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There’s this grand misconception that being queer means being the LGB in LGBT — that queerness itself is a measure of sexuality and nothing more.
When we were born, society sat us down at our school’s playground and picked up its chalk, waving its hand up in the air above our tiny heads before bringing it down to the blacktop to draw an imaginary and arbitrary circle around what it called the “common identities.” It told us that this was what we were supposed to be in life, lest we be viewed as strange, weird, or as some would call it, queer.
Those “common identities” were heterosexual, heteroromantic, and allosexual — all matters of sexuality, yes — but also among them was cisgender. Sexuality and gender identity can’t be observed in their own separate vacuums, with the sexuality vacuum being labeled as the “queer one” and the gender identity vacuum being labeled as “something else I guess.” To be queer means to inherently defy society’s expectations of your gender. Men are supposed to like women and women are supposed to like men, so the men who like men must surely be more feminine! And the women who like women must surely be more masculine! And everyone else in between, outside, or who doesn’t believe in the binary altogether can go fuck themselves.
That’s why it’s necessary to widen our view of queerness to include the T in LGBT, and include the IA+ as well. And that’s why it’s necessary for all of us — from L to G to B to T to Q to I to A to plus — to DESTROY gender and its oppressive expectations. We have to deconstruct the concept of gender itself and, as Morris Gelbart will say as you flip the page, keep our community inclusive and align ourselves with anti-racism (Disentangling Gender and its Future, pg. 9-10). We need to smash all the series of assumptions that lead to the idea that women who like women must surely be more masculine, but at the same time, we should celebrate those WLW who are bold enough to embrace that masculinity, because as Jean Duggirala will point out, the history of that community — the butch community — is extremely rich (Can I Light Your Cigarette, pg. 19-20).
We also have to embrace the artists in our community who are using their art to wreck gender, like the punks in the queercore movement who dragged gender into the mosh pit with them and gave gender a (metaphorical) black eye (Queercore, pg. 17-18). We have to acknowledge that with art’s power comes the limitations of the industries behind them in embracing gender nonconforming people, which we discuss with 23-year-old non-binary butch lesbian artist Rio Romeo in an exclusive interview in our Arts & Entertainment section (Rio Romeo, pg. 27-28). While keeping a national perspective on all of these issues, we also have to keep a tight lens on our local artist communities, such as with indie-turned-alternative artist a kid named rufus, who attends the Bandier Program right here at Syracuse University (a kid named rufus, pg. 31-32).
From the local community to the national community, it’s clear that the traditional notion of gender already has one foot out the door, but we need to shove it out and slam the door behind it. That “we” includes the whole queer community — the people who don’t identify with the heterosexual, heteroromantic, allosexual, and (most importantly) cisgender norm.
Concepts of gender and sexuality are notoriously complex. Any assertion otherwise is at best misguided and at worst ideologically malicious.
If Judith Butler’s assertions of gender’s “performative” and learned nature hold true (à la “Gender Trouble and Performative Acts and Gender Constitution”), so must the roles that traditionally accompany them be unsubstantial, along with the unquestioned and assumed universal “normalcy” of strictly binary gender presentations, and heterosexual relationships.
climate, et cetera. But still, the price to be paid for nonconformity is usually higher, with the tendency for identities that are not “gender normative” to be lumped into the broad category of “transgender,” further marginalizing people from mainstream society as well as the LGBTQIA+ movement, as Susan Stryker observes in “Transgender History.” Especially then, it can seem worthwhile to adopt a more “acceptable” and palatable presentation — to seek validation under the neoliberal status-quo that demands a certain degree of marketability, leaving less and less room for gender dissidents, hence the conversations around “passing” and the need for slogans like “Non-binary people don’t owe you androgyny!” Cisheteronormativity, and even the dominant “homonormativity,” thrives on distinct binaries, all in return for some acceptance from the
same system that sets the goalposts. Given these conditions, how do you leave enough space open for everyone?
Often in “the west,” struggles in gender and sexuality have been seen as an almost western invention, a “Eurocentric progress narrative,” in the words of David M. Halperin (“How to Do the History of Homosexuality”), that aligns modernity,
Western culture, and metropolitan life against “pre-modern, non-Western, non-urban, non-white, non-bourgeois, non-industrialized, non-developed societies, which appear in this light as comparatively backward.” Essentially, the “enlightened and developed west” (supposedly bringing the “emancipation of LGBT people”) is too often situated in contrast to the “undeveloped world,” with the idea that these people had been there living “in fear and silence” all along. Beyond being a reductive model which erases the fact that many places around the world have and have had their own rich ideas of gender and sexuality before the advent of imperialist colonialism (which imposed its own ideals), it is important to take a broader look at the diversity of groups and movements on a global scale, taking into account their histories but also how forces like race and class play into this to this very day. The aforementioned broad category of “trans,” can include, as Feinberg points out, “homeless teenage drag queens” who rage “against the cops who beat them mercilessly and then demand sex” as well as “cross-dressers who own banks and railroads, hold high-level government offices, and run television studios.” These are clearly two very different sides of a broad umbrella.
To again quote from Feinberg, maybe the project isn’t necessarily to completely dismantle and deconstruct gender, but instead open up “a
world of possibilities,” one that queers the family structure, democracy and gender relations itself. “Trans liberation has meaning for you — no matter how you define or express your sex or your gender” she writes, “this movement will give you more room to breathe … to discover on a deeper level what it means to be yourself,” fighting for “each individual’s right to control their own body, and to explore the path of self-expression,” thereby enhancing your “freedom to discover more about
yourself and your potentialities.”
This means not only fighting against vague notions of “homophobia” and “transphobia,” but actively blurring boundaries, subverting gender, maintaining open queer inclusion and building a global and antiracist solidarity.
When we talk about “deconstructing gender,” it is important then, in the name of liberation and solidarity, to be aware of current movements and organizations worldwide. This means not only fighting against vague notions of “homophobia” and “transphobia,” but actively blurring boundaries, subverting gender, maintaining open queer inclusion and building a global and anti-racist solidarity. A larger move towards a radical queer sexual politics, part of which involves a true deconstruction of gender, must at its core seek to transform institutions, not be co-opted by them.
Trans liberation has meaning for you — no matter how you define or express your sex or your gender” she writes, “this movement will give you more room to breathe.
Currently, however, it appears that a larger number of people, especially young queer people, seem to be more accepting of, if not outright identifying with, more nonbinary gender identities. In general, they’re moving away from normative concepts of gender altogether. There is a lot of heavy lifting here that can be attributed to the easier access to queer media and information, a generally more socially accepting
Through beauty and pain, genderfluid individuals experience a powerful everchanging identity, many times misundertood by others.
