Petticoats That Dragged: What the “kings” and “queens” can teach us about non-duality
- CG Judd
- Jan 20
- 3 min read
After seeing how the Tennessee drag ban is affecting the drag community, I began wondering about the origins of drag. Drag is a tradition that goes back to Ancient Greece and Shakespearean theater.
For religious reasons, women could not play themselves on stage, so men played the female roles instead. The word “drag” originated when male performers’ petticoats would drag across the stage during performances.
By the late 1700s women played the roles of men in opera in what were called “pants” or “breeches” roles. Men always played the roles of nurses in the operas back then. In Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, a woman always plays the main pageboy role.
Now there is a new generation of drag performers coming to the opera world, bringing this tradition to a whole new audience. Some modern drag queens, who are also opera singers, are glad to bring these old legacies to the modern operettic stage.
Drag continued into the 1800s, the time of Oscar Wilde, who was gay. Being gay wasn’t legal in England and many of the drag performers were among the LGTBQ+ community.
Drag kings are like drag queens except they are women who dress up as men in their performances. A well-known drag king of that time was Matilda Alice Powles, whose male name was Vesta Tilley.
Drag queens went from the stage to the screen. One well-known drag queen movie star was Divine who starred in many John Waters films including the 1988 hit Hairspray. She was also the inspiration for Ursula in Disney’s The Little Mermaid.
A revolutionary representation for a drag queen was the character of Beverly LaSalle in All in The Family in 1975. Archie revives her after she collapses in his cab from exhaustion. Beverly is portrayed as a kind and good person; her drag career is shown simply as her job. As the show continues Archie warms up to Beverly, and she becomes Edith’s best friend.
Beverly’s story concludes with her being killed in a hate crime. Edith is devastated when she hears the news. She can’t understand why someone would hurt Beverly and questions her own faith as to why God would allow Beverly to be killed. Leave it to Norman Lear to be way ahead of his time in exposing this travesty.
There are many people who participate in the drag culture including trans women, straight men, gay men, and drag kings.
The person who brought drag to the modern mainstream is RuPaul. He was the first make-up ambassador for MAC Cosmetics.
RuPaul has an incredibly diverse career as a musician, actor, American drag queen, television personality, and model. He hosted and judged the reality competition series RuPaul’s Drag Race on MTV which launched the careers of drag queens from all different backgrounds. He also hosted RuPaul’s Secret Celebrity Drag Race on VH1.
RuPaul took drag from the ballroom scene of the late 20thcentury, where drag queens could perform in a safe space without fear of being harassed or harmed, to an open drag culture that can be enjoyed by everyone. These TV shows help the world to be more accepting of people who are expressing in creative and fashionable ways.
In the bigger picture, I see a shift taking place on Earth going from duality to the One. Gender fluidity and androgyny are physical manifestations of humanity going towards nonduality. Some famous androgynous stars are Tilda Swinton, Grace Jones, David Bowie, and Boy George.
In the nonphysical there is no gender. The only thing we are on the nonphysical plane is Light, Spirit, and Vibration, a part of the One.
In the nonphysical there is no gender. The only thing we are on the nonphysical plane is Light, Spirit, and Vibration, a part of the One.
By seeing the melding of genders, people will realize that this is nothing to be afraid of. It will become the norm and our amazing drag queens will be accepted for the gifts of creativity, beauty, and color they bring to humanity.
My message to the drag queens in Tennessee is to hold on! This denial of your divine selves will not last. One day you will be appreciated for the awesome, wonderful, and beautiful people you are. The people who are currently operating on a lower frequency will eventually see it, too!
If you could free yourself to be a drag performer, what would your stage name be?
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