Dina’s Diner 3/6/23

IS IT SAFE?

Will it be safe to dress like this in red states?

In the film Marathon Man, the aged Nazi war criminal (played by Laurence Olivier) must come out of hiding to collect his ill-gotten war booty. He famously asks his captured nemesis (played by Dustin Hoffman), “Is it safe?” I thought of this scene recently when I read a couple of news articles recently. They both appeared in late February 2023.

Many news outlets – including our own Trans News Now feature – reported on the offer of a mixed martial arts studio to supply bodyguards for drag performers who were threatened in West Virginia. A family restaurant/sports bar had promoted a drag show but canceled it after receiving numerous threats of violence by hatemongers.

Enter mixed martial arts fighter Jonathan Haught. One news outlet reported, “Haught, who owns and operates the Ohio Valley MMA studio, said he and his fighters were prepared to work security if and when the event was rescheduled. “I’m not afraid to stand up to people, and I train to fight people all day, every day, so if somebody really wants to attack somebody, let them attack me instead,” Haught said, as reported by NBC News “Don’t attack the drag queens.” The MMA fighter told local outlets he had security experience and has bounced at multiple bars over the past decade. Haught said he’s confident that he and his fighters had the skills to de-escalate tense situations and ensure everything remains peaceful.”

Haught also told reporters, “The drag show is no more offensive than a Broadway show, or a stand-up comedy show,” Haught continued. In essence, it’s a mix of both. At the end of the day, it is entertainment. Not part of some hidden agenda, like some would have you believe.”

Not long after this controversy in West Virginia, the governor of Tennessee said he would sign a bill that would restrict drag shows in the state. The Tennesseean newspaper reported, “The bill classifies “male and female impersonators” as adult cabaret performers and bans “adult-oriented performances that are harmful to minors,” as defined in Tennessee’s obscenity law. Since the bill was filed, some Republicans have said it would not broadly affect drag shows, only those with material that fits under the state’s existing obscenity laws and under a strict obscenity test defined by the U.S. Supreme Court.”

This is, I think, the first legislative attempt to curtail drag after all the brouhahas about drag story hours, drag shows (as above) in non-gay-themed venues, and more broadly the whole issue of trans and nonbinary kids. Just to make the Tennessee case more ridiculous, someone dug up an old photo of the Governor, Bill Lee, dressed in drag (yep!) for a high school gender-bending football game. As I write this, news of Texas state legislator Nate Schatzline who authored a drag show restriction bill was also found to have dressed in drag as a student.

Governor Lee in drag on the right.

This war on drag is infuriating to read about. That people are getting so worked up about something so camp is depressing for the future of common sense. And we must keep some perspective here that cultural tempests run their course and (so far at least) usually get steamrolled by the side of the angels.

But here is my concern for us as un-drafted soldiers in this particular culture war. If you are a crossdresser who ventures out in public: are you safe? Will people who disapprove of crossdressing, gender-bending, drag, or however they care to name it, feel emboldened by their crazier compatriots and perhaps take the next step to physical confrontation? Will being crossdressed in public be viewed as “asking for it” by yahoos looking to make trouble? Would that viewpoint (in the event of an attack) fall on sympathetic ears with the authorities, fellow citizens, or juries?

A PENNY FOR MY THOUGHTS

The Pinterest.com site has been a fertile field for Diner material as well as all manner of other content that strikes a chord for me. A few weeks ago, I started to see photos of former child actress Angela Cartwright showing up in my feed from the site.

Angela Cartwright

When I was a boy – a small boy – I had a big crush on Angela Cartwright who was only a couple of years older than me. She played Danny Thomas’ daughter in the series Make Room for Daddy in the early 1960s. This was an innocent prepubescent crush. I didn’t know how it would happen but I knew that we were meant for each other. Bright-eyed and bright-smiled, Angela was pretty but not in the same way as Maureen McCormick who came along a decade later in The Brady Bunch. It was a lot of girlish bangs, shift dresses, bare legs and ankle socks.

Angela also played one of the Von Trapp girls in The Sound Of Music around the same time. She had a part in Hitchcock’s The Birds. She gave ‘Beaver’ his first kiss on an episode of Leave It To Beaver. Not long after, she turned up in the series Lost In Space as “Penny.” By now she was high school age, not quite filling out those horrible silver bodysuits, but almost as tall as her TV mother played by June Lockhart. Later, she did all the usual television stuff with guest spots on many series, a cameo in the later Lost in Space movie, and is now mostly retired.

I only bring this up because when I saw her photos on the Pinterest site it all came flooding back: the crush, that time of my life, and how life went on for both of us – despite never becoming man and wife as I had imagined as a 7 year old. And although I never considered Angela Cartwright in my crossdressing, she is part of that mélange of females that made an impression on my younger subconscious and that probably influenced some part of my feminine development or sensibility. So in some small way, Angela and I did become entwined and remain so as evidenced by the way I feel when I see her photos all these years later.

