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“I think that the proliferation of drag, in general, means that there are more people out there to reject the beauty standards that are being upheld by the show,” says campy Brooklyn queen Ariel Italic, offering a counterpoint to the critiques: In fact, the general consensus amongst queens seems to be that the show's positive effects far outweigh the negatives, but complaints about the mainstreaming of the medium are slowly becoming almost as ubiquitous as the praise. Of course, Drag Race hasn't fucked up drag. Part of the humor of Masters' video was its extreme hyperbole. Not every queen is a pretty, skinny male who follows all the trends and says, “Yas! Werq! Slay!' There's way more to drag than just that,” says Zalika. “It's just creating a heteronormative mindset but for drag and art. It's certainly reminiscent of other facets of the entertainment industry.īut it's more than just money, Drag Race sets a specific and perhaps rather constricting aesthetic standard that many queens who fall outside of it are beginning to resent.
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I've witnessed producers of high-profile events reserve tens of thousands of dollars of their budget for these queens, while even internationally legendary, established non- Drag Race alum receive a fraction of that sort of pay-or are sometimes just wooed by the potential "exposure" of getting to perform alongside TV stars. the RPDR machine has also created a tier of celebrity drag queens, many of whom can command top dollar for their services making a livable wage doing drag as a local performer is much more challenging. “ RuPaul's Drag Race has brought a greater awareness to drag, in general, and has therefore grown the art form and helped local communities to thrive,” said Goldie Peacock, a New York-based drag king, who sees the effects of the show as a kind of double-edged sword: It’s definitely going to be a completely different dynamic this year in terms of the crowd and how the show is.”
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“I think it’s a little early to tell, but I do think a bit of the magic of coming together on a Monday night might be lost. Huffington Post writers James Michael Nichols and Cole Delbyck detailed the ways that this essentially robbed local businesses of an evening of profits they had begun to count on: “ felt like a community experience with everybody watching this show and having a really good time,” said Brooklyn, New York, gay bar owner Steven McEnrue. What seemed like a small, innocuous change that would allow the show to court a wider audience (paired with Ru's move from Logo to VH1) ended up hurting countless gay bars, who depended on the show bringing in traffic on a night that would otherwise largely be dead.
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Masters' comments perhaps underscore a growing discontent with the way the show continues to affect both the art and business of Ī poignant example of this effect could be seen when it was announced that, for season nine, Drag Race would be moving from Mondays to Fridays. In fact, many of the performers working today simply don't remember a time before the show even started. Drag Race has had an immense effect on the world of local queens and continues to shape the aesthetics of drag writ large for a new generation who may or may not understand the immense history of the art form. Although the video's opening line has since become somewhat of an ironic catchphrase, with Drag Race recently concluding its ninth season, it is becoming increasingly obvious that at least some of what Masters had to say isn't wrong.