London Council Slammed Over Child Reading Campaign Involving ‘Rainbow Dildo Butt Monkey’

A London Labour-led council has been slammed over a children’s reading campaign in their libraries involving a “Rainbow Dildo Butt Monkey.”

Redbridge Borough Council in London hosted an event on Saturday by Mandinga Arts, a troupe of street performers that has a “a distinctive style bringing together live music, carnival, street costume, puppetry and dance, drawing on diverse influences from Europe, Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa,” according to its website.

The event, with walkabout characters, was designed to seemingly encourage children to read, but included one man in a bright costume with a dildo attached to it and naked buttocks in the style of a monkey

The event quickly gained traction on social media, with Janice Turner, a journalist for the Times, succinctly describing the man in the costume as a “Rainbow Dildo Butt Monkey,” which then became the moniker for the grotesque display.

https://twitter.com/VictoriaPeckham/status/1414187555382300677

With the backlash growing, Vision, the Culture and Leisure Department at Redbridge Council, maintained a defense of the Rainbow Dildo Butt Monkey, commenting “if you’ve got it, flaunt it,” on social media, and seemingly blocking concerned constituents who complained.

Council leader Jas Athwal, who later described the event as “disgusting,” initially tersely responded to those raising complaints, saying he wouldn’t “take lectures from a Johnny come lately.”

Wes Streeting, the Labour MP for Ilford North, slammed the event in a public letter. “I cannot understand how anyone involved – including your staff – thought that a costume described by one national journalist – with depressing accuracy – as a ‘Rainbow Dildo Butt Monkey’ was appropriate for family audiences around our libraries and public realm, let alone a festival aimed at promoting literacy amongst children,” Streeting said.

“This episode has caused significant damage to the reputation of our Council and the Borough. It has also left parents questioning whether our libraries are safe places for children to be,” he continued. “It is deeply troubling to me that Vision staff who saw the monkey and broadcast it across social media could not see what was so blindingly obvious to the rest of us.”

This is an excerpt from the National File.