I don’t always feel like a “girl,” but sometimes I do. There are days when I love my curves, bask in my femininity, and admire my breasts. There are moments when I can see my body and feel at home – a warm feeling envelopes me.
Sometimes I feel like a “boy.” I find myself running late to class because I’m trying to hide the chest I once adored. I practice walking in a “less girly way” in front of the mirror and I physically restrain myself from picking up the scissors to cut my hair off again.
And sometimes, I find myself existing in uncharted territories. Neither boy nor girl, but somewhere far beyond the two. Nothing is definitive, nothing is certain. All I am is a cluttered mess of confusion, anxiety, and dysphoria.
I grew up with hating myself one day for the very same reasons I loved myself the next.
I had no way to describe how I was feeling, so I never even tried to. The one time I considered being trans I quickly dismissed it, as I was convinced gender was not only binary but also set-in-stone.
After years of uncertainty, I finally came across a new word: genderfluid. At first, I was lost. How could someone’s identity be constantly changing? But ever so slowly, I began to see myself in the definition. Something about the concept dancing in front of me seemed to resonate. Over time, I came to realize that being genderfluid was not as bizarre as I once thought, mostly because I began to realize it was in fact my reality.
To put it simply, when we talk about one’s gender identity, the conversation tends to be about how they want to be seen by society as a whole. When someone expresses that they are genderfluid, or that their gender identity changes over time, this generally means that how they want to be perceived by the people around them in regard to their gender also changes.
At first, I was relieved. Having found a term to describe how I’ve felt my entire life was reassuring — I felt valid. But beneath the surface, there is so much more to this aspect of my being than just a simple definition.
I value honesty so I will be transparent: it isn’t always glamorous.
It’s difficult to understand yourself when part of your identity is constantly shifting. It’s hard to plan ahead when you don’t necessarily know how you are going to feel tomorrow. I’ve learned to live spontaneously, from second to second, because anything could change at any moment.
But I also realize that there is beauty in the unknown, and art is a way to chan nel that. In my opinion, some of the most authentic pieces of poetry I have ever written come from my experiences with genderfluidity. Not only have I found that writing helps me to process my feelings, but it helps shed a new light on a situation I once had trouble establishing any sort of perspective on.
If you’re still struggling to understand the concept of genderfluidity, I’ll leave you with this. Perhaps it will help you find some clarity, just as it once did for me.
I balance on the fine line of Sea’s horizon Tip-toeing the edge of his depths and lingering in her light
Mirroring the twirls of sisters, embracing the stance of brothers Dancing under the careful gaze of Artemis to the strings of Apollo I swing from stars to the crescent to clusters unknown Wanderlust through time is all I’ve been shown
Article by Gray Reed (they/them) Design by Alex Ryberg Gonzalez (she/they/he)
In the mid-80s, a splinter of the punk rock scene broke off and began to challenge society’s disapproval of queerness through counter-cultural music, art, zines, and film. The movement eventually became known as queercore and has made a lasting impact on society to this day.
In the face of some of the 20th century’s greatest social issues — including the Regan administration’s lethal neglect of the rising AIDS epidemic, an increasingly vocal Moral Majority that claimed homosexuality would bring about the demise of American culture, and the domination of straight, white men in the punk scene — queercore questioned and opposed the dominant forces of the era and society’s disapproval of the LGBTQIA+ community.
Punk, especially in the beginning, struggled with homophobic, sexist, and racist elements, with those in the scene even using gay sex as gross-out punchlines. But in true punk fashion, the more progressive wings of the scene refused to concede ground and instead created scenes of their own, like queercore, where they felt safe and heard.
DIY publications like G.B. Jones and Bruce La Bruce’s Toronto-based zine J.D.s helped lay the groundwork in the queer punk world.
From the beginning, punk was inseparable from the LGBTQIA+ community, as the crossover between the two took place in a variety of forms from music to selfpresentation. Punk’s reaction to the social injustices in society allowed itself to build a platform from which to vociferously attack, but as the mainstream media relapsed into the moral frenzy of punk on society when it first arrived on the scene due to the disruptive and aggressive nature of the scene, punk itself gave rise to its own zines and semi-politicized groups and organizations.
By doing so, many young people were suddenly exposed to uncensored knowledge and were granted access to information on issues that had been previously suppressed, among them LGBTQIA+ and sexual identity issues.
One young person inspired by the organization of punk is Quynn Lubs (they/them), creator and operator of Junk! (https://www.junkpunkshow.com/ and @junkpunkshow on Instagram), a queer femme–run collective that provides artists an outlet to create in a safe and accepting community. When they went to their first show at 15, they were seeing The Garden, which opened an entirely new door of sexual and gender identity, community, and
The inspiration of Junk! was Lub’s intolerance to the system that has been built just for white, straight, and cisgender people. Junk! aims to continuously create a safe and welcoming space for everyone and has zero-tolerance for any hate at any of their shows.
Quynn Lubs said, “What I always say about punk is the reason we’re so fucking obnoxious and the reason we deck ourselves out with our spikes and our piercings and shit [and] the reason we stand out so much, like, that’s on purpose. It’s all for a reason. It’s all because we want to be so in your face.”
Even though punk performers felt so comfortable being in your face, a lot of punk remained closeted until the mid-70s to early 80s — Buzzcocks’ Pete Shelley didn’t come out as bisexual until the band split, and Germs’ Darby Crash, who also helped kick off the entire LA punk scene, kept his sexuality a secret until his suicide. Hüsker Dü’s Bob Mould revealed in an interview with Yahoo Entertainment that he was “worried about being pigeonholed and having his music ‘recontextualized’ in light of his sexuality.”
In 2022, we live in a generation that has gone through monumental change and in turn, has opened up new eyes and conversations. While people have been more accepting and vocal about who they are, activism is still needed as culture and generational wars continue to rage. The war does not stop until everyone is able to be able to freely express themselves, and while there has been progress, the war is still far from over.
“I know a lot of people who identify as bisexual and older generations are kind of using that as an excuse to be like ‘Why is every single young person bisexual?’ And I think it’s more so that the world is more accepting of that now. So, it’s not that more young people are bisexual. It’s that more of them are comfortable coming out as bisexual and accepting that part of who they are,” said Lubs. “I feel like queer people still face a lot of bigotry and a lot of hate today, but it’s definitely less than it was back in the beginning of when punk was created.”
The queercore spirit remains in those who question. In the words of Penny Arcade in the 2017 documentary Queercore: How to Punk a Revolution, “Losers, freaks, and deviants started this movement, not these control freaks.”
Article by Chika Ma (they/them) Design by Jackson Springmann (he/him)The History of
Exploring and analyzing what “butch” dating rituals are, how to spot them, and whay they matter
Butch lesbians get a bad rep. Something about us seems to violate even the most “progressive” of gender expectations. It seems like every other time I scroll through TikTok, there’s a new trend about the “red flags” of our masculinity, as if our gender subversion is somehow a proximity to cis hetero masculinity or, even more absurd, cis hetero male privilege.
