Until I competed in my first pride pageant on May 28 at River City Casino, all I really knew about pageants came from watching the iconic 2006 film Little Miss Sunshine and occasionally mining YouTube for the worst beauty pageant responses to the on-stage Q&A. My working class roots and the fact that I was…
Portrait of a Drag Friendship: Big, Queer and Female
In the dressing room at St. Louis’s newest gay bar, Prism, nine drag performers are in varying stages of undress. They pass around duct tape to secure their genitals and help each other shimmy into breast plates. Their voices are low, and they always need something: safety pins, concealer, eyelash glue. Usually, I have whatever…
Arch Rival Roller Derby Is a Queer Sanctuary
When I joined St. Louis’ flat-track roller derby team in 2016, one of the first things I was told was, “Nobody joins roller derby if they have a perfectly happy life. Usually, they’re dealing with some shit.” That was certainly the case for me. I was 22, newly enrolled in graduate school at Washington University…