Drag practice: more authentic that actually being a woman?

[Patnotpending]

I was listening to Saturday REview on Radio 4 yesterday and there was a discussion about the latest Almodovar film. Dorian Lynsky, music writer for the Guardian, says that something in the film relates to:

'drag practice, in which to channel femininity is more authentic than being a woman.'

My jaw dropped – and so did that of the presenter, Tom Sutcliffe, who instantly picked him up on it. It was laughed off, but only after Lynsky repeated that this was drag practice. It's here, at around 05.58 minutes in:

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0007wkd

Can this really be true – that men in drag think they are being more authentic feminine than women? It's just so fucked-up, so obviously based on sex stereotypes. What are all these idiots on?

Have just listened to it - not sure whether it was Dorian Lynskey or Adam Mars-Jones, but I don't think he meant that drag is actually more authentically feminine than being female, because he then says that the "drag convention" is that it is, ie drag artists believe themselves to be more authentically feminine. That's my understanding, anyway.

I'll need to listen to it to make a judgement. I'm increasingly annoyed by drag culture. I do find it offensive and also see other sides of it in art/ historical contexts.^^ At the moment it mostly offends me.

I'm well feminine gullible I just subscribed to beauty pie. short term (yeah right)

Bet those dragsters ain't.

Loving the 15th rule creepster

"Even better than the real thing..."

So, authentic now = fantasy I concocted in my head with no connection to material reality whatsoever?

Ok - a google search to settle it. A google images search of:- Germaine Greer- Feminist Campaigner Laura Bates- Drag Acts.Who are more feminine?

RuPaul nailed it in response to being referred to as a female impersonator: "I do not impersonate females! How many women do you know who wear seven inch heels, four foot wigs, and skin tight dresses?"

That's a drag queen I can respect. He knows that what he's doing is performance and pastiche and doesn't claim to be a woman or even to be impersonating one.

Oh come off it - are you seriously saying you've never seen the large amount of posts on here from posters who never wear dresses/ skirts/ make- up/ nail varnish/ tights / heels etc. etc ? It's a badge of honour trotted out on every thread discussing clothes and appearance.

You do not have to wear pretty dresses/make-up/heels/tights to be 'feminine'. You just have to be female.

That's a drag queen I can respect.

Doesn't come across the right way. "He's a drag queen I can respect."

You do not have to wear pretty dresses/make-up/heels/tights to be 'feminine'. You just have to be female

You seem to be redefining femininity. Many posters on here go to great lengths to explain that they are female but do not "perform femininity" and and are not feminine.

Yours is the post of the day Creepster

the newly added 15th rule of misogyny
Men are better at performing femininity than women are because they invented it and it gives them a boner

Especially the last bit.

I agree Creepster, true.

I think they get off on it as well

It appears that men invented feminity and women had to adopt it.

Well I never.

given so many of you post frequently about how much you hate and avoid anything feminine.

Oh come off it - are you seriously saying you've never seen the large amount of posts on here from posters who never wear dresses/ skirts/ make- up/ nail varnish/ tights / heels etc. etc ? It's a badge of honour trotted out on every thread discussing clothes and appearance.

These two statements don't match.

I don't wear skirts. I don't hate them though, I just don't like to wear them.

This jumping to disagreement == hate is the intolerance we're talking about and disapprove of.

I also disapprove of people sending girls/boys into softplay in long dresses/shorts and no leggings/tights - because the slides do horrible things to naked skin sometimes. But I don't hate the parents who dress their kids that way. I disapprove, I think it's impractical, but I don't hate!

Many posters on here go to great lengths to explain that they are female but do not "perform femininity" and and are not feminine.

Assuming this is true (and I'm not sure it is), what's your objection? You seem to be implying that we should all enjoy performing femininity.

You seem to be redefining femininity. Many posters on here go to great lengths to explain that they are female but do not "perform femininity" and and are not feminine.

Define "femininity". To a Maori woman, it means having her chin tattooed, but Europeans would not consider that feminine. For large chunks of European history, dresses that exposed the breasts were common for noble women, yet now it is men who may show their nipples at the pool whilst women must cover up.

