Current Events > I wasn't aware that drag shows were under the 'is this ok?' microscope

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://standpointmag.co.uk/issues/november-2019/blackface-is-evil-why-isnt-drag/

The thinking goes like this, in a nutshell:

Meghan Murphy argues that just as white people in blackface appropriate exaggerated cultural stereotypes of ethnicity in order to mock black people, drag queens mock women by appropriating exaggerated cultural stereotypes of womanhood. These include hairstyles, make-up, nails, dresses and supposedly feminised traits like cattiness. Worse, just as white people who don blackface typically have whiteness-related privileges that black people lack, drag queens typically have male-related privileges that women lack.

And:

As with blackface, a fundamental source of humour operates independently of any wittiness, observation, or timing. Namely: a white person as a black person, or a man as a woman, is found by audiences to be hilariously incongruent, given the presumed superior social status of the performers relative to the inferior groups they respectively impersonate.

Finally:

Much laughter towards drag queens depends on, and simultaneously nurtures, the attitude that a man can be made to look preposterous by dressing up as a woman, but not vice versa.

(I'm not sure about that last bit tbh, seen plenty of masculine drag kings)

This one is interesting to me because you would never dream of donning blackface in 2019, but dressing in drag is fine by most accounts. Thoughts?
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I always thought the point of drag queens (which is different from cross dressing) is that it's a performance piece done for comedy. You're mocking the entire negative stereotypes.
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sounds like some TERF nonsense to me

The author of this is known for similar viewpoints, and has been accused of transphobia in the past. The fact that she's not even familiar with drag kings immediately makes her thoughts null and void.

While I'm not 100% an expert, as someone who has enjoyed drag in many forms throughout their life, there's nothing inherently offensive about it unless you have an extremely naive, sheltered, unrealistic concept of what womanhood and gender expression is.

To me, drag is often multi-faceted artistic expression using over-the-top femininity (and masculinity to a lesser extent) as its canvas. Blackface is inherently offensive because 99.9% of the time it's used to demean people of color and focus entirely on stereotypes that lower and dehumanize them. If you sincerely think that drag is just as problematic, you're poorly mistaken.
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'Scuse me while I get my terf management company on the line.
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Drag is weird but I don't see any real problem with it.
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So...is this a terf thing ya reckon?
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pinky0926 posted...

So...is this a terf thing ya reckon?

Do I think an article about how drag queens are filled with male privilege is a terf thing?
No.
But when we take into account that the author is a fucking idiot who didn't do research, I would argue it's a TERF thing
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pinky0926 posted...

So...is this a terf thing ya reckon?

The author of the article has been criticized as a TERF for some time.
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CRON posted...

The author of this is known for similar viewpoints, and has been accused of transphobia in the past. The fact that she's not even familiar with drag kings immediately makes her thoughts null and void.

While I'm not 100% an expert, as someone who has enjoyed drag in many forms throughout their life, there's nothing inherently offensive about it unless you have an extremely naive, sheltered, unrealistic concept of what womanhood and gender expression is.

To me, drag is often multi-faceted artistic expression using over-the-top femininity as its canvas.

Even then, using stereotypes as artistic expression can still in many ways reinforce the negative attributes those stereotypes cause. My personal preference for stereotypes in media and art is that they should exist mostly to either criticize the propensity with which we stereotype, or to exhibit the ways in which stereotypes often fall short. Any concept, or character, or persona should try to exceed the bounds of the stereotypes that confine, because most people are far more complex than what a stereotype can convey.

I don't know if Drag Queens are the most ideologically offensive in this regard, and I certainly know they don't intend to be so I can't really criticize them for it. I can see the merit in an argument against it though even if it's just from the perspective of rarefying traits of feminity in males through extremes.

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drag seems like the weirdest fuckin thing to me, i dont get the point or understand the appeal
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The proliferation of drag kings is newer to the scene and they don't have the fame or play as drag queens do.

That even mentioning men using women's oppression ("femininity") as a plaything is seen as hateful or phobic proves the point Murphy is making, that women's oppression isn't actually seen as legitimate. The sexism of gay men (the primary movers of drag) is worth critiquing.
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