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Original poster

Why is drag so popular now?

712 replies

Nothingcomesforfree · 17/08/2019 09:43

Genuine question. I have seen lots of posts on a Facebook this morning about attending some drag queen event. Mostly women and several bringing their teens ( both sexes)

It seems really popular but I have no idea why or what people going get out of it? Is it comedic or fashion or something else.

OP posts:
Thread gallery
15
Fraggling · 17/08/2019 14:51

The not nice bits of femininity (sex role) are things like

Being unable to park
Being shit at maths
Being vain, vacuous, shallow, bitchy
Being a bit thick generally
Being weak
Etc etc

These things need celebrating? By men dressed as women??

KaySarahSarah · 17/08/2019 14:52

I do not see the celebration myself.

psychomath · 17/08/2019 14:56

I think there are different types of drag queens? The only ones I've seen in my daily life looked like 'normal' women (i.e. no pantomime-style make up) and in fact it took me a minute to realise they were men. They weren't doing a show, just hanging out in a club I was at. But I've seen the caricature/Dame Edna types at Pride as well. No idea what the shows are like as I've never been to one.

I don't think drag kids necessarily have to be sexualised - some boys do just like wearing dresses and make up and performing in front of an audience, which is no more inherently sexual than any kind of child acting/dance/modelling/whatever. I was at primary school with a boy like that back in the 90s, way before any of this stuff became cool or mainstream, and he went on to become a professional ballet dancer. Some children's drag acts are sexualised though and that's disgusting, and so is the culture of turning a blind eye to potential abuse because we're too busy celebrating the parents for being 'progressive' and 'open minded'.

Fraggling · 17/08/2019 14:57

I think the celebration is in being able as a member of the dominant class, to be able to don the socially enforced trappings of the hierarchically sex class. Have some 'fun' with it, it's only seen as subversive as why would a man dress as a woman when a woman is lower, then get to remove it when the 'fun' is over.

I'm sure I'll get called an over thinking feminist killjoy any second!

Fraggling · 17/08/2019 14:57

Hierarchically lower sex class that should read.

Propertyofhood · 17/08/2019 14:59

Drag isn't denigrating femininity though...it's celebrating femininity. It's probably the most female positive performance out there!

How fucking offensive!!!!

Browniebronze · 17/08/2019 15:00

It's celebrating a man's idea of femininity.

Propertyofhood · 17/08/2019 15:01

The drag I have seen is mostly gay men dressed as caricatures of women, making lots and lots of heavy innuendo jokes about having sex with men.

Maybe I'm missing something and that's not the true 'essence' of drag, I dunno.

AllSweetnessAndLight · 17/08/2019 15:02

Good idea for a thread. Let's bash anyone who is 'different'. Hmm 😪

JoyceJeffries · 17/08/2019 15:03

It’s not my cup of tea.

It’s having its moment in the sun but in 5 yrs time if will be something else and drag will be considered a bit tacky.

SingingLily · 17/08/2019 15:06

I spent my childhood years in another country. When we moved to the UK in the mid-70s, there were three things on TV that people seemed to rave about but I found strange and quite creepy although I couldn't articulate why at the time: Jimmy Savile, the Black and White Minstrel Show and Danny La Rue.

I still feel the same way. However, now I know why I couldn't stand the sight of them.

FudgeBrownie2019 · 17/08/2019 15:08

it's celebrating femininity. It's probably the most female positive performance out there!

Are you including female performances in this? So female movie stars, theatre performers, street artists, sports stars, comediennes, dancers, singers, artists, sculptors, all of those come second in celebrating being a woman to the "female positive" art of drag, done predominantly by men? God forbid women should be better at being women than men.

ALittleBitAlexis · 17/08/2019 15:18

I'm one of the many women who came to love drag via Drag Race. I understand the criticisms, but I still enjoy it.

To me, drag combines glamour and earthy humour in a way I can rarely get elsewhere. I love fashion, aesthetics, pop culture references and daft humour, so drag is obviously going to appeal to me.

I do think that once again it's an example of men getting an easier ride than women, but that's not the fault of the performers so they're the wrong target for criticism, to my mind.

