Being offended by “womanface” (drag) is bizarre

[MrsWinters]

Is anyone else thrown by the fact the Daily Mail has described the concept of being offended by drag as bizarre? I thought there was enough debate on the topic-and it has been going on for long enough to not be labelled as “bizarre”.
I’m not saying that I want to ban drag or anything, but surely I have a right to find it offensive? Otherwise aren’t we into the realms of thoughtcrime?

@jellyfrizz , o that's good, so it's certainly not prescriptive at all, and if you happen to be the right sort of man (was it Harry Styles that was mentioned?) and you wear the right sort of approved clothes choices (maybe we could get a council together to make decisions on this?)...then men are free to wear whatever they want.

ok

Only some people are allowed to be offended these days OP.

Women aren't allowed to be offended by anything... Oh unless you're a man who wants to be a woman of course, then you can be.

[quote suggestionsplease1]@jellyfrizz , o that's good, so it's certainly not prescriptive at all, and if you happen to be the right sort of man (was it Harry Styles that was mentioned?) and you wear the right sort of approved clothes choices (maybe we could get a council together to make decisions on this?)...then men are free to wear whatever they want.

ok [/quote]
I really don't give a shit what they wear as long as they aren't mocking women (or punching down at other groups).

Its about gay culture far more than it is about women.

It's really not. It's about mocking women and belittling female issues for entertainment. Names like Miss Carriage and Ana Bortion - how is that anything to do with gay men and their identities?

I honestly don't know how anyone can suggest things like a drag queen called Miss Carriage etc... Is about anything other than mocking women.

Can you imagine if someone dressed up as an exaggerated example of POC stereotypes and called themselves something that was so clearly a mockery of a race issue?

It's disgusting. But again, us women aren't allowed to be offended by anything. We just need to be kind to all the poor men who believe it's their right to parade around as exaggerated women with fake huge breasts and names like Ana Bortion.

The same people who think this is okay would be horrified at the equivalent in blackface.

The way it appears to work, to me, is that any male attempting to wear more stereotypically feminine clothing is met with jeers that they are parodying or mocking women and it is offensive and/or a fetish.

Again, no. You're making things up. Any male wearing stereotypically female clothes should just crack on. It's insane that men can't wear dresses and makeup without fear of being jeered at.

Men putting on swishy skirts and claiming to be women so they can get their rocks off in a women's changing room is where the problem lies.

Do you really not understand the difference?

Oh and naturally we need to be cool with it being introduced to our children too.

Fuck that.

I agree with Jellyfizz on last few posts

Delighted to hear that women are finally beginning to object to the casual anti-woman sentiment that’s been on the increase in recent years, often driven by super-sensitive men and other social justice warriors who are frequently listened to, even when only one objection is raised. It’s about time women started to raise their voices and begin to reverse the process.

often driven by super-sensitive men and other social justice warriors who are frequently listened to, even when only one objection is raised

Yes it's funny isn't it how these people like to tell us how conscious we must be of what offends everyone else and yet they scoff at what women find offensive and even go so far as to call you phobic this or that.

@WiseUpJanetWeiss

The way it appears to work, to me, is that any male attempting to wear more stereotypically feminine clothing is met with jeers that they are parodying or mocking women and it is offensive and/or a fetish.

Again, no. You're making things up. Any male wearing stereotypically female clothes should just crack on. It's insane that men can't wear dresses and makeup without fear of being jeered at.

Men putting on swishy skirts and claiming to be women so they can get their rocks off in a women's changing room is where the problem lies.

Do you really not understand the difference?

I understand the difference between illegal/antisocial behaviours and legal behaviours, yes. I do not associate attire with this distinction.

If I see an illegal behaviour occurring then that is the time that a behaviour is not fine, and an illegal behaviour has nothing to do with attire.

You have already gone straight from 'males who dress / ID as women' to 'illegal/ antisocial activities' in one swift, seamless, prejudiced conflation in your penultimate sentence.

[quote suggestionsplease1]@jellyfrizz , o that's good, so it's certainly not prescriptive at all, and if you happen to be the right sort of man (was it Harry Styles that was mentioned?) and you wear the right sort of approved clothes choices (maybe we could get a council together to make decisions on this?)...then men are free to wear whatever they want.

ok [/quote]
Out of interest, what is the 'right sort of man'? Harry Styles was mentioned, as was Billy Porter and the new Romantics of the 70's and 80's. I'm wondering what you are trying to insinuate with this comment.

Following on from several comments about the term 'womanface', it's a term I dislike as I've seen very compelling and informative discussions that drag is not comparable to the sheer violence and dehumanising which was inherent in blackface.

What drag is, is demeaning and insulting to women and uses language which refers to women's bodies in a deeply misogynistic way.

Drag should be seen as a hate crime.

drag is not comparable to the sheer violence and dehumanising which was inherent in blackface

I don't think the main comparison is whether or not something happens to the same degree. Caricaturing a less privileged group is still wrong and offensive. In any case, women have been dehumanised and experienced violence and discrimination throughout history. So much so, that it is still normalised in many ways.

