Gender is a drag

...it is not that drag opposes heterosexuality, or that the proliferation of drag will bring down heterosexuality; on the contrary, drag tends to be the allegorization of heterosexuality and its constitutive melancholia (Butler 247).

Gender, as we know, is culturally constructed. However, it is also an act that is performed. The act of performing gender is more easily visible in drag.

I don't believe that drag subverts gender norms. Drag is more or less a form of entertainment. Those who participate are only performing a gender in an exaggerated and dramatic form. Drag queens for example, parody the socially constructed gender norms of females in an over the top fashion. They take on the physical appearance of a female, but they don't take on the power that females have in society. They still retain their masculine power.

My paper topic is about patriarchal power disguised as drag queens in the movie To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything Julie Newmar. The basic synopsis of the movie is that three drag queens enter a drag contest in New York. Two tie for first, feel bad for the third, and take her with them from NYC to Hollywood for another drag queen beauty pageant. However, their car breaks down in the middle of nowhere and they are forced to stay in the tiny midwestern town until their car part arrives. In the process they befriend the locals and are able to transform the entire town.

I think that this movie might have thought it was taking a risky step having drag queens in it, especially since the actors who portrayed them were "action" hero-type stars. Really though, it's more entertaining than ground breaking - just as drag queens are. They're entertaining, not deconstructing gender roles. The characters in the small town fall into the typical masculine and feminine roles. The men have all the power and the women do what they say. But when the drag queens are involved, they are able to "show" the women that they can have power in their small town too.

There are a few scenes in which the drag queens "strip" the men of their power and give it to the women. But it's strange because even though they're men supposed to be portraying women, they use their masculine power to overcome the men of the town and "control" them. It's like they're reinforcing the patriarchy by saying to the women it's ok if you have power but only we can put the men in their place because we are men and we have the ability to do so.

Really in the end they're not completing much. All they do is transform the women to act in an exaggerated, dramatic fashion as the drag queens do. Basically reinforcing the traditional gender roles that those in drag perform as a parody.