Drag and the importance of free queer expression

Another attack on drag threatens the entire queer community.
It is difficult to overstate the importance of drag within queer history, community and activism. For decades, the drag scene has been a place where queer individuals can not only find each other, but find joy. Drag creates a safe space for people who have been discriminated against and marginalized. It provides an outlet of expression for people whose identities have been the subject of ridicule and persecution. Drag has formed a community for many queer people and that community has been the basis of many aspects of the modern queer rights movement. The Stonewall Riots would not have happened if brave drag artists had not stood up against the cops who sacked the bar.
This is why when District Court Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk for the Northern District of Texas decided that “it is not clearly established that all ‘drag shows’ are categorically ‘expressive conduct,’ ” I wanted to scream.
To address Kacsmaryk’s first point, that drag does not “obviously convey or communicate a discernable, protectable message,” the message is that queer people exist. The message is that, despite generations of discrimination, hatred, violence, forced closeting, being ignored and unprotected and often victimized by the government, we are here. We are here loudly, openly and visibly. The message is one of resistance, of community and of resilience in the face of those who want to eliminate us.
To his point that drag is a form of “sexualized conduct” that should be prohibited in order to “protect children,” drag is not inherently sexual. It is no more inherently sexual than any other form of performance art. Like acting, singing, dancing or any other sort of performance. It can be sexual, but it is not always. Drag is a medium of expression and performance; if there is any message inherent to that medium, it is, again, a message of community and resistance.
But even putting aside the factual inaccuracy of Kacsmaryk’s claims, the rhetoric he uses — that queerness is inherently sexual and something children ought to be protected from — is not new. In the 1970s, former Miss Oklahoma and orange juice spokeswoman Anita Bryant launched the largest public anti-gay campaign in American history, a movement she called Save Our Children. Bryant’s campaign rallied in opposition to anti-discrimination laws that would protect the rights of same-sex couples. Bryant herself said, “As a mother, I know that homosexuals cannot biologically reproduce children; therefore, they must recruit our children.” To see this language — language that was used to demonize queer people and to justify denying them housing, employment and the ability to adopt — repeated by a federal judge is horrifying and only emboldens a hateful movement that has been gaining traction in recent years. Kacsmaryk’s language is reminiscent of that used in the “Don’t Say Gay” bills passed in Florida and a similar bill currently pending in the Oklahoma Senate. This legislation has been used to forcibly out and silence queer educators and students, and has led many to feel unsafe in their public schools, all in the name of “protecting the children.”
To address Kacsmaryk’s final point, that drag is somehow discriminatory against women, I am afraid I have no choice but to quote Judith Butler: “Gender reality is performative which means, quite simply, that it is real only to the extent that it is performed.” Or, as RuPaul once put it, “You’re born naked and the rest is drag.” The “performance” of womanhood exemplified in drag shows is just that — a performance. It is a satirisation of the traditional roles and traits of women. That is why anyone can do drag, regardless of gender. Drag is not making fun of women, it is making fun of the things we expect women to be — unrealistic curves, full face makeup, hair and nails and over-the-top outfits. Drag is a performance and it highlights the ways in which, to some extent, all gender is a performance.
But the real reason claiming that drag is not a form of expression, or that drag has no “discernable, protectable message” is so ridiculous is because, by so fiercely opposing drag, you prove it does express something. It does have a message. If it did not have a message, it would not make people so uncomfortable. If drag was not a form of expression, people would not be trying to ban drag artists. The issue with drag is not its lack of message, it is that the message of drag is one that conservatives do not like. It is a message that conflicts with their preconceived notions of the world. It is a message that forces them to acknowledge a reality they would rather ignore. It is the same message it has always been — that queer people are here. Queer people exist. We are here, and we are not going anywhere.