If you think that butchness makes us toxic, I get it. We’ve all had our hearts broken by a softball-playing, chain-wearing, multiple-girl-texting commitment-phobe. I’d just like to suggest an alternative view of butchness, one not so rooted in these stereotypes. Butch lesbians can instead be summed up by one word: sexy. Don’t believe me? Ask history.
Let’s get this out of the way — the 1950s were not a great time for most anyone involved, butch women included. But where we appear, we are guaranteed to be absolutely swimming in chivalry, and the 50s weren’t enough to douse that fire. Take Merril Mushroom’s “How to Engage In Courting Rituals: 1950s Butch Style in The Bar,” which outlines the seven tried-and-true courting rituals a Butch should use when approaching a potential partner. Smash hits include classics like:
Is it hot in here? No? Just me?
On a more serious note, it is important and absolutely nonoptional to examine the way society’s treatment of butch women harms us, both on an individual and community level. Your trauma with masculine presenting individuals is real and valid and worth hashing out — with a therapist. It is not an excuse or a reason by which to treat butch women (or people) like we are the enemy, especially if you are in a position of privilege over us. As much as femininity can be hard to navigate for women, and especially queer women, there is still incredible and unavoidable privilege in the ability and choice to conform to the normative gender expectations.
Which is so hot? Honestly, this has the same energy as making a Spotify playlist simply titled,
Here, Merril emphasizes that a slow dance would be best. The last time someone asked me to slow dance, I was twelve in a P.E. class — so we could definitely be doing a little better carrying on this legacy.
Visible subversion is dangerous, and lesbians who identify as or are perceived as butch have a much different experience with the world than do our more “femme” presenting counterparts. Often, this varied experience is the harsher one. This alienation should not be compounded in our own safe spaces.
Which is kind of lung-cancer-chic but could easily be traded by, like, offering a piece of gum.
And that’s only four. Out of seven. That’s barely half and I’m already feeling ready to take this bar date back to my place for a goodnight kiss! If this is how dreamy butch babes were in the ‘50s, where essentially looking at someone in a “gay way” was illegal, imagine the moves we could have now!
So put on your dancing shoes and get back out there! Be in community with butches and we will make your life a frutier, sexier place. I’ll fire up the JukeBox with some T-Swift if you can find something for me to light on fire in a chivalrous way, and we can see where the night takes us.
Article by Jean Duggirala (they/them)
Design by Paola Gabriela Gonzalez Torres (she/her)
4. And, most importantly, “The Dance.”
I’m in a classroom at Syracuse University, a university that prides itself on its diversity and inclusion efforts, and the question of doom arises: “Can you explain what your pronouns mean?” My heart drops. Of course, I’m not surprised by this question. I come from a small, conservative town, so the fact that someone is actually curious is better than someone outright calling me a woman. I’m a pretty understanding person, and I’ve answered the question dozens of times, so why do I feel uncomfortable? I could say “you should know better” or “look it up,” but my fear of confrontation wins this time. I clear my throat and answer. All I’m left with is a feeling of disappointment.
As someone who uses they/them pronouns, educating the uneducated is a burden I carry every day.
Written by Em Burris (they/them) Designed by Alex Ryberg Gonzalez (she/they/he)When you finally become comfortable in your identity, it’s like an unbearable weight is lifted off your shoulders. There are obstacles, there are glances, but god it feels good to be you. There’s always someone who expects that explanation though—professors and students alike. “I go by Em; my pronouns are they/them.”
I’ve debated wearing my pronoun pin my mother gifted me just to avoid the engagement, but like service, I chose to smile and fight my battle with kindness.
This experience alienates queer people from the “normal” cis/hetero world. It isolates us from the crowd and, most importantly, makes us feel like an outsider in a space where it’s supposed to feel safe. What is most frustrating about this entire process is the frequency with which misgendering continues to occur, even after making your pronouns clear. Admittedly, there is much to be said about the generational differences between student and professor and the novelty of using gender-neutral pronouns, but in an academic space, misgendering is unacceptable. Students should feel heard, respected, and understood. I believe in Syracuse University where pronoun introductions are normalized in the classroom—not just for a select number of classes, but for all. After all, a university should be a place where all students can feel comfortable in expressing their identity.
pronouns mean?My friend is gay... So like... how does it work?
I saw this thing on tv Is it true You like men AND women?
Non-binary? Aren’t there only two genders? So you’re not a guy or a girl...
When seen as different, queer folk are often expected to explain themselves to those who are uneducated.
Whether in the hands of a priest or the drawer of a bedside table in a Comfort Inn room, the Bible lists out the same moral code that Christians should follow. One aspect of that moral code is not accepting any homosexual behavior within the church. The Bible starts with the book of Genesis telling the story of Sodom and Gomorrah and ends with Paul
Christianity and homophobia — like peanut butter and jelly or mashed potatoes and gravy. The two seem to go with each other as God intended. While in recent years the stereotype has become marginally less accurate, especially with Pope Francis creating space for LGBTQIA+ people in the church, homophobia is still rampant among various denominations.
bashing same-sex relations in his Epistle to the Romans. The confirmation of homosexuality as a moral wrong is prominent and consistent throughout the Bible.
Except, that’s not true. The Bible has no opinion on homosexuality. At all.
Social-Politics writer Sam Baylow dissects the historical and social implications of alleged homophobia in the Bible, deconstructing longstanding notions of religion justifying discrimination against the LGBTQIA+ community.
Article by Sam Baylow (he/him) Design by Casey Fairchild (she/her)
According to a Pew Research Center study in 2015, only a little over half of all U.S. Christians (54 percent) agreed with the statement that homosexuality should be accepted in society. Certain denominations, especially those in the Evangelical Protestant and Mormon traditions, had followers that believed homosexuality should be discouraged. From Catholicism to Jehovah’s Witnesses and every denomination in between, homophobia still defines the church and the belief systems of many of its patrons, and those in the church who condemn homosexuality and the LGBTQIA+ community will point to one piece of literature that guides their stance: the Bible.
Before reading it, some contextual historical facts are needed to understand the Bible’s original messaging. When reviewing the historical context of the Old Testament, one needs to consider the gender roles in Israel at the time, which defined that the man should behave in ways that preserve his honor, including in the bedroom. If a male was sent to prison, possibly for acting in a way against his gender roles, it was common practice to use gang rape to put male prisoners in their place. The goal of gang rape was to destroy the masculinity of the male prisoner and therefore his honor.
