The only live Shakespeare performance I've ever seen was a nude, all-female rendition of The Tempest in broad daylight in Brooklyn's Prospect Park. I went there on a whim with a group of friends when I was in college. Admission was free. It was awesome.
I thought of this performance in light of the Tennessee state legislature's passage of a bill that would ban public drag performances. According to the bill summary:
This bill creates an offense for a person who engages in an adult cabaret performance on public property or in a location where the adult cabaret performance could be viewed by a person who is not an adult. The bill defines an "adult cabaret performance" to mean a performance in a location other than an adult cabaret that features topless dancers, go-go dancers, exotic dancers, strippers, male or female impersonators who provide entertainment that appeals to a prurient interest, or similar entertainers, regardless of whether or not performed for consideration.
That "appeals to a prurient interest" clause seems to do a lot of heavy lifting. The actresses I watched in Prospect Park were technically "topless dancers," but while I didn't find their performances "prurient," another viewer might. Semantics aside, this legislation is an obvious attempt to ban drag performances, which lawmakers say are "harmful to minors." And who gets to say what's harmful to minors, anyway? (I fondly recall my childhood trips to Provincetown, Massachusetts, where I would wave at the drag queens standing on the street advertising their shows. I don't think that those drag queens' portrayal of diverse gender expressions harmed me at all—just the opposite.)
Some people, including Tennessee Republicans, have pointed out that public obscenity is already illegal in the state. The purpose of the law, then, isn't to ban drag, but to frighten people—including trans people—out of expressing themselves and their gender however they choose.
Meanwhile, state lawmakers are trying to ban gender-affirming care for minors. Proponents of these laws say they're just trying to protect children, but it's not clear that children need protection from drag in the first place.
—Abigail Weinberg
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