LOOKS CAN BE DECEIVING

Raluca Granola

Another thing that popped up in my Pinterest feed was a photo of someone who was identified as Raluca. A very pretty, very young, transgender woman Raluca appeared to be.

I searched around for information on Raluca and came across a site that identified Raluca (some other sites use the name Raluca Granola) as a 22 year old Tik Tok creator. That was surprising because the photos were presenting a much younger appearance. Raluca doesn’t mention pronouns and only identifies himself as ‘Androgynous’ on his Instagram page.

Another site reported that Raluca was born in Brazil. There are some postings by others that seem to imply that Raluca is not for real. Unfortunately, the sites are in a foreign language and I couldn’t find a translation link. So the Raluca mystery deepens.

I tried watching a couple of the Tik Tok videos (there are dozens) but they aren’t very illuminating. In fact, the more I looked at the videos and the Instagram images, the more skeptical I became. Although some of the images seem real, some of them seem subtly manipulated, others were obviously filtered or manipulated. The cumulative effect began to make me doubt much of what I was seeing. The hyper youthful facial appearance may be a result of digital tampering. The photos and videos are not lewd or suggestive and it seems genuine in the way young people make and produce social media posts these days.

In the past I’ve written about young men who are famous makeup influencers with amazing photos, pre-teen drag queens, and high school boys competing in ‘womanless beauty pageants.’ Several years ago, I had an item about a fifty-year old Japanese man who digitally manipulated his image to appear as a beautiful young blonde woman. I thought Raluca might have been an otherworldly example of a nonbinary person. Well, perhaps otherworldly is the right term in this case because Raluca may be too good to be believed.

THEY COULDN’T KEEP HER DOWN

Jackie Moggridge

I saw a brief tribute to a woman named Jackie Moggridge on a Facebook page for a U. K. veterans foundation. Through further reading I found that Jackie was a busy pilot for the Royal Air Force during World War II.

This capsule description of her military service is from a Wikipedia page about Jackie: “Like many women interested in flying for the war effort, she joined the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force until she could join the Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA). She was recruited to the ATA by the Women’s Commandant, Pauline Gower in July 1940. Moggridge was the youngest of the female pilots at the time. She flew more than 1,500 aircraft of 83 different types. Jackie Moggridge was awarded the King’s Commendation for Valuable Service in the Air in 1945.”

She was awarded her RAF wings (only the second woman at the time) in 1953. She later flew war surplus Spitfire planes to Burma for the Indian army earning her the nickname “Spitfire Girl.” Jackie became the first female commercial pilot for a passenger carrying airline in 1958.

A webpage dedicated to her accomplishments details even more interesting things about Jackie’s life in the air and on the ground. There are a lot of photos of her in her RAF uniform and flying gear. I kind of like this photo that shows a self-assured Jackie and her aircraft. No, there’s nothing to do with crossdressing in Jackie’s story. She was a wife and mother along with everything else. Hers is a story of determination to be the best woman she could be. In that way, perhaps we all do have some connection to Jackie Moggridge.

WHAT HAPPENED TO MARDI GRAS?

Carnival Queen

I was looking forward to writing an item about Mardi Gras and it’s more flamboyant Brazilian version of Carnival. I didn’t see much reporting about Mardi Gras here in the states and the online reporting of Carnival in Brazil seems indistinguishable from year to year.

In the early 2000s Mardi Gras became a big party night for bars in many cities. It’s a festive anything-goes vibe and would seem to be ideal for crossdressing. There were a few years when I did partake of the opportunity in Philadelphia. But the crowds eventually got so rowdy that bars in the South Street corridor shut down early to prevent further mayhem.

The Mardi Gras celebration in New Orleans always garnered coverage in the media. I didn’t see any of it this year. Maybe I just missed it. Maybe the post-Covid stay-at-home culture is still ascendant. Compared to the sights from Carnival in Rio de Janeiro, the Mardi Gras in New Orleans seemed to be a tawdry affair anyway.

The celebrations in Brazil’s largest cities are filled with elaborately costumed showgirls (and boys) and loud, percussive samba parades. The official celebrations in recent years have championed trans participants in the parades. The Voice of America website did warn that Brazil has a high incidence of LGBTQ hate crimes, however, and another site warned against pickpockets in the large crowds.

I learned that anyone can join one of the samba schools to march in the parade if you make arrangements far enough in advance. Costuming is an important part of the ritual and the schools can sell or rent costumes to newcomers. How would you like to parade in Rio (or elsewhere) in some skimpy, rhinestoned, and feathered showgirl costume? Let’s see a show of hands. Ah, as I thought. Nearly unanimous.

Tags: crossdressing, featured, news, opinion, Transgender

Category: Transgender Community News, Transgender Opinion