Drag Queens

The history of Drag is quite interesting really. It's very much part of gay culture nowadays, but it originally comes from the theatre. It was very popular in the late nineteenth century in the music halls. But it really comes from a much longer theatre tradition of men dressing up as women because women weren't allowed to act on stage so men and boys played the female parts.
Cross dressing is present in lots of theatre, like pantos and Shakespeare. Drag acts are all about theatrical performance. Pretending to be a woman, but never with any intent to fool the audience. You can see it as an art form.

Sparrowhawk nails it for me. I don't like it either. I don't watch Drag Race, so I can't speak to that, but the drag acts I have seen, which was in the clubs in the 90s and 00s had a nasty edge of misogyny to it. Aren't women ridiculous? Aren't we silly when we're dressed up as women? And we get to say things that we can't otherwise say. We're catty, we're bitchy, we're superficial etc...

I've discussed this with gay friends before. Some like it, just see it as a laugh. But there are also some who really don't, because they feel it plays into the stereotype that a gay man is like a woman in many ways, that a gay man has access to and can send up femininity because it's part of their make up, because they're not "stereotypically" masculine. That's not how they see themselves, and while they're taking against it on behalf of gay men and not on behalf of women, we end up in the same place of disliking it.

Dana, one person at a trans organisation complained unofficially on their behalf. This was followed by feminists saying how it was typical of all trans people, and trans people saying they didn't agree with the initial complaint.

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Yes I find it boggling that for all these years there have been groups of women saying that they found it offensive and they were ignored. Trans people say it's offensive and that is taken more seriously.

And the whole massive ironies of that are just, well massive

Not so offensive to women, but certainly offensive to the trans community:

www.pinknews.co.uk/2015/08/23/trans-charity-label-drag-fun-run-for-hospice-a-hate-crime/

I haven't seen much drag and am no afficionado of the gay scene.

When I have seen it including when I was young it made me feel a bit - uncomfortable I guess? - I didn't like it. Actually I'm thinking about men dressed as women generally don't know if it counts as drag. Like Kenny Everett, which probably would (cupid stunt). Or even Les dawson or the 2 ronnies. I always felt like they were taking the piss out of women. The boob hoisting, and the overdone speech mannerisms, and the pettiness. It was never kind. That was what was on TV when I was growing up.

I don't really like it. It does feel, to me, like when a man dresses as a woman, it's generally to take the piss out of her (the character / women in general).

I like it. Was quite disappointed to hear them saying "fishy!" all the time on the most recent episodes, though. I've heard gay men say it lots, and I don't get upset but they ought to know better than to do it on world-wide television shows.

I like drag because I like people who mock gender, I like performers, I like spectacle, and because drag queens put a lot of interesting women nobody else pays attention to on a sort of pedestal.

Is it? Been a while since I was on a hen night. Still, as some feature pole dancing classes etc, I won't put hen nights down as fighting the patriarchy!

I do agree that the ones I have seen have an aggressiveness against the woman character they are playing and of course homophobia is also an outcome of patriarchy, so I'm going to chalk it all up as outdated.

Deep

Yes, that's what's confusing me slightly. Because it's very unwomanly, but still relies on a stereotype. It's almost as if they've invented a stereotype that doesn't really exist in real life, if you see what I mean. I've only been to two, quite a few years ago but the slight aggression and, what I can only describe as 'maleness', felt as alien from woman/feminine as you could possibly be.

Either way, I didn't much enjoy it as I felt there was some form of misogyny at its base. Their target audience didn't seem to be women or straight men. I think that's changed now though as it's a hen night favourite, isn't it?

If it is sending up gay men, datun, it is doing so by likening them to exaggerated stereotyped femininity.

Nah. We have to fry all of the fish at once. Let the small fish go and they'll turn into bigger fish.

Now that I think about the minstrel analogy, it does seem a bit more offensive.

However, it's not just drag queens who are offensive, a lot of things are offensive. I feel we have bigger fish to fry first.

Interesting one. It does seem as though it is the female characteristics that are being sent up. But I always thought it more about sending up gay men. The overt sexuality and slight menace doesn't feel very much like a parody of womanhood in any particularly recognisable way.

Need to give it more thought.

Women can impersonate men and be "drag kings". You can look it up. So is that just as bad?

What points out the power disparity best IMO is the fact that it'd be near impossible for women do a drag act, because men's clothes are so 'ordinary' and 'normal.' A woman in a suit isn't in 'drag' she's just in a suit

There was a Victorain and Edwardian music hall tradition of "mashers" which were female drag acts. Brassais' photographs of the Parisien demi monde in the 30s have women in drag.

Many years ago I saw a woman impersonating a drag queen. She was excellent. I've heard a lot of misogyny in gay clubs in the 90s (as a lesbian) around drag, so I hate it and refuse to go. Agree about panto too, why is the lead woman as a man not comical when the man as a woman is?

Which is as harmful to men as it is women.
I also disagree it's a case of 'haha look at that greater being dressed as a lesser being' it's look at your big feet in those 'sexy' shoes you look ugly and ridiculous and make other men conforming to societies masculinity rules feel uncomfortable, so they laugh at you. Which is why I think it's as much about mocking men and shining an uncomfortable light on any suppressed feelings of 'femininty' they might have.

Tricky, I think with gay drag it's different. The whole point to me seems to be "I (the drag act) am totally comfortable with this, you are not which is your problem". I kind of like that. I will have to mull it more.

No a woman in a suit isn't unusual Sweets because she's copying more powerful behaviour (ie masculine behaviour). A man in a dress is ridiculous because who wants to look like a woman? It's embarrassing for a more powerful member of society to dress like a less powerful one.

Yy Sparrowhawk

Like racerback, it feels like white performers doing "black face" to me.

I think they are making fun at themselves rather than anyone else.
The denial of men to be allowed to show 'feminine' behaviours/dress etc is as much of a driving force for drag Queens to be mocked and laughed at. In fact women are afforded much more choice re clothing on a day to day basis then men. A woman in a suit isn't anything unusual, it's part of life.

Yes, drag isn't about sympathetically representing women, it's about sending them up and making them look ridiculous.

*passing

Ru Pauls Drag Race is amazing

The acts are cartoonish and it seems the trend in drag is getting more outrageous with each passenger year. The standard is so high you see. You can't just stand there wafting a gloved hand like the Queen Mum like Danny La Rue. Not these days.

So it has very little IMO to do with women. It's too OTT. The contestants rarely talk about women at all, tbh.

There was one contestant who was a Britney Spears impersonator who was very natural in her make up/hair in order to resemble Britney and was really very very beautiful. I think Derrick/Derek was her name IRL. She was criticised a lot for not looking drag enough which she found very stressful.

There was another one (in last year's All Stars) who decided to flip the stereotype and look like a real girl: more specifically a regular emo/Goth girl from your neighbourhood. It was the clothes she felt comfortable in. She got a lot of resistance and a lot of pressure to look more cartoonish and got so upset that she quit.

So actually there seems to be the idea that looking like a regular female is not "drag". Drag is something almost beyond gender even though they refer to each other as "she".

I like a good drag act. Some are very good at what they do. It's a bit of theatre.