And I just don't see them as any sort of opposition - are there people who worship Bianca del Rio but would shout "you're not funny!" at Katherine Ryan? I don't think so. It's small-minded straight men who are the issue for all of us.

LordProfFekkoThePenguinPhD · 17/08/2019 15:28

It's probably the most female positive performance out there! but it’s not though. It’s by men not women. Men pretending to be a cartoon version of a woman for laughs.

It’s a poor imitation of what they think women act/look like. Imitation is certainly not the most sincere form of flattery.

Original poster
Nothingcomesforfree · 17/08/2019 15:57

Good idea for a thread. Let's bash anyone who is 'different'. hmm

That wasn’t why I started the thread. I wanted to know why drag was currently so popular, especially with my age group of women and their teenage kids.
I have never seen a drag act or watched Ru Paul so I was interested i peoples views on what it was all about.
I also grew up with 1970’s TV so I assumed things had moved on from that. One of my friends has posted a picture of her and a drag queen and it looks nothing like a man OR a woman frankly.

OP posts:
KaySarahSarah · 17/08/2019 16:00

Just to correct my 70s error, it was Roy Barraclough who partnered Les Dawson.

LordProfFekkoThePenguinPhD · 17/08/2019 16:00

Different? This thread could very well have been ‘I hate musicals’ or ‘I can’t bear to watch cricket’.

Or am I a hideous musical cricket hater, denying the very existence of musical theatre and men in whites?

mindutopia · 17/08/2019 16:10

Drag has always been a thing. Men and women have been dressing in each other’s clothes probably since Ancient Greece. Have you ever since a Drag King show? It’s also amazing. I think it’s just a little bit more mainstream because the world is slightly less homophobic than it used to be. Btw, most drag queens aren’t trans, if that’s what’s getting you riled up. They’re mostly gay men who look like men in every other space unless they’re performing. Drag and ballroom scenes have given a lot of young people a space to be themselves and a ‘family’ (usually after their own has turfed them right out onto the streets for being gay).

Fraggling · 17/08/2019 16:17

'Good idea for a thread. Let's bash anyone who is 'different'. hmm 😪'

Actually that is a good summary, thank you.

Men are default.
Women are other.
That's why it's funny for men to dress as women, in a nutshell. We are different. Silly, bitchy, ludicrous. Plus breasts are hilarious.

Why do lots of men find big breasts hilarious / obscene? Les Dawson was always hooking his bosom. Blackadder with the comedy breasts. Cupid stunt iirc had big fake chest and low slung dresses.

Breasts are not about femininity they are about being female. How they are dressed / displayed (or not) and judgements around size are functions of feminine standards, sexual objectification, how these body parts in particular are fetishised by men in our society etc

TooTrueToBeGood · 17/08/2019 16:20

Drag isn't denigrating femininity though...it's celebrating femininity.

I've yet to see a single drag queen that looked remotely feminine. They all look like their make up has been applied by paintball gun and their clothes came from a circus skip.

It's probably the most female positive performance out there

If you exclude every single actual female performer.

Fraggling · 17/08/2019 16:25

Whichever way you look at it, misogyny.

It could be taken as a display of dominance in the hierarchy.

Hierarchy has men at top women at bottom
And straight comes above gay

When men want to insult each other they imply they are homosexual, or can't get sex with a woman. Most of the insults revolve around that. With a handful of insults about women close to the man, rather than directly at him.

When men want to insult a woman they compare her to an animal. Or day she can't get a man to fuck her.

Gay men dressing up as women could be construed as a dominance display. Well I'm lower in the pecking order than a straight man, but I'm still higher than you. Look I can caricature you hahahaha isn't it fun! And soooo subversive.

Themyscira · 17/08/2019 16:42

Exactly that, Fraggling.

CarolDanvers · 17/08/2019 17:38

Likening drag to blackface is horrendously racist, I can't believe you can't see that!

Can you explain how then? Serious question.

0blio · 17/08/2019 18:21

Likening drag to blackface is horrendously racist, I can't believe you can't see that!

Don't be ridiculous Hmm