It's A Drag

 So here's an interesting thing: There were "drag shows" back in Elizabethan England. They were written by Shakespeare. 

As any student of the Bard will likely relate, assuming they would like to show off their Bachelor of Arts degree or the three credits they got for taking a literature course on their way to an engineering major, women's parts were played by young men or boys. Desdemona, Othello's wife, was not played on stage by a woman until some sixty years after the play was written. 

There is still some discussion about where the term "drag" originates, but one of the most popular was that it was a stage direction abbreviation for "DRessed As Girl." The veracity of this claim is still a point of conversation among those who converse about such things, but the fact remains: Women's parts were played by men as part of convention. In Shakespeare. Exactly why women were not allowed to appear onstage is also up for debate, most of it centering on the widely held opinion that acting and the theater attracted less than the best types. And Puritan leader William Prynne's declaration that “popular stage-playes are sinfull, heathenish, lewde, ungodly spectacles, and most pernicious corruptions.” And apparently full of extra letters. 

Then there 's the sad reality that what we now revere, the works of Shakespeare, were not preformed in ritzy palaces to which we have become accustomed. More like big open barns, with audiences that tended to walk in and out during performances and a ready supply of rotting vegetables to hurl at any moment they felt needed punching up. It was some time before actors and their work became respected. Or revered. 

Which may help to explain the right's disdain for all things theatrical. The Hollywood Elite. The Blue Coasts. Never mind that when a James Woods or Dean Cain pops up they are quick to be absorbed by the MAGATs. Never mind the very theatrical way that these folks tend to carry on, and most of the talking heads at Faux News presentations could easily be defined as performance art. Never mind that the groups of "militia" that show up in their matching khakis to protest men dressed in women's clothing suggests a costuming effort. The puritanical streak is reminiscent of the fear and loathing experienced centuries ago. 

And just for history's sake, why not ask Anderson Lee Aldrich how tough drag queens can be. It's not what you're wearing, it's how you wear it.