Is female impersonation/drag offensive?

[dannybb]

Hi. As a teenage hairdressing apprentice I used to do a drag act in my spare time - a few decades ago. With more time on my hands I'm now thinking of returning to female impersonation - doing drag queen bingo and entertainment mainly in old peoples homes etc.

While I am (and always will be) very respectful of women I'm wondering if the era of men dressing as women to provide entertainment has had its day.

Has this now become offensive or inappropriate?

Any responses much appreciated!

“You believe all the members of Monty Python hated women?”
Well, the absence of women in the group suggests that, at the very least, there might have been issues. Interviews with woman contemporaries reinforce that view.

I really dislike drag, I went to a party recently and there was a drag queen who was basically dressed up as me - he felt awkward chatting to me as of course I really am a middle aged woman whereas he was a poor facsimile. I had the full going out effort on - false eyelashes, blow dried hair etc and lots of make up, like him, but my breasts are clearly my own and my 1980s dress was one I’d bought in 1988. I presume they appeal to men who don’t take women seriously or are threatened by them.

Good update from the OP and a really interesting thread

Danny You sound lovely. And I like your rationale very much - it’s a just a shame about the deeper systemic problems and I’m really surprised and impressed (sadly) that you’ve given this so much thought.

I thjnk it's interesting that drag came out of gay culture. Some people are always looking for someone else to shove down a few rungs on the ladder of oppression.

Nothing wrong with drag, and quite concerned that people here think there is - see Magdalen Berns on this issue

Oh so someone is concerned that we think there is something wrong with drag - how about blackface - are you concerned people think there is something wrong with that? Or is it just women who concern you?

I'm shocked so many people find it offensive, I don't in the slightest and have never heard of or known anyone to be offended by it, untill this post.
I don't see drag as mocking women at all, I don't find it degrading or insulting.
I see it as comedy and art (how they can transform themselves)
This is why I don't see it the same as blackface. I have never saw a drag act that does drag to put women down or be insulting to woman as a whole.
Like any comedy act people will be offended and people will enjoy.

In that video Magdalen acknowledges that there is a feminist critique of drag; and that there are plausible reasons why people find it objectionable and draw parallels with blackface. She doesn't agree with the blackface analogy (for a reason quoted by an earlier poster). But she hardly comes across as dissing the idea that people might have reasons for finding drag objectionable.

Nothing wrong with drag, and quite concerned that people here think there is

Why are you concerned? Are we not allowed to have different opinions? Are we not allowed to find parodies of ourselves offensive?

Here's a few parodies of Irish people that were hilarious in their day. Oddly, we Irish didn't find them that funny, but that was because we had no sense of humour, and were too stupid to understand that "cartoons are an art form! FGS."

I have never liked it, it's like cultural appropriation, but for gender/sex

It always comes across as mocking women somehow

To me

I know this is not a rational response!

you sound awesome and this:

So what to do? How to exist beyond the restrictions? Not to be a new type of man but perhaps how to be a new type of person while never denying the reality of biology...

is what I want for my sons.

I'm shocked so many people find it offensive, I don't in the slightest and have never heard of or known anyone to be offended by it, untill this post.

Drag, as a topic, and whether it is offensive has been discussed several times on FWR.

Oddly, we Irish didn't find them that funny, but that was because we had no sense of humour, and were too stupid to understand

Was told I was being humourless when I pointed out to a relative that I didn't want my kids singing a nursery rhyme with 'nick back Paddy whack' because of its origins, until I told her to replace 'paddy' with the n word and see how it chimed out then. Soon shut her up.

Ah, I see I am not alone

Hurrah

SolitudeAtAltitude
I know this is not a rational response!

It's absolutely rational. Why should anyone of any race/sex/religion be expected to laugh at mocking depictions of themselves?

Worked with a bloke who did Drag on weekends.

One weekend I lent him a cocktail dress of mine for his show.

He looked better than me in it ( not jealous lol), plus the show was really fun and entertaining.

I have always felt this, even as a teen 30 years ago, but until today only ever confessed it to my DH

At the same time, I don't find boys wearing dresses, or transgender/anyone else people dressing how they like in any way upsetting (or unsettling), so it is not as if men in dresses and wigs upset me as such.

It's only actual drag that makes me feel I am being mocked/sneered at

I don't have a problem with men who identify as men dressing 'as women'. I think it can be a good thing and subverts gender norms, ideas of masculinity.