Spokane

While the Gender and Sexuality Alliance is a student group, Serrott says it's become a safe community space for all queer folks at the college, not just the students — which is why it was especially painful for the club's sole annual event to be canceled.

To Serrott, the cancellation is indicative of the larger anti-queer rhetoric that's growing in North Idaho. It's become more common, especially online, to baselessly accuse LGBTQ+ people of being "groomers" or pedophiles.

"We have allowed a certain political group, or certain political ideologies, to define what it means to be queer in a way that is not true," Serrott says. "I see us bowing to these political pressures as giving fire to those definitions. We're not groomers. We are not obscene. It's almost unfathomable to me to think otherwise."

Serrott says that just underscores the importance of the event for NIC's queer community.

"For some students and faculty, it's their first time ever getting to experience or play with ... not only drag, but gender expression, too," he explains. "It's really a space for creativity, expression and belonging."