Audubon Society Celebrates Pride Month with Drag Queen Dressed as Bird to Warn About Climate Change

Penny Starr

The National Audubon Society describes its work as “science-base bird conservation” but it is taking the opposite approach, celebrating Pride Month by promoting a video of a drag queen dressed as a Meadowlark to warn against “climate change.”

“Audubon scientists predict that, by 2080, 314 species will be threatened, endangered, or possibly extinct, due to habitat loss wrought by climate change,” the website says.

A press release announced that Audubon worked with “drag artist” Pattie Gonia to warn about the danger to birds from climate change while promoting the homosexual and “gender fluid” ideology. Audubon said:

From hiking in platform boots to ice skating in a famous dress made from recovered pieces of discarded trash, Pattie Gonia is the creation of avid hiker and backpacker Wyn Wiley. Wiley says the character was born spontaneously on a hike several years ago, but became a way to call attention to climate change crises facing North America’s wild lands. She quickly earned millions of views and hundreds of thousands of followers on social media.

“People ask me all the time, ‘how are the queer and environmental movements related’,” said Pattie, and continued:

I say, first, ‘no planet, no Pride!’ Second, there’s such an opportunity for people so versed in social justice, like the queer community, to join into the environmental movement. Similarly, there’s an equal opportunity for people versed in climate justice to help advocate for queer people. Why not take these two communities and work to cross pollinate them?

The traditional narrative if you’re queer is to run to big cities for acceptance, and oftentimes I think that creates a severed connection to nature, so I hope that queer people take away that they are part of nature and the outdoors. And I think that it’s a necessary step for organizations like Audubon to lead the way and show others, ‘hey, this is what it looks like to diversify outdoor and environmental spaces.’

“I am so inspired by birds,” the man says in the press release. “Everyday birds tell us that climate change is happening through their songs and through the songs they no longer can sing due to habitat and species loss. So are we going to choose to listen or not?”

Audubon boasts that it started celebrating Pride Month in 2018 with LGBT-themed bird walks, and “bird drag tutorials” that show men how to put on makeup that matches a bird species.

“When asked about one of her goals in collaborating with Audubon and what message she wanted to share with the LGBTQ+ community, Pattie adds with her usual flair: ‘Nature can be a part of your lives as queer people. You don’t have to run to a big city to find yourself!’” Audubon concluded.

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