Femininity and masculinity change with time and place. Gender expression and roles change with time and place. This is all the proof you need that gender is a social construct. Women on this forum who do not perform what British people in 2019 call "femininity" may well be considered very feminine by the standards of a different time and place.

Drag is as offensive as black face.

I don't think drag has any connection to femininity. It's a grotesque parody of women in the same way as blackface is a grotesque parody of black people.

If anyone has a copy of the article by (I think it was) Cherry Austin that discusses gender presentation through time and place, please @ me with a link. IIRC, it had an amusing description of Henry VIII's clothing as a "manly embroidered minidress".

Women on this forum who do not perform what British people in 2019 call "femininity" may well be considered very feminine by the standards of a different time and place.

They may even be considered very feminine by everyone who knows them. The difference between performing and being.

I'm one of those posters who does not wear skirts or dresses, or make up, none of which I own.

I also have many interests that are, according to current, culturally specific sexist stereotypes 'masculine'.

These are just facts about me which I point out when some stupid person comes along and suggests being a woman is about anything other than biology. Women are female, as determined at conception and observed at birth, people who are fortunate enough to have reached the state of adulthood. 'Femininity' is irrelevant, and what is considered 'feminine' changes through time and space. It really isn't very long ago (the 90s as I recall) when wearing heavily caked on make up as a woman had people suggesting you looked like 'a man in drag', ie was considered 'masculine'.

Funny how they never class doing all the housework and child care as authentic femininity.

They can have a competition any time to look after my 15 mo old who has discovered the true art of the drop to the floor back arch tantrum. They can have him at 4:30 am too when he's teething and can't sleep.

I'm not sure why you (general you) are so upset by that given so many of you post frequently about how much you hate and avoid anything feminine

The truth is that what most people here rail against is dressing up and performing as something you are not - or being expected to; or expecting yourself too. What most people here and trans people have in common is the desire just to be, and express, who they feel themselves to be.

The difference is that many TRAS become imprisoned by their own performance - in that they have to 'identify' with 'femininity' 24/7 - even when they don't. I guess that is where the whole 'non-binary' thing comes from. The thing is, we're all friggin' 'non-binary' - because we're all human beings, and not walking stereotypes.

I'm not sure why you (general you) are so upset by that given so many of you post frequently about how much you hate and avoid anything feminine

I celebrate my womanliness and always have done. The thing is 'femininity' and femaleness are not the same thing at all. Femininity is a set of stereotypical expectations or performances ( like a drag act).
authenticity is always better, and never comes across as fake.

Oh come off it - are you seriously saying you've never seen the large amount of posts on here from posters who never wear dresses/ skirts/ make- up/ nail varnish/ tights / heels etc. etc ? It's a badge of honour trotted out on every thread discussing clothes and appearance

You are conflating the accessories of femininity with actually being female and being perceived to be female.

A lot of women do reject the costumes of 'performance' because they feel trapped by them, or because they associate them with negative experience. Doesn't mean that they don't sometimes express themselves, behaviourally, in ways which are perceived as being stereotypically female ( or feminine).

I'm not entirely sure what he intended by it but it sounds to me that he thinks femininity as MEN perceive it means drag is more authentically feminine than women. So the performance of femininity is key and it must be to male standards.

The fact he uses the term 'more authentic than BEING a woman' makes his point nonsensical. Either you are a woman or you aren't - being a woman is not about performing femininity it is just about being who you are. It is disingenuous to say drag is more authentic than BEING a woman to say, a woman on her period/who has given birth/is going through menopause. In fact the way he phrased it makes him sound like a pseudo intellectual and incredibly pompous just reeling off words without engaging the brain.

Drag isn't just about stereotypes - it is about overblown, exaggerated, sometimes comical stereotypes. It is an incredible distortion of language that describes a practice of piling on make-up, contouring the face, padding the body, tucking the genitals, wearing wigs and affecting a voice as 'authentic'. Someone buy this man a dictionary.

Also makes you wonder what his definition of 'artifice' is?