During the period in which the New Testament was written, homosexuality was often practiced in methods that today we
would consider criminal and immoral. Michael
B. Regele’s book “Science, Scripture, and Same-Sex Love” details the extent to which homosexuality was practiced during the New Testament era. The most common form of same-sex sexual encounter at the time was when Greco-Roman men would practice pederasty, which is when an adult man, known as an erastes, would sexually penetrate a boy, known as an eromenos, to initiate them into becoming a man in society. In ancient Rome, dominance became even more of a sexual virtue, with the freeborn Roman man being allowed to sleep with anyone he wanted, including men, women, second wives, male and female slaves, and male and female prostitutes as long as he maintained the insertive role during sex. Finally, the last fact needed to correctly interpret the New Testament is that male prostitution was legal in Greek and Roman civilizations. Those who did not have the money to participate in pederasty would purchase male prostitutes, creating a thriving business shamed on by society. To summarize, both the writing periods of the Old and New Testament were defined by men needing to have dominant, strong roles in society and during sex. If men were ever penetrated during sex, that was considered antithetical to the male gender roles of society.
With that history of the Bible understood, specific passages that seem to condemn homosexuality can now be interpreted as
what they are: rules and stories that denounce rape, pedophilia, human trafficking, and the general sexual practices of both Old and New Testament eras. Beginning with Sodom and Gomorrah, the story is about angels who visited the wicked cities and destroyed them after they found no holy people in the city.
The common homophobic interpretation of the story is that the angels are sent to destroy the two cities for practicing homosexuality. However, the story is actually about violating visitors by threatening to gang rape them. In the story, once Lot invites the angels into his home, a group of Sodom residents stands outside his home threatening to rape the angels. This story criticizes rape as punishment, using the narrative as a vehicle for YHWH (God) to highlight the immorality of such actions, which was a prominent practice in Isreal’s prisons at the time. Later in the Old Testament, the book of Leviticus pens a line that arguably appears to be the most direct decry of homosexuality in the entire Bible. Leviticus 20:13 is a line that haunts the LGBTQIA+ community in the church because a quick interpretation of the line leads to the inference that God believes homosexuality is punishable by death: “If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall be put to death; their blood is upon them.”
It seems near impossible to synthesize any other meaning from the line, yet Leviticus 20:13 is not discussing homosexuality; it is discussing the role men should have in Israeli society. The Israelites were under constant persecution, and men needed to promote manly honor with their actions to protect them. Leviticus 20:13 has nothing to do with sexual orientation — homosexuality wasn’t even a term used in language until the 18th and 19th centuries. The line is calling upon men to fulfill their gender roles to protect the clan of Israelities, and if one man was to lie with another, that action would seem feminine, and therefore the man would fail to live up to his honor code. History highlights that these gender roles were a means of survival of that specific period. Leviticus 20:13 doesn’t mention homosexuality at all, and its discussion of gender politics also should not be used to discuss modern morality because of the historical context in which gender roles were used.
In the New Testament, Paul’s letter to the Romans provides a blunt demotion of same-sex relationships from a first glance. In the letter, Paul seems to equate homosexual relationships to a downward spiral of lust.
to degrading lust… Males performed shameful actions with males, and they were paid back with the penalty they deserved for their mistake in their own bodies.”
However, that interpretation is wrong, as Paul is criticizing the sexual practices accepted in Greco-Roman society at the time, which included men taking advantage of much younger boys and a prostitution economy that created a human trafficking ring that received tax cuts from the government. The shameful sexual relations performed by some men at that time took advantage of society’s admiration of dominant men. That self-interested behavior did not follow God’s rule according to Paul. In total, there are eight passages in the Bible that Christians have cited to condemn homosexuality, but each example has nothing to do with homosexuality, instead discussing the immorality of criminal sexual acts, people idolizing sex over God, or the preservation of gender roles to maintain a society. From cover to cover, the Bible doesn’t mention homosexuality even once, and if your Bible does mention homosexuality, it’s because of an either incorrect or purposefully demeaning translation meant to persecute and other the LGBTQIA+ community.
“That’s why God abandoned them
23-year-old non-binary butch lesbian artist Rio Romeo’s piano ballads speaking openly about queer life and love have made them a rising star in the queer music scene. With nearly 450,000 TikTok followers and just over 360,000 monthly listeners on Spotify, their work is resonating with a growing audience, having added over 100,000 people to both their TikTok follower and Spotify monthly listener counts in just a year. Their 2021 single, “Butch 4 Butch,” a song about butch lesbian love, which is underrepresented in media, was a smash success with over 13 million Spotify streams to date. Yet one thing is missing from this equation, and it’s something Romeo feels shouldn’t be by now: a manager.
“My big thing is that when it comes to industry professionals, I’ve found that people don’t know how to market someone who is gender nonconforming. I’ve had people tell me to my face, ‘I don’t know what to do with you dude. I don’t know how to market you,’ ” Romeo explained.
To them, the question in the music industry is not “how much talent do you have,” but rather, “how can I make money off of you,” and a tried and true way to make this money is to craft a sexually appealing artistic persona.
“People don’t know how to properly sexualize people that are not cis,” Romeo said, laughing. Managers don’t see their gender nonconformity as an aspect of their identity, but rather as an obstacle to be overcome. The irony in this is that, as Romeo’s large online following demonstrates, there is an existing market, mainly made up of young queer people, for openly gender nonconforming artists whose work addresses queer themes. But, as Romeo pointed out, “I don’t really think that [the queer community’s] dollars are really respected in the way that other marginalized communities’ are respected.”
Another one of the music industry’s failures to make space for gender nonconforming artists is baked right into our musical system: the binary division of vocalists. “You have female vocalists and male vocalists, and those are broad categories. Not as many people are looking for GNC vocalists,” Romeo explained. They also believe that industry professionals are “really afraid to offend [prospective gender nonconforming artists] with the categorization of [their] vocals,” a sensitivity that is in part born of a lack of experience with gender nonconforming artists.
This situation, however, is not the same for all musicians whose presentations deviate from gender norms. To Romeo, a large part of the industry’s difficulty to accept their gender nonconformity is the fact that they are assigned female at birth (AFAB). “If you think of David Bowie or Freddie Mercury, it was just like oh cool, he’s quirky,” Romeo said, contrasting their experience with those of assigned male at birth (AMAB) artists who were famous for their styles that toyed with how men were expected to look, and in Bowie’s case, played around with androgyny. “If I were AMAB and I had the amount of streams I’ve gotten and I had a more male voice, I think that people would respect me as they respect men. If I was AMAB, I would have had a manager and a record deal by now.”
Having music that mostly touches on openly queer themes has also impacted Romeo’s reception by the mainstream music industry. “People like what I’m doing but they don’t want to upset me or others in any way,” Romeo said, touching once again on industry professionals’ lack of experience and fear of offense. But, despite all this, they think there is hope: “I’ve had some labels approach me and say they think I’m gonna change the world.”
