rob@ptsfb.UUCP (Rob Bernardo) (02/24/86)
I have been following with interest the discussion on the non-traditional and stereotypical behavior of some gay men because oddly enough the past few years I have been finding myself *more* turned off by many sorts of behavior particular to the gay ghetto. One area that I have thought a lot about is the concept of "drag". I think there is a confusion between the concept of costume (drag) and non-costume dress prevalent in the gay ghetto . And I suspect what happened is this: In the earlier days of the gay liberation movement, many gay thinkers (including yours truly) realized there were lots of gay behaviors that really didn't need any apologizing for and that, in fact, on closer examination they were actually quite parallel to more traditionally acceptable behavior. Many thought, "We don't need to apologize for drag. After all the person who works in the financial district puts on a costume of a suit/tie to *show* others how he fits in and is successful -- isn't that drag?" And so, I suspect, the concept of drag was extended to *any mode of dress*. And any mode of dress was considered a costume of one sort or another, but a costume, and therefore a put-on, nevertheless. This was then used as a rationalization for dressing in whatever way one wanted and for thinking that wearing a costume wherever one pleased should not be looked on as "wrong" or "improper". I think an important distinction was missed in that line of thinking, being the *intention* a person has in dressing a certain way. The intention makes the difference in whether a set of clothes is a costume or not. *To the extent* that you put on some clothes with the intention of them making a statement about yourself, it is a costume. When a gay man puts on a leather outfit before going cruising at a leather bar in order to demonstrate "I am a tough MAN, and I am going to treat you rough.", that's a costume. When a gay man puts on a cowboy hat before going out socially so that others with think of him as a cowboy for their sexual fantasy, that is a costume. When a business man deliberately selects a certain suit or certain attache case because they connote success, that is a costume. However, there are complications to this analysis. One is the difference between the intent the wearer had in putting on certain clothes and the intent the viewer *infers* that the wearer had in putting on those clothes. The second is that once a costume becomes comfortable and commonplace for a person, the person may put it on *without* the intent that he used to have. Then it no longer becomes a costume. Many styles of dress that were originally costumes in the gay ghetto have become commonplace modes of dress over time. Many gay men on Castro Street wear leather outfits casually (I suspect) simply because (I suspect) they just like that look and they feel comfortable dressing that way. However, to someone outside that community, the clothes still appear to be a costume, because he infers an intended *statement* in the clothes. The third complication is that intent (in *any* area of behavior) can be conscious as well as unconscious. I can imagine someone arguing that in the case of the leather outfit worn "casually", the intent of making the "I-am-your-sexual-fantasy" statement has merely become unconscious. I think this analysis of the concept of "drag" can be applied to many of the non-traditional behaviors (e.g. put-on effeminacy and camping) common in the gay ghetto. The extent to which a gay community becomes a ghetto and in-grown, certain behaviors that were originally done "for effect" grow to be casual, and appear (wrongly or rightly) to be "affected" to the person outside that community.