What a drag

If you want to chip away at prejudice, the first thing you need to remember is that you cannot flaunt a controversial issue in people’s face on a very international platform and expect them to agree with you, without any backlash.

It is for this reason that I think that Tom Neuwirth’s decision to dress up in drag and create the persona of Conchita while sporting a beard badly misfired.  He said he wanted to get people talking and that he surely did (and he also won the Eurovision in what was already a foregone conclusion), but from what I can see he did not change the minds of people who are uncomfortable with transvestites. 

Of course he got the overwhelming LGBT vote, which is a formidable lobby within the Eurovision world, but what about the rest of the audience made up of a substantial number of (mostly married and conventional) women who also love the glitz and glamour, and even the campy bitchiness of this song contest?  [The small percentage of straight men who actually manage to sit through  the festival without falling asleep is negligble. The others who managed to stay awake, took one look at Conchita and confirmed why they hate the Eurovision].

And this is where Conchita ran into a snag, because the reaction to her beard has simply reinforced the bigotry. The image rubbed many straight people the wrong way. Some found it disturbing, some mocked it and others simply labelled it as “freaky”, which is understandable considering that once upon a time, traveling circuses used to have “the bearded lady” as one of their main attractions along with dwarfs and other people who were different.  I’m not sure what was exactly gained by the image in terms of opening people’s minds that we should accept everyone as they are.

And before I’m accused of “taking the Eurovision too seriously”, may I point out that it was Conchita herself in her press interviews who spoke about deliberately wanting to spread the message that everyone should just be who they want to be and it is not important how one looks. The lyrics of the song were also on these lines. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but Tom/Conchita is no fool - it was patently obvious that the image made him stand out from all the rest and would create the controversy and publicity one needs to stand out as one forgettable singer after another belts out one forgettable song after another in front of millions.

Throughout Europe, audiences have been divided over the Conchita persona: some embraced her (but they tend to be liberal anyway) and some were, let’s face it, repulsed (which is why I’m saying the idea misfired because they are the ones that Tom presumably wanted to reach out to). 

Of course, these kind of gimmicks at the Eurovision are nothing new - remember the transgender Israeli singer Dana International way back in 1998 who had everyone in Malta making the sign of the cross and saying, “u le, u le” when they realized ‘she’ was originally a ‘he’? Even in that contest it was obvious who would win precisely because of the stir which she created. 

Since then, drag queens no longer cause such a stir, although they still continue to be object of jokes  - indeed we have a long history of men dressing up as women for Panto and carnival purely for laughs. And that is another reason why the Conchita gimmick won’t open people’s minds because by playing around with gender and imposing a beard on what could otherwise pass for a beautiful woman, Tom Neuwirth too seems to be mocking the very segment of the population he is purporting to defend: those who have gender identification issues.

It did not help that Conchita spent the entire voting process feigning exaggerated surprise (12 points, moi?!) and mouthing ‘thank you’ and ‘I love you’ to the camera with enormous goo-goo eyes. If it were done with a hint of self-parody I would have laughed, but instead I found it incredibly annoying (in the same way if a woman had done it, may I add).  It was like watching a bad actress hamming it up for the camera who has convinced herself that she is being genuine in the way she is portraying her emotions. Normally, I would not attach such importance to this - after all, it’s just a show. But my irritation with the Conchita persona stems from the fact that it all seems to be one big joke and the hype was highly contrived, as opposed to the reality of those who are actually transgender.

I recently watched a very moving documentary about a little girl named Jazz, and as she puts it “I have a girl brain, but a male body”. Jazz knew she wanted to be a girl from the age of two, her remarkable parents eventually accepted her decision to live like a girl and they will be taking steps to delay the onset of puberty. Jazz does not want any of the outward signs of masculinity which growing up will inevitably bring; the very idea of her boy’s body betraying how she feels inside simply terrifies her. 

If people in the LGBT community truly want to break down the walls of prejudice among the mainstream population, they should recommend this video. It will do far more to open closed minds than a thousand bearded ladies.