Be gay. Do crime.
My foray into drag at a moment of societal panic
I picked quite a time to cram my toes into a pair of heels and explore the art of drag.
I didn’t pick the shoes. The shoes picked me.
I know a number of young queens who are looking to make a career out of drag. I’m not one of those gals. I’m just in it for the fun. The tips aren’t bad, either.
Drag is giving me a way to reconnect with my creativity, and I need that now more than ever. I’m singing again, and drag gives me permission to perform full out with no inhibitions.
Drag is inspiration. Drag is expression. Drag is innovation. Drag is art.
But art is being criminalized in this country. Queer art. And more than that, queer people.
The LGBTQ+ community, at large, is under attack by conservative Christians, and drag queens—perhaps because of how visible they are in pop culture at the moment— have become an easy and politically useful target.
Drag queens are performers who exaggerate and challenge common notions of gender. Gender, itself a kind of performance art, is a hotly contested subject in this country and around the globe. Demonizing drag queens for their gender play has enabled right wing activists in the States to criminalize gender expression that they deem undesirable in order to, as they put it, protect the kids, which is nonsense. These anti-drag bills are designed to target people who may have nothing to do with drag.
Trans and nonbinary people, who don’t necessarily conceive of their gender identity as “performance,” are affected by these laws directed at drag performers. It’s sinister and it’s intentional. Anyone who, by simply being themselves, challenges gender norms is at risk of persecution. This means that even if you're a straight-passing masc gay guy or femme lesbian, you're still in danger because your sexuality is seen as a deviation from what men and women should do with their bodies. You don’t fit their gender mythology, no matter how well you pass.
Anti-LGBTQ activists are fighting for a society that has never existed; a society in which all people fit neatly into two categories (man and woman), where sex is only procreative and pleasure is shunned in the name of religious purity. This isn’t just about people whose gender expression seems radical to conservatives. This is about using the power of the State to criminalize people who deviate from gender norms.
So I'm sorry, gay Republicans, at some point they’ll come for you, too.
Anti-LGBTQ propaganda may speak of an America that wasn't tarnished by "alternative lifestyles" or "radical gender ideology," but that America never existed. It's a fantasy. There have always been people who lived outside of the gender binary and who loved in ways that defy simple categorization. Read A Queer History of the United States by Michael Bronski if you don't believe me.
We've always been here and we will always be here.
Even Hitler couldn't get rid of us, though he also tried.
With the support of a Christian nation, I might add.
Maybe you think this has nothing to do with you.
Maybe you're a straight person in their 60's or 70's who is fine with gay people being gay, so long as they don't get radical about it. Or perhaps you quietly agree with the pundits who argue that trans people are predators and Pride flags are a sign of the deterioration of society (and if that’s the case, I’m not so sure how you found yourself here, but hi). Maybe you'd never post anything like that on Facebook, but you're not so quiet about it offline.
Or maybe you consider yourself to be an ally, or even just an open-minded person who takes a "live and let live" attitude, but who doesn't want to get involved with politics.
The truth is, if you're a person who fits neatly into one of the above categories (man or woman), or someone whose expressions of love, sex, or relationship have never lived in the realm of queerness, then these bills are being written in you're name.
They're made for you. They're written on your behalf.
Anti-LGBTQ bills are written to protect people like you from people like me.
And when they pass, you are intended to benefit from them, while I, along with my friends, family, and community, am intended to suffer from them.
In other words, we're all involved in this. No one is safe from the affects of policing gender.
In the imaginary world constructed by religious fundamentalists, Christian nationalists, and ideologues on the right, you are either one of the good people who these legislations are seeking to protect, or one of the bad people that these legislations are targeting.
And honestly, I think that should piss you off.
This past Thursday, I put on a fierce face, zipped up my 6" platform boots, and invited a bunch of delightful people to get up on stage and sing their favorite songs. I did what I could to make them all feel welcome and celebrated, and I reminded them that experiencing joy at a moment such as this is an act of defiance.
There was nothing criminal about it.
But even if there was, I would do it again.
Proudly.
Thank-you! Drag is fun and very entertaining. To be targeted like this in my time is abhorrent to me. Targeting all people in the LGBTQIA+ community is a political stunt to many states right now and as part of our community it pisses me off. They have no regard for my life and more importantly for our young people. I grew up with this back in the Stonewall age and it was very difficult. The fact that we are here again sickens me. I say loud and clear we’re not going anywhere. We’re here and Proud and alive.
Thank you for recommending the book! I have placed a hold in my library for it. I'm saddened and angered by the way our country is going!