Throughout history, members of the LGBTQIA+ community have had to struggle with the decision of whether to come out or not. Regardless of whether it stems from social standing, familial relations, friendships, jobs, safety, or any other reason, deciding whether to come out or not, when to do it, and who to tell is an extremely difficult decision for anyone to make.
Many factors come into play when an individual decides whether they should come out or not. In some cases, it may not be safe for an individual to come out as a member of the LGBTQIA+ community depending on where they live, where they work, and the people in their lives. Many feel they’re not ready for people to see them differently, unsure of their identity, or just see no need to come out. Many members of the community do not feel that coming out is necessary, and simply live their truths without a formal announcement. Regardless, any person — out or otherwise — is a valid member of the LGBTQIA+ community.
At Syracuse University, we have a diverse community of LGBTQIA+ students that are a part of what makes this campus unique and welcoming. However, college is a time of selfexploration. For a lot of students, this means figuring out not only one’s future career, but also their sexuality and gender, among other things. Within this community, some students are fully out to friends and family and have been for some time, some are partially out to select friends, and some choose to keep this aspect of their identities to themselves. All these people are valid and loved, and some are willing and excited to share their stories.
Eva Newhill-Leahy (she/her), a freshman here at Syracuse University, is fully out as pansexual to family and friends. Additionally, Eva stated that her name and pronouns might change in the near future, but that for now, she is still figuring things out. Eva has been out since the eighth grade, marking five years now. For Eva, the process of coming out was not difficult, as she stated, “When I discovered who I was and who I liked, I felt whole. Like I had been missing a part of who I was. It was also helpful that my parents, sister, and friends were very supportive, which made it feel safer to come out and be who I am.” Like many other members of the LGBTQIA+ community, after coming out to close family
and friends, Eva never felt the need to come out officially on a grand scale. “I came out because I wanted to, to my family and friends… People at my school found out because I started openly dating a girl,” Eva stated. Part of what made Eva’s journey easier was her support system. “As I said before, my friends and family are very accepting and loving. The same goes with SU. I live in the LGBTQ+ LLC [living learning community], which is where I’ve made a solid group of friends and met my girlfriend. I’ve met other queer people in my classes too. I love all the friends I have made here.”
Another student is following a different path. This interviewee wishes to remain anonymous, so we will call them ‘Student X’ and use gender-neutral pronouns to discuss them. Student X has recently found the freedom to explore their sexuality in college and has come out to a few friends at Syracuse as pansexual. In broad terms, this means that they are attracted to people of any gender. They are still learning and educating themselves on their sexuality and are continuously deciding when and to whom they want to come out.
“Since being at Syracuse, I have been embraced by the LGBTQ+ community here, and the support I have gotten from my friends here and back home is just amazing, and I feel so accepted.” Student X has made the decision, as of right now, to not come out to their family, saying, “It’s not that I don’t think that most of them would accept me or anything like that, but I think that they would treat me a bit differently or make hurtful jokes unintentionally regarding my relationships.” Student X is a proud member of the community, and their coming out has nothing to do with their validity.
Unfortunately, some people hold the damaging belief that if you are not fully out, you aren’t a true member of the community. Put simply, this belief is just not true. No one can dictate when, how, and to whom a person comes out. It is an extremely vulnerable and personal decision that a person gets to make on their own, in their own time.
The upcoming album discusses the numerous changes that 19-year-old Rufus Sivaroshan has experienced since moving to the U.S. to attend Syracuse University.
Article by Gillian Follet (she/her) Design by Alex Ryberg Gonzalez (she/they/he)
ast January, Rufus Sivaroshan traveled over 9,200 miles to the U.S. to begin their first semester at Syracuse University, leaving behind the only life they had ever known in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The only constant they held onto during this enormous transition was their burgeoning music career — which, incidentally, was the primary motivation pushing Sivaroshan to pack up their life and cross the globe.
Sivaroshan began producing music under the stage name “a kid named rufus” in 2019, releasing a handful of pensive singles on Spotify in the first two years of their music career, followed by their first EP, graduation in 2021. Now, they’re planning to move their career into the next phase by releasing their first full-length album, whatever works inspired by the drastic changes they’ve experienced in their life since moving to the U.S., including a journey of self-discovery and struggles they’ve faced in their transition to adulthood.
Photographed by Em Burris (they/them)
“whatever works talks about everything from being a broke college student, to trying weed for the first time, to hook up culture. Queerness, anxiety, being in relationships, breaking up with someone — everything that I’ve experienced, you get little glimpses of it,” Sivaroshan said. “Everything’s been different, and I have to sort through that, so there’s been a lot to write about.”
Suddenly, at only 16, Sivaroshan found themself thrust into the music industry, with the number of daily streams of “useless” ballooning from roughly 200 to over 20,000. “People in Malaysia weren’t [the ones] streaming my music. It was people in the U.S. and Canada and the U.K. that became my biggest markets in a week, at the snap of your fingers. And it was like, ‘What the fuck is happening?’” They quickly became overwhelmed by their sudden success as music labels, managers, and other artists began reaching out to them, asking to work with them or collaborate on music.
“That’s one of the downsides with virality. No one prepares you for it, so that when you’re dealing with it, it’s a clusterfuck of emotions basically,” they said. “You have to figure out everything on the fly and you don’t know in the moment if what you’re making is a good or bad decision. You just go off your gut and the limited amount of knowledge that you [have].”
Following their breakthrough single, Sivaroshan made the decision to study at SU in the Bandier Program. Their determination to leave home and move halfway around the world for university was only natural: “My parents specifically raised me and my sister to leave Malaysia. They were always like, ‘You’re going to find a better quality of life elsewhere.’ That’s why I’m here.”
Sivaroshan never intends to move back to Malaysia. The country’s government is infamously conservative, with Penal Code 377 criminalizing gay sex and Sharia law, the Islamic legal system, forbidding any type of gender nonconformity that contradicts the sex assigned to a person at birth. According to OutRight Action International, a LGBTQIA+ human rights organization, “[LGBTQIA+] Malaysians are subject to arbitrary arrests, assault, extortion, and violations of their privacy by police and public officials,” as well as conversion therapy and censorship.
Since coming out, Sivaroshan has felt more liberated to experiment with their appearance, learning from their friends how to apply eyeshadow and other makeup, buying clothes from the women’s section at thrift stores, and growing out their hair to the longest it’s ever been.
Gender identity and sexuality is a central theme on whatever works, along with the impacts of several other significant changes in their life since leaving Malaysia. Moving to the U.S. and navigating the immigration process alone thrust them abruptly into adulthood, requiring them to secure a Social Security number and establish a bank account, among other responsibilities that most 18-year-olds starting college don’t need to think about. Over the past several months, they’ve trudged through the lengthy process of extending their Visa to stay in the U.S. after finishing their studies while simultaneously deciding to make music their full-time career and signing with a record label — not to mention juggling the responsibilities of being a junior in college.
