Drag
Coming soon to NW Arkansas is another visit from the throusands of bikers participating in our Annual Event Bikes, Blues and BBQ. This is a huge event for this area it is the second largest massive motorcycle rally in the USA with Sturgis, SD being the largest.
Most local Freakin' Eurekans, myself included, tend to dress fairly conservatively. If you knew me, it would probably come as no surprise to see me out and about in a t-shirt and jeans or in my gym clothes after a workout.
In 2018, during this same annual biker event, one biker, observing me and my Husband Jeff sitting the bar at The Rowdy Beaver Den looks me up and down, head to toe and says to his buddy, but loud enough for most to hear, "get a load of this dude's drag" while giving me his side-eye on what I'm wearing.
Please Note: I'm in gym shorts, a tank top, and my blue New Balance sneakers with gym socks.
Now, we all know that tourism is important to Eureka Springs, and we certainly want our visitors (over 800,000 visitors a year) to have fun and behave like adults, but I was taken aback by this. "Seriously?" I thought to myself as I beemed a pearly-white smile directly at him from ear to ear. This brief interaction subsided quickly as he and his buddy laughed it off and moved on. But the whole moment got me thinking . . .
It's all drag.
OK, yea, yea. If you look up drag on Wikipedia, it talks about drag as specifically dressing in clothes of the opposite sex. But I challenge this. We have cross-dressers, female impersonators, male impersonators, etc. and well, drag did essentially evolve from Shakespearean times, when it was referred to as, "costuming oneself as the opposite sex."
I think drag has evolved much more into "what does one look like on the outside at that moment in time as a human being."
It's all drag.
Aside from the annual Halloween events that we all participate in, human beings have lots and lots of drag examples if we view it through this wider lens.
Take the Former Governor of Illinois Bruce Rauner. He is often seen in his Governor drag and also in his biker drag.
Everything that presents our "look" is drag in a sense. These two judgmental bikers at The Rowdy Beaver Den were wearing the obligatory leather chaps, vests, headbands, gloves, etc. as they judged me solely on my gym drag in that moment.
Because it wasn't at all like their drag, it doesn't belong here. I don't belong here. That's how a simple 7-word statement like, "get a load of this dude's drag" can be cutting.
If this was what they were thinking when they were commenting about us, this is absolutely not Eureka Springs. Eureka is radically inclusive and everyone belongs here.
For bikers, renaissance fair goers, hunters, RuPaul: The Drag Queen, sports fans with painted faces in the stadiums all across America - it's all drag.
It's all drag.
Bikers have donned their drag for their weekend here with the thousands of similarly dragged out bikers all over NW Arkansas as they play around with their friends before they head back to their law offices, financial firms and medical facilities to put on their work drag and get back to what they do to earn a living.
What I love most about Eurekans is that we battle things that are unfavorable to us with love. It's about a person's behavior, demeanor, constitution, disposition, and love - not their drag.
Trust-building behaviors are an essential part of human interaction and living here and interacting with local Eurekans, a visitor will quickly learn about our town and our culture. How we treat you, is how we expect to be treated. Eureka is synonymous with love.
In this case, my disarming smile was only armor necessary to move them along.
Here's the Real Dilemma
In actuality, what we have are beliefs, traditions and groupthink all at a crossroads with one another. This is what causes conflict and discourse because it's often difficult for human beings to change their beliefs and to stop with old traditions (ways of doing things or thinking things) and making new ones.
"A belief is just a thought that you continue to think." ~Abraham Hicks
Group-think in American society is rampant. If you do not look similar to me (i.e. in my group, in my drag) then I judge you because you are different. That is the real dilemma in our society, and it often starts with drag (simply, how the person looks) and it goes from there.
Groupthink gets more unfavorable when it moves into thinking such as: "all Goth people are bad, "all soldiers are upstanding," "all Patriots fans are jerks," "all priests have integrity," "all bikers are . . ." and so on.
Because of beliefs, traditions and groupthink, people are quick to first judge the book by the cover rather than the content. Our challenge, as our society continues to evolve, is to flip this around and simply take time to get to know another fellow human being first, regardless of their drag, and make your assessment by the trust-building behaviors that develop, or don't develop, as you get to know more about one another.
Cody Barlow, a US Navy Veteran from Oklahoma, is a true example of a person that interacts with other people in this manner. He has publicly supported people from all walks of life by getting to know others from the inside out.
The History of Drag
With its mainstream success, some may be surprised to learn that the history of drag as a form of entertainment dates back to Shakespearean times and for more utilitarian purposes.
In the 17th century when Shakespeare's plays were first performed at the Globe Theatre in London, only men were allowed to take part in the productions, as they were in religious rites. So when plays included female roles, the male actors would dress as women to fill the void.
It's in the theatre that the slang term "drag" is believed to have originated. When men played female roles, they would supposedly discuss how their costume dresses would "drag" across the floor.
Drag began to take on more of an individual form of entertainment (as opposed to being utilized as a part of an ensemble performance) when female impersonation was introduced into American culture via the genre known as "vaudeville."
Vaudeville performance gained traction in the early 20th century in the United States, and it combines comedy, music, dance, and burlesque to create an offbeat type of live entertainment. Vaudeville and burlesque were quite popular back in the day here in Eureka Springs as well.
Female impersonation quickly became a facet of the vaudevillian entertainment experience. It was through vaudeville that the first official well-known drag queen came to exist, named Julian Eltinge.
His popularity moved beyond vaudeville and his success earned him the title of being the highest paid actor in the world, surpassing even Charlie Chaplain at the time.
In the 1930s, female impersonation and the history of drag is said to have entwined with gay culture which also coincided with the Prohibition Era, which abolished alcohol production and consumption from 1920 until 1933. Gay men and women used underground clubs and speakeasies as an opportunity to express and enjoy themselves.
Out of the sight of the law, gay men and women, communed with each other and felt free to be themselves in these clubs and speakeasies.
So how is this different really? Are we THAT different?
Bikers, wear their drag, crowd into the Rowdy Beaver Den, and other pubs, restaurants and clubs around town, commune with each other and feel free to be themselves as well, right?
It's all drag. We're all human.
Be yourself and be human in your drag. But, most of all, be nice.
