalized for violating a law they should understand it, she said.
The bill passed 78-15 with two voting present. It now heads back to Senate committee and the full Senate for votes on the amended version.