After graduating from high school in 2020, Sivaroshan deferred their admission to SU by a semester, choosing instead to devote time to writing and producing music. Music had fascinated them from a young age — an interest encouraged by their mother, who urged them to participate in traditional Indian music performances to practice their half-Indian culture. Sivaroshan spent much of their early childhood singing, winning several competitions, and at 14 began to expand their musical talent by learning acoustic guitar and teaching themself to produce their own music. Sivaroshan initially toyed around with acoustic textures in a more mainstream context, inspired by Ed Sheeran and his use of a loop station that allowed him to record a short guitar instrumental and have it repeat in the background while he sang or played other instrumental parts. Soon, however, Sivaroshan moved away from mimicking Sheeran’s stripped, acoustic style and embraced a pop style that soon melted into soft indie pop.
In March 2019, while Sivaroshan was a sophomore in high school, they decided to release their first song on Spotify, “Fine,” which delivers an uplifting message about overcoming obstacles through floaty, melodic vocals and a driving beat. But it wasn’t until a few months later, in July, when they would have their first major success with their second single, “useless.” The song — which details an unhealthy, crumbling romantic relationship, the melancholic lyrics conflicting with an upbeat instrumental track — exploded in popularity on Spotify only a week after its release when it was added to two popular Spotify playlists — “Lorem,” a popular playlist designed to cater to a younger, quirky audience, and “Fresh Finds,” which spotlights up-and-coming independent artists.
Although Sivaroshan never received any exposure to the small pockets of LGBTQIA+ communities in Malaysia, they knew before moving to the U.S. that they were queer. They never fit in with their male classmates, preferring to participate in traditionally “feminine” activities like music and art when their classmates were pressuring them into sports like football or basketball. However, it wasn’t until their first year at SU that they became truly pained by the idea of identifying as male after witnessing the toxic masculinity inherent among their male classmates at the university, which led them to begin to identify as non-binary.
“Even in my time in Malaysia, which was overtly homophobic, I had never seen those kinds of [bigoted] responses to anything. Those kinds of stigmas,” Sivaroshan said of the behavior they witnessed from male students at SU. “That was kind of my tipping point. I definitely did not see myself as male cause it literally broke me inside to be associated with [that] and I just couldn’t do it anymore.”
Sivaroshan came out as non-binary to their close friends in October, and a few months later told their classmates in the Bandier Program. Their friends and classmates quickly embraced their identity, but officially coming out and officially switching their pronouns to they/them was still slightly nerve-wracking for Sivaroshan, who had never met anyone who was non-binary until moving to the U.S. and knew that any gender identity that deviated from the male-female binary could be punished in Malaysia with assault and imprisonment.
Choosing to formally dedicate themselves to their music career made them especially anxious, after being raised in a culture where “pursuing anything that’s avant-garde, especially the music business or being an artist, is super weird. Everyone’s very concerned about [job] security and stability.” The success of their 2021 EP graduation, though, coupled with the knowledge of the music industry they’ve gained from their major, spurred Sivaroshan to commit themselves to their music career and officially work with a record label.
Now, four years after releasing their first single on Spotify on a whim, they spend several weekends per semester traveling around the U.S., especially to Los Angeles, to produce promotional content and work on whatever works while also learning about the industry at SU – “Everything that we’re learning in class [is] happening to me in real time.”
Sivaroshan is extremely proud of the work they’ve accomplished with whatever works. The album represents a transitional period in their life, both in terms of approaching age 20 and leaving their adolescence behind and adopting a new musical style more in-line with experimental alternative sounds rather than indie pop. “I’ve been trying to be more creative and make something I enjoy in the moment,” they explained, scrolling through their recently-played artists on Spotify. Along with more mainstream indie artists such as Tame Impala and Dominic Fike, they highlighted NYC-based artist Sipper and Filipino singer-songwriter Eyedress.
Above all, for Sivaroshan, the most important aspect of whatever works is faithfully representing the different aspects of their identity — both their struggles and their personal growth — to help others going through similar changes feel represented.
“I have a unique story, and I want to be able to tell it in-depth, because I know that there are people like me – queer people, people that are non-citizens like me – that are navigating this stuff, non-binary people, people suffering through mental health issues,” they said.
“I want whatever works to be a good example. I want to represent those communities as best as I can, and make it the best work I can.”
The “Don’t Say Gay” bill — how much more homophobic could a person be than insinuating the word gay can’t even be mentioned? Those words echo the infamous “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” United States military policy that was in place until 2011, where military members were discouraged from mentioning that they were LGBTQIA+. That was 2011, this is 2022 — and we are faced with the same, if not more blatant and appalling, forms of homophobia at the cruel hands of the Florida government.
Besides the blatant homophobic practices of barring the discussion or inclusion of LGBTQIA+ subject matter in Florida public schools, it should also be noted that parents, under the bill’s provisions, may sue the school if they garner suspicion that there is classroom dialogue about LGBTQIA+ topics. The legislation threatens to harm the safety and growth of LGBTQIA+ individuals who, especially in Florida, are highly deprived of any such sexual or gender orientation teaching material or discussion.
Social-Politics writer and Florida native Alejandro Rosales deconstructs what exactly Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill implicates, and why it’s so wrong.
The aforementioned “Don’t Say Gay” bill swiftly moved through the Florida legislature and was signed into law by Florida governor Ron DeSantis on March 28. The governor criticized children’s ability to speak on gender identity or choosing their own identity in schools and has labeled such conversations as “entirely inappropriate.” The legislation, a part of a larger “Parents Rights in Education” House Bill, would discourage any lesson plans or classroom discussions pertaining to “sexual orientation or gender identity in primary grade levels or in a manner that is not ageappropriate.” What is considered “ageappropriate” is a vague term that would be up for Florida’s Department of Education to establish.
Of particular note is a quote by bill sponsor Joe Harding, who stated that the statute was meant to avoid
“a six-year-old [from having] one identity in school and one at home because the school encourages that kind of behavior.”
Not only is this comment rooted in homophobia, disrespecting the identity of a child, but it is also rooted in insufficient grounds. Instead of criticizing a child for having “different identities” at school versus at home, why not consider why they need to have such different identities, why they feel compelled to put on a façade at
home versus in an outdoor environment where they perceive more safety and freedom of expression. Why must the bill concern itself with not teaching children about different sexual and gender identities and instead focus on the astronomically high rates of LGBTQIA+ suicide and abuse they face from their families for being “different?”
