# Transvestism in a Unisex World **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 29, 2004, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transvestism-in-a-unisex-world/282149 "2004-12-29T20:53:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2005, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transvestism-in-a-unisex-world/282149/41 "2005-01-02T04:06:59Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > When the show is over and the drag queens go home, they go back to being guys. This is not entirely accurate. Most drag queens are gay men, but a few transsexual women do perform as drag queens. There aren’t a lot of them, but they exist. These women generally do not dress as drag queens offstage of course, who has the time or energy for that? They dress as other women normally do. ---
**Author:** ![Kaitlyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/73ab20/32.png) [@Kaitlyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaitlyn)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2005, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transvestism-in-a-unisex-world/282149/42 "2005-01-02T04:26:55Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > This is not entirely accurate. Most drag queens are gay men, but a few transsexual women do perform as drag queens. There aren’t a lot of them, but they exist. These women generally do not dress as drag queens offstage of course, who has the time or energy for that? They dress as other women normally do. There’s a fact-based movie playing on either HBO or Showtime right now, _Soldier’s Girl_ that illustrates this quite well. It also explores some of the other issues raised in this thread. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2005, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transvestism-in-a-unisex-world/282149/43 "2005-01-02T05:10:48Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > This is not entirely accurate. Most drag queens are gay men, but a few transsexual women do perform as drag queens. There aren’t a lot of them, but they exist. These women generally do not dress as drag queens offstage of course, who has the time or energy for that? They dress as other women normally do. Wow… so on stage they pretend to be in drag. Because “drag” vis-à-vis women’s clothing only applies when it’s a man wearing it. So these women are pretending to be men in drag… Reminds me of Rosalind in _As You Like It_ or Viola in _Twelfth Night_: in Shakespeare’s time played by a boy pretending to be a girl who pretends to be a boy… It’s enough to make your head spin. The conundrum being: how did Shakespeare’s boy actor maintain the illusion of being a girl disguised as a boy when he was really a boy wearing boy’s clothing? A certain subtlety enters the picture here, which must have escaped all but the finest of boy actors. When blackface comedy was the norm in vaudeville, there were real African-American comedians who couldn’t get a gig unless they performed it in blackface. Dewey “Pigmeat” Markham told of this in his autobiography _Here Come the Judge!_ Irony upon irony… ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2005, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transvestism-in-a-unisex-world/282149/44 "2005-01-02T05:26:44Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > Wow… so on stage they pretend to be in drag. Because “drag” vis-à-vis women’s clothing only applies when it’s a man wearing it. So these women are pretending to be men in drag. Obviously at this point, the thread would benefit from a showing of Victor/Victoria. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2005, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transvestism-in-a-unisex-world/282149/45 "2005-01-02T17:42:32Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > Wow… so on stage they pretend to be in drag. Because “drag” vis-à-vis women’s clothing only applies when it’s a man wearing it. So these women are pretending to be men in drag… I wouldn’t really say “pretending” to be in drag, because the typical drag queen’s costume is pretty far removed from the typical woman’s clothing. Putting on a three-foot wig, six-inch heels, a sequinned evening gown, huge earrings, and a thick layer of makeup isn’t easy or comfortable for many people, be they men or women. The drag queen look is so hyperfeminine that it’s unnatural for practically everyone. Heck, I’ve known plenty of drag women to say “I feel like a drag queen!” when they’ve gotten all gussied up for a formal event. It’s actually not unheard of for non-trans women to play a sort of drag queen role at drag shows. I’ve never heard of them being allowed to compete, but they sometimes serve as escorts, MCs, or the feminine love object in drag king acts. Oh, I did want to mention that Terrence Stamp’s character in **The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert** seems like a fairly realistic depiction of a transsexual drag queen to me. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2005, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transvestism-in-a-unisex-world/282149/46 "2005-01-02T17:44:31Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > Heck, I’ve known plenty of **drag** women to say “I feel like a drag queen!”… I have no idea where that extra “drag” came from. Please ignore it, as it makes the sentence nonsense! I was talking about regular, ordinary women. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2005, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transvestism-in-a-unisex-world/282149/47 "2005-01-02T19:06:26Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > Drag queens are less about actually emulating women and more about extravaganza. When they start getting really outrageous and screaming in their style, they can sport outfits that no woman actually ever wears. I mean, twelve-inch platform heels??? “I do not impersonate females! How many women do you know who wear four-foot-tall wigs, seven-inch heels, and skin-tight dresses?” - RuPaul ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2005, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transvestism-in-a-unisex-world/282149/48 "2005-01-02T19:09:59Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > This is not entirely accurate. Most drag queens are gay men, but a few transsexual women do perform as drag queens. There aren’t a lot of them, but they exist. These women generally do not dress as drag queens offstage of course, who has the time or energy for that? They dress as other women normally do. Yup. In fact, some trans women work as drag queens in order to earn the money for SRS. I believe that’s the situation of at least one of the performers at our fabulous local drag club, Cabaret Mado – some of her numbers allow you to be quite certain that those are, in fact, her own breasts. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/transvestism-in-a-unisex-world/282149.md?page=2)