Paris is Burning: Hot AF

Paris is Burning...WOW! This film shows New York drag balls in the late 1980s and focuses on LGBTQ people of color.  The ball had various competitions: some were more traditional drag, while others ranged from military personnel to hip-hop street dancers.  The variety of competitions and “walks” gave ample freedom as there was something for everyone.  It was widely known that everyone would walk when their time came.  Some walks were directed toward butch queens, gay men, or trans women: the environment was competitive, but beyond the shade throwing was overwhelming support. The people in the balls faced discrimination throughout their regular lives, and the balls offered a positive escape.  Some interviewees compared it to the Grammies: the aura was fabulous, and the competitors were celebrities.

 

Significant members were interviewed; many of them were “house mothers.”  There were different houses which were exclusive groups of individuals who were faithful to each other in competition and familial love.  The film is about a subculture that thrived and an event that quickly became home to many.  Some LGBTQ youth were kicked out of their homes, and the ball offered a sanctuary.  Many of the house mothers offered motherly advice, love, and consistency; something every teenager needs. 

 

Paris is Burning details the complex performance of gender in daily lives and on the nights of the ball (two different types of performativity):  “Gender reality is performative which means, quite simply, that it is real only to the extent that it is performed” (Butler 527). Pepper LaBeija was a house mother: she was a drag queen and fashion connoisseur.  She preferred to be referred to by female pronouns, but claimed, “I’ve been a man, and I’ve been a man who emulated a woman” and strongly opposed sex reassignment surgery.  She said she has never been a woman because she has never had a menstrual cycle or been pregnant.  Although many people agree with this definition of womanhood, it is important to decipher between sex and gender.  LaBeija can perform as a woman without female genitalia.  The inaccurate association between gender and genitalia has been a source of confusion for many.  Butler, and others like her, paint a clear picture of gender and the gender binary as a social construction; it bears no scientific weight.  Your sex should not confine your gender expression or gender identity.