8 transgender queens from RuPaul's Drag Race, from the Philippines' Jiggly Caliente to Japan’s Gia Gunn
RuPaul’s Drag Race attracts millions of fans from around the world to Netflix to follow the hunt for America's next drag superstar, but transgender performers like model Carmen Carerra haven’t always been welcome on the runway
Since its launch in 2009, RuPaul’s Drag Race has seen just about every kind of drag queen come through its werk room doors. Gone are the days that drag was purely for gay men dressing up as women: we’ve seen some cisgender women (the likes of Vanessa Williams on RuPaul’s Celebrity Drag Race) and straight men (Scaredy Kat on RuPaul’s Drag Race UK) sashay their way on to the Emmy-winning reality show.
Not surprisingly, the show has also featured a host of transgender stars, who were either in the process of transitioning while filming, or came out after the show.
The transgender drag debate
Drag Race fans know very well that the idea of transsexual queens on the show has been a heated talking point, which led to a massive backlash for RuPaul in the past.
During a 2018 interview, Ru admitted during an interview that he “probably” wouldn’t have admitted a transgender woman like Peppermint on the reality show if she had already started gender-affirming surgery.
“You can identify as a woman and say you’re transitioning, but it changes once you start changing your body,” he told The Guardian, “It takes on a different thing; it changes the whole concept of what we’re doing.”
Ru’s comments caused massive outrage in the drag community, but it was only the beginning. In response to the backlash, RuPaul made matters worse by tweeting: “You can take performance enhancing drugs and still be an athlete,” RuPaul wrote, “just not in the Olympics.” Ouch.