Sentiments defending the bill only raise more hatred and questions about politicians’ real priorities. The simple fact of the matter is policy makers do not care about parents’ rights in education, the basis of the whole of the bill. They care about kicking the LGBTQIA+ community to the curb and further stigmatizing a group that already faces constant hatred, bigotry, and threats in a notoriously conservative and homophobic state. The bill can be described as nothing short of a homophobic attack on the youth of Florida and education as a whole. The legislation, and any subsequent bills it may inspire in other states, will only further divide the population and ostracize the LGBTQIA+, continuing to reinforce heteronormativity and leaving members of the LGBTQIA+ feeling lost, vulnerable, and unrepresented. The bill has also faced public opposition
and criticism, with multiple rallies and counter-protests occurring around Florida, including ones organized by Safe Schools South Florida, a Floridian LGBTQIA+ advocacy organization. The bill was later signed into law by Governor Ron DeSantis, but not before The White House made the rare move to comment on the situation, with President Joe Biden condemning the state bill, tweeting that LGBTQIA+ individuals are “loved and accepted just as [they] are”, especially including those “impacted by this hateful bill.” The statement comes amidst deep discontent between the White House and Florida’s DeSantis over a multitude of different social and political topics, using the lives and safety of LGBTQIA+ individuals as political warfare between the two branches. It is not just Florida dealing with homophobic laws and discrimination — bills across the country are being proposed and signed, targeting marginalized community members. Anti-transgender sports laws have been a hotbed issue throughout multiple states, with lawmakers in Alabama, Arkansas, Idaho, Mississippi, Montana, South Dakota, Tennessee, and West Virginia having laws prohibiting transgender athletes from competing with their peers in the K-12 level. Preexisting anti-LGBTQIA+ legislation still exists
in states as well, such as the heinous gay panic defense, a legal strategy used legally in multiple states to defend acts of violence against the LGBTQIA+ due to homosexuality alone. Homophobia still thrives in the legal system, and the “Don’t Say Gay” bill is only the next chapter of this sickening trend.
Speaking from a place of connection growing up in Florida, there is already no LGBTQIA+ representation in education. Sexual education courses, if available, only focus on heterosexual relationships. Elementary schools only teach about heteronormative relationships and living situations while omitting the existence of LGBTQIA+ individuals and their family structures. Children of the state already have to seek oftentimes dangerous online resources simply to get a grasp of who they are and to know they are not alone, buried deep in a closet created and fostered by an unrepresentative educational system. The “Don’t Say Gay” bill does nothing to support parents’ rights to education and does everything to burn down the LGBTQIA+ community and youth that only wish to be accepted and recognized.
I wrote these words far too late on a school night, the home in question snoring gently next to me. It’s strange to sit back and realize how inseparable two people can become. Three years ago, we lived on opposite ends of the countries, unaware of the other’s existence. A year and a half ago, I sat across from them — my best friend — on the bathroom floor of our shared apartment after they asked me to use different pronouns for them. Now, we sit next to each other on the bed that we share, two twin mirrors. Legs crossed, laptops open, fingers flying.
In a way, I think our collective transness is inextricable from everything else about our relationship. It is the foundation upon which so much of our understanding of each other is built. I wake up dysphoric and they know before I’ve even crawled out of bed. They wake up feeling butchier than usual, and I instinctively hand them an outfit that screams “dyke.” Our shared identity allows us an understanding that would otherwise be absent.
I believe that the recent rise in numbers of “t4t” relationships like ours — where one trans person is romantically involved with another trans person — is because of this reciprocal understanding. Plenty of trans people can be perfectly happy and understood in relationships with cis partners. There’s a lot to be said about trans-cis relationships and the role they play in validating one’s identity—that’s just not what I’m here to talk about.
When my partner Jean and I first got together, I had been living openly as non-binary for a year and a half but still knew so little about my identity. I didn’t know if I wanted to medically transition or not. I didn’t know how to label my sexuality or even that the label “nonbinary lesbian” was an option that existed for me. I didn’t know what I wanted to wear or how I wanted to act or who I wanted to be. I’m not sure if they did either.
Our shared identities allowed us to figure it out and grow together. It took multiple subpar at-home haircuts and our fair share of binder mishaps, but we are now both so much more comfortable and so much truer to our identities than we ever have been. This is the understanding that t4t relationships breeds. I never had to explain the intricacies of my identity to them. They either understood instinctively or learned from observation, and I did the same for them. It was so refreshing to skip the awkward conversation that most trans people are all too familiar with, where we have to justify or explain our identities and what they mean.
My home speaks like a poet and loves like the sun.
It is no secret hookup culture is very prevalent on college campuses, and while asexuality is a spectrum and many asexual people are sex positive, hookup culture negatively impacts the asexual community as a whole. The recent movement for sex positivity and having a more relaxed outlook on sex is amazing in and of itself, but recently, there has been a general trend towards sex expectancy rather than sex positivity. Sex positivity is about empowering people regardless of their sexual history. Sex expectancy, on the other hand, is the idea that society has formed that says everyone should have sex by a certain age, usually by college, to be seen as “normal.” A person’s sexual history is no one’s business except their own, and no one should be shamed for how many or how few people they are sexually intimate with. So what’s the problem with hookup culture?
Hookup culture is not about empowering people to make their own choices about their sex life based on what’s best for them. It encourages people to have sex while looking down on people who don’t. As a sex repulsed asexual, I have had a lot of trouble connecting with my allosexual friends when
talking about relationships. A core example that sticks out in my mind was when someone asked if I was “cuffed” and when I said no, she said, “Oh, well you need to get on that.” Even if she was joking, it’s a joke I’ve heard too many times, and it isn’t funny anymore. The judgemental looks shot at me when I reveal I’ve never been in a relationship have severely damaged my self worth and made me feel like something was wrong with me for being happy single. It’s difficult for sex averse aces to date, especially in college, because of the prominent hookup culture. It is also very difficult to establish platonic relationships out of an inability to connect to allosexual people on the subject of sex and relationships. When sex and relationships are promiment conversation topics, it becomes a hurdle for asexual students to even make friends. College kids are told sex is something that is to be expected. If they aren’t doing it, they’re behind. This isn’t sex positivity.
It’s difficult to find an ace community on campus because of this, but I have been lucky enough to meet a few great aspec people (people on the asexual and/or aromantic spectrums), and their experiences are very similar to mine. I asked some of my aspec college friends what their experiences were like dealing with hookup culture and trying to relate to their allosexual friends. These were some of my responses:
“I’m not a huge fan of sex jokes [...] and I’m not big on talking about people’s romantic or sexual relationships, but that’s a lot about what [my friend group] talked about. They would often make me feel guilty for disliking it.”
