{"id":9362,"date":"2020-04-01T11:56:22","date_gmt":"2020-04-01T15:56:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/eportfolios.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/?p=9362"},"modified":"2020-04-01T11:56:22","modified_gmt":"2020-04-01T15:56:22","slug":"drag-race-relations-how-rupauls-drag-race-all-stars-fed-into-their-racist-rumor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/2020\/04\/01\/drag-race-relations-how-rupauls-drag-race-all-stars-fed-into-their-racist-rumor\/","title":{"rendered":"[Drag] Race Relations: How RuPaul\u2019s Drag Race All Stars Fed Into Their Racist Rumor"},"content":{"rendered":"

By James Brischetta<\/strong><\/p>\n

*NOTICE* This article discusses past and present seasons of the competition show <\/span>RuPaul\u2019s Drag Race<\/span><\/i> and <\/span>RuPaul\u2019s Drag Race All Stars<\/span><\/i>.<\/span> Spoilers ahead.<\/b><\/p>\n

The newest season of the Emmy Award-winning competition show <\/span>RuPaul\u2019s Drag Race<\/span><\/i> premiered just a few weeks ago on February 28th. The show, for those who haven\u2019t watched, goes a little bit like this: 1) Drag Queens compete in challenges, 2) One of the bottom two performers are eliminated each week via a Lip Sync battle, 3) Drag Queen Matriarch RuPaul, from the final four contestants, picks each season\u2019s winner of $100,000 (among other prizes).<\/span><\/p>\n

The show is known for its drama, and deservedly so. There\u2019s usually one large dramatic event that defines each season (and that warrants the infamous \u201c<\/span>Drag Race<\/span><\/i> Drama Background Music\u201d), the most recent example being Sherry Pie\u2019s disqualification from Season 12, before she even premiered on the show, amid catfishing allegations. Other examples include Asia O\u2019Hara killing a bunch of butterflies on stage during the Season 10 finale, Willam\u2019s shocking disqualification on Season 4, and most controversial, Nina Bo\u2019nina Brown not getting Blac Chyna in Season 9\u2019s \u201cKardashian: The Musical\u201d episode.<\/span><\/p>\n

Though there\u2019s one external drama that has followed the show through its last few seasons: race relations. The \u201c<\/span>Drag Race<\/span><\/i> Hall of Fame,\u201d home to every Queen that has previously won the show, is fairly diverse. In fact, more Queens of color have won the mother show than white Queens. But the show\u2019s spin-off, <\/span>RuPaul\u2019s Drag Race: All Stars<\/span><\/i>, where Queens who have previously competed on the main show get a second chance at the crown, does not follow suit. Of the five Queens who have won <\/span>All Stars<\/span><\/i>, only one of them, Monet X Change, is a Queen of color. This has been a huge topic of discussion among the show\u2019s viewers, who have criticized the show and RuPaul for only crowning white Queens in the first 3 seasons of <\/span>All Stars<\/span><\/i>. Season 4, the latest season of <\/span>All Stars<\/span><\/i>, saw the crowning of the series\u2019 first Queen of color, only for Monet\u2019s crowning to be overshadowed by the franchise\u2019s first-ever double-win, with a white Queen.<\/span><\/p>\n

The observation that the show was only crowning white queens began to surface during the premiere of the third season and racist accusations toward the show\u2019s production began with Trixie Mattel\u2019s crowning at the end of that season. I do agree that race played a factor in the decision making of <\/span>All Stars<\/span><\/i>, but not until <\/span>All Stars 4<\/span><\/i>; and I can explain why.<\/span><\/p>\n

Chad Michaels won <\/span>All Stars 1<\/span><\/i>, but because it was the spin-off\u2019s first season, I don\u2019t think that race could\u2019ve played a factor. There was no racist pattern to adhere to yet (Also, anyone who watches the show knows that <\/span>All Stars 1<\/span><\/i> doesn\u2019t really count at all).<\/span><\/p>\n

Alaska won <\/span>All Stars 2<\/span><\/i>, but again, I don\u2019t think race was key in Ru\u2019s decision here. Alaska had the most wins of the season, and at that point, in the entire franchise\u2019s history. Coincidentally, three of the top 4 Queens were white, so chances were a white Queen was going to be crowned that season anyway.<\/span><\/p>\n

Trixie won <\/span>All Stars 3<\/span><\/i>, but I\u2019d say Ru was forced to pick her. This season\u2019s \u2018Jury Twist\u2019 allowed the eliminated Queens to vote on the top two, of which Ru would decide who the winner was. The eliminated Jury ruled out Shangela, a Queen of color and the season\u2019s front-runner, leaving Trixie Mattel and Kennedy Davenport for Ru to choose from. Kennedy is a black Queen and Trixie is half Native American but identifies as white. Trixie was runner-up to Shangela, while Kennedy performed poorly for most of the season. So again, I don\u2019t think Ru had much of a choice.<\/span><\/p>\n

That brings us to <\/span>All Stars<\/span><\/i> 4<\/span><\/i>. The top four Queens were Monet X Change (Queen of color: 3 wins), Trinity the Tuck (White: 4 wins), Monique Heart (Queen of Color: 3 wins), and Naomi Smalls (Queen of Color, 1 win). Ru decides to crown both Monet and Trinity.<\/span><\/p>\n

Twitter. Freaked. Out.<\/span><\/p>\n

Some viewers claimed that the show only picked Monet because they had to, others claimed the crown should have only gone to one of the Queens, and a select few kept to a firm \u201cManila was robbed #Life\u2019sNotFair\u201d. Whatever their opinion, the viewers were mad and the show\u2019s final four were flooded with hate comments and threats. Aquaria, the winner of <\/span>Drag Race<\/span><\/i>\u2019s season 10, responded to the fanbase\u2019s riots with this:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cPlease stop tagging me or using my name in your disgustingly negative posts about last night\u2019s results or competitors. I\u2019m horrified by some viewers\u2019 response to these four talented queens and it has made me so genuinely sad that people feel okay sharing these opinions and hate.\u201d (@Aquariaofficial on Twitter)<\/span><\/p>\n

The decision to doubly crown Monet and Trinity, I believe, is the only time race was taken into account. I speculate Ru wanted to crown Trinity for her record but didn\u2019t want to deal with the backlash of viewers criticizing another white<\/span> All Stars <\/span><\/i>winner. It made it seem like Monet won because she had to. The other problem was, Monet\u2019s win was made insignificant, almost insinuating that a Black Queen could not win <\/span>All Stars<\/span><\/i> on their own. If Ru had crowned one Queen or the other, I think there would have been less retaliation. A multitude of fans also came out to say the same thing I am: that this season was less deserving than others of a double crowning and that they had thrown out the option simply to shush the fans’ criticism of a white Hall of Fame.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By James Brischetta *NOTICE* This article discusses past and present seasons of the competition show RuPaul\u2019s Drag Race and RuPaul\u2019s Drag Race All Stars. Spoilers ahead. The newest season of the Emmy Award-winning competition show RuPaul\u2019s Drag Race premiered just a few weeks ago on February 28th. The show, for those who haven\u2019t watched, goes…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":703,"featured_media":9402,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"portfolio_post_id":0,"portfolio_citation":"","portfolio_annotation":"","openlab_post_visibility":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[677,1596,1800,1900],"class_list":["post-9362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts-entertainment","tag-drag-race","tag-opinions","tag-race-relations","tag-rupaul"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/703"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9362"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9362\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/openlab.macaulay.cuny.edu\/messenger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}