On average 2 women a week are killed in England and Wales.
Women face discrimination based on their sex in the workplace, in education, in entertainment.
Women risk death and serious health issues as a result of pregnancy and childbirth.
Women and girls are routinely trafficked for sex.
Women’s bodies are commodified for surrogacy.

Women are an oppressed group everywhere in the world so actually if I find drag akin to ‘woman face’ I think I’m entitled to hold that view.

@Waitwhat23 I'm insinuating that there appears to be very particular, narrowly defined circumstances whereby men might be permitted, socially, to transcend the norms of attire for their sex.

So it seems they have to be wholesome enough, be high profile enough, say the right sort of things, wear a very particular type of clothing that doesn't go beyond norms too outrageously. Play the rules, be the right sort of person, and you might just get away with it.

Of course, this would have been the same for women transcending social norms of attire in 1860s etc. If you were rich enough, powerful enough, and perhaps didn't rattle too many cages in other ways you might have got away with cross-dressing without too much opprobrium. The women who had to stick to social norms just for survival of course did not have that luxury; they would have become outcasts in their communities for crossdressing, shamed and disgraced and thought of as deviants and perverts, just like men today who face stigma for doing the same thing.

Hopefully in time that will change just as the situation for women changed.

If I see an illegal behaviour occurring then that is the time that a behaviour is not fine, and an illegal behaviour has nothing to do with attire.

You have already gone straight from 'males who dress / ID as women' to 'illegal/ antisocial activities' in one swift, seamless, prejudiced conflation in your penultimate sentence.

Your assertion is that women posting on FWR think that men wearing stereotypical women's clothing are perverts, no?

My answer is that you are wrong, women on FWR have no problem with men dressing in stereotypical women's clothing. Women on FWR have a problem with those men who
a) wear stereotypically women's clothing and
b) say they are women and
c) invade women's spaces to get their rocks off

Women on FWR have a lot of other concerns, but where wearing stereotypically women's clothing the above just about sums it up.

It's difficult to believe that someone can be this so hard of understanding.

So it seems they have to be wholesome enough, be high profile enough, say the right sort of things, wear a very particular type of clothing that doesn't go beyond norms too outrageously. Play the rules, be the right sort of person, and you might just get away with it.

No, all they have to do is not invade women's spaces. They can be as flamboyant as they like. What is the matter with you?

@WiseUpJanetWeiss

If I see an illegal behaviour occurring then that is the time that a behaviour is not fine, and an illegal behaviour has nothing to do with attire.

You have already gone straight from 'males who dress / ID as women' to 'illegal/ antisocial activities' in one swift, seamless, prejudiced conflation in your penultimate sentence.

Your assertion is that women posting on FWR think that men wearing stereotypical women's clothing are perverts, no?

My answer is that you are wrong, women on FWR have no problem with men dressing in stereotypical women's clothing. Women on FWR have a problem with those men who
a) wear stereotypically women's clothing and
b) say they are women and
c) invade women's spaces to get their rocks off

Women on FWR have a lot of other concerns, but where wearing stereotypically women's clothing the above just about sums it up.

It's difficult to believe that someone can be this so hard of understanding.

Haha, how long have been on those boards?!

I think you'll find that most take an approach whereby point a) is enough to suggest a significant risk of point c), and that risk alone is sufficient to stigmatise any born male who dresses in stereotypically female clothing.

There's a thread right now on these boards isn't there about a male in a dress reading stories for children in a school That is all they are doing and people are in conniptions over this atrocity.

There's a thread right now on these boards isn't there about a male in a dress reading stories for children in a school That is all they are doing and people are in conniptions over this atrocity.

Link?

I dont find it offensive. I don’t get offended easily.

But they do look bloody ridiculous. Camp, plastic and that dick tucked somewhere the dun dont shine. Its not entertaining.

@Kizty

Well nobody finds it entertaining and hilarious when women dress as men. I think that tells you something.

This.

Hmm, OP for that one appears to have started a 2nd thread, suggesting their first maxed out at 1000 responses:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4490413-Drag-Queen-at-a-Primary-School-Thread-2?msgid=115387106#115387106

However, links to the original one, whether by following the link in this second thread, or looking for it in a search of it's own, don't appear to work, suggesting it has been taken down.

Now I wonder why that might have happened? hmm, scratchy chin.

@suggestionsplease1

Hmm, OP for that one appears to have started a 2nd thread, suggesting their first maxed out at 1000 responses:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4490413-Drag-Queen-at-a-Primary-School-Thread-2?msgid=115387106#115387106

However, links to the original one, whether by following the link in this second thread, or looking for it in a search of it's own, don't appear to work, suggesting it has been taken down.

Now I wonder why that might have happened? hmm, scratchy chin.

Both links work fine for me. Maybe a website glitch.

The problem highlighted in that thread is, as you well know, that men wearing highly sexualised clothes (that would never be seen as appropriate for school if women wore them) sharing their stage names so that children can find age-inappropriate content, are reading stories to children.

It's nothing whatsoever to do with men wearing stereotypical women's clothes.