“I also feel like I’m doing something wrong if I’m not actively seeking to hookup with people at parties [...] worried that I appear “naive” or “inexperienced” to my friends. While I’m not ashamed of never having or wanting to have sex, I don’t want my friends to think less of me.”
“I never had anything to contribute to [conversations about sex] and was always uncomfy because of my asexuality [...] This often, in any friend group, made me the punchline of the joke, the ‘prude’ of the group, etc. Also since I’m not afraid to show some skin if I’m going out with friends, this could end with the ‘tease’ or ‘asking for it’ comments.”
All of us on the asexual spectrum are very proud and confident in our aspec identity. Regardless, we still have to deal with this pressure on a daily basis, and while there is absolutely nothing wrong with partaking in hookups, there is harm in pushing hookup culture onto everyone, which is unfortunately very common on college campuses, including Syracuse. I feel the pressure to have sex every time I open Yik Yak or talk to my friends about their relationships or even go to any social event, but because allosexual people see this as normal, many aspec people do not open up about it. I often won’t disclose my ace identity out of fear of what my peers will say. It is important to understand and respect your friends’ boundaries. Ultimately, we need to normalize the idea that every person is different. Some will partake in casual sex, some will wait for a serious relationship, and some will never have sex. And all of that is okay! When we dismantle hookup culture and accept everyone regardless of their “experience,” that is when we will achieve real sex positivity.
The drag performer, who debuted their gender warping persona while studying at Syracuse University, is packing up and moving back to New York City, turning the drag show into a drag career
Article
by Payton Dunn (he/him) Design by Eleni Cooper (they/she)
On April 1st, 2022, The OutCrowd sat down to talk with SUNYESF senior Ilsa Dohner. They had just won Pride Union’s 20th Annual Drag Show Finals for their provocative dance routine, which saw them falling to the floor and twerking to the Silk Sonic track “Smokin Out The Window” as the audience clapped along to the Billboard Hot 100 hit song. Ilsa had debuted their drag persona “Dilf Dangerbottom” earlier in the semester at the Drag Show Preliminaries, tossing out roses to the crowd in their Yung Gravy – inspired persona and receiving a standing ovation from the audience. Read our full interview below:
The OutCrowd: What inspired you to get started doing drag?
Ilsa Dohner: My very first drag show that I ever got to go to was actually at a zero-waste conference, so it was a drag show where all the drag was made out of trash, and I was just blown away. I was so excited! It was the very first one I got to go to. It was my freshman year. It was just in the back of my mind and then I got to go to the Pride Union drag show my sophomore year and I saw them and I was like, “Wait, I could do that! I love performing!” And then it was just this little seed in my head and I just kept thinking about it. Then COVID happened. The next year, I felt like I had to prepare more than I had to, so I didn’t do it that year, and then I saw people performing and I was like, “Wait, you know, it’s not as complex as I think it is!” Then this year came around and I was asking my friend, “Should I do this?” And they were just like, “You’ve literally been thinking about this for three years! Just go do it! It doesn’t have to be perfect.” They were actually around when I made the name Dilf Dangerbottom. It was just a name I made up for fun when we were playing a tabletop game. Since then, it’s just been my alter ego name and it just went from there.
I was actually hugely inspired by Yung Gravy, who’s a rapper, and that’s where the idea “Dilf” came around — cause he’s into MILFs. Just sort of that very goofy, fun, but also kind of sexy masculinity that I always wanted to embody and just have fun [with]. That’s where it started, but I wouldn’t say Dilf isn’t entirely like Yung Gravy, because there’s also the other parts. There’s the Dangerbottom part, which was like my last performance. That’s all about the danger and the excitement and the surprise that I also like to emulate.
You’re citing that hyper-masculinity as being a core part of Dilf’s persona, but you made the choice for it to also be non-binary drag, which was even shocking to many of the queens that were on stage. Where did that originate from?
Well, I am non-binary. I’ve known that for a really long time actually. I’ve always been pretty much out about that. I’ve never been closeted about that, and through Dilf has been my own gender journey as well. Cause I was just like, “Oh yeah, I’m non-binary, but I go back and forth between masculinity and femininity.” And I was actually concerned about my second performance. After having such a masculine first performance, I was like, “Is that what people want from me?” I also will like to perform femininely and I think that’s fun as well. I wasn’t sure if people were gonna get it or like it, and then I did it and people liked it. Then that’s when I realized I actually like being masculine in my everyday life, but I like being able to perform femininity. It’s more of a performance and a big show that brings excitement. Masculinity is more of my everyday life, but that nonbinary part of it is that through my drag. I get to do both and I get to switch between them and they both get to be [there] at the same time. It’s just kind of weird and wacky, but it’s also really beautiful at the same time. People didn’t just like seeing both sides of that. People loved it! You got co-signs from all the biggest drag Queens and drag performers that were there. What was that like for you?
Honestly, I was just in disbelief. That month leading up to the performance, my entire life was just the show. Yeah, I had school and I had work, but every minute that I could be thinking about the drag show, that’s what I was thinking about. I was thinking about the costume. I was thinking about my dance moves. I was thinking about the audio. I actually went through a couple of different songs. There [were] actually a couple earlier different versions of it before I settled on those three songs. I wasn’t even thinking about what the judges were gonna be saying, and then I was out there and I was like, “Oh my God! They actually like it!” They’re not just being like, “Oh, it was good for amateur drag.” They actually liked it and they were talking to me backstage and they were like, “You should do this.” I was like, “Oh my gosh!” It was just this validation that I needed cause I felt like, yeah my friends tell me I’m good and some college students tell me I’m good, but I don’t really know. It could just be people just telling me whatever. But then [hearing] somebody who doesn’t know me at all, has no connection to me whatsoever and is a professional getting to tell me that this is what I should do and that I could do this professionally was... I was just blown away. I didn’t really process it until the next day, and then the next day I was like, “Oh my gosh, that happened!” It was just incredible.
You’re going to be going off into the professional world very soon. You’re graduating this year. What’s the future for Dilf like and what does that feel like?
It’s a little scary because before this I had very set things I could prepare for, and before Dilf I wasn’t really sure what I was gonna do. I was kind of like, “Okay, I’m just gonna go figure out something. I don’t really know what I wanna do.” And then Dilf happened and I’m like, “Okay, what are the steps? This is the first time I’ve been excited about something like this in a long time.” ... I’m probably gonna be moving back to [New York City] with my family where it’s just one of the drag capitals. It’s kind of scary cause that’s where people do real drag. There’s so many professionals there, but even when I get intimidated, I have to be like, “You know what? I just have to start doing what I’m doing!” Even if it doesn’t succeed at first or if I have to do some trial and error with performances that’s okay. That’s pretty much what my future is like. I’m just gonna go do Dilf and see where people like it and what people want from that. That’s what I’m pretty much going all-in on at this point because this is what I wanna do.
