Lahoma: Drag is not a positive word! Drag is like 'draaaag', but um-- but queen is a positive word.
I feel like I have it best, because I can do both - I can be a man and I can be a woman. And [...] you see the world differently, through the different ways, and you get to see different things, and you get different reactions from people, so I get to see a side of straight males when I'm like this, that I don't ever get to see as John.
Someone: What side?
Lahoma: Well, it's like, a vulnerable side. Because women have real power over men, they do. And you don't get to see that as a man. You do get to see it as a woman.
Someone: But don't you think that a cute boy has just as much power over men?
Lahoma: Over straight men? Or "straight" men?
Someone: Well, straight men, yeah. Since we're saying that everyone has a feminine side.
Lahoma: Maybe, but they don't show it.
Rupaul: It's used in a different way, because [...] what's set up in our minds as male-female and in male-male, it's different. He does have power over him, but the way they would approach, what's happening between them, would be totally different.
Lahoma: Well, society's conditioned them where they can't go across that line. They can't react in a certain way. But if it's a female, and even if it's a male dressed as a female, and they could at least say "Well, I was drunk, I didn't know."
Rupaul: Right!
[they all laugh]
Lahoma: It doesn't matter, they give this thing. And it's also--
Someone: Well, it's all in the accessories.
Lahoma: It's accessories, too, also, really! Sometimes, males are so conditioned to react to the accessories that make a female, that it doesn't really really matter what's down in the pants. They're reacting to the fantasy.
Rupaul: Yeah.
Someone: Plus, they want what's in the pants anyway.
Lahoma: Well some do, some don't, some just don't care. Some just get into the fantasy, whether it's a male or female.
Rupaul: Yeah, and everybody loves playing with toys. All the accessories are so much fun and stuff. I think females get just as turned on by it, too. They say that women dress for other women.
Lahoma: Oh yeah, 'cause I get reactions from girls who dress like this, and it's like, [head tilt], y'know, it's like this knowing this, kind of like "Alright, go ahead girl." I get that from women, too.
...
Nelson: Well, there's all kinds of drag. But I think a lot of this drag in the East Village is social terrorism.
Lahoma: Oh yeah, there's a part of that. Also, it's just the fantasy that you've created, and then you live it. You run out, in public, and you just live this fantasy. And I get pleasure out of... I don't wanna say shocking, or... I get pleasure out of the reactions I get. And the fantasy, my fantasy going through a certain set-up, like a certain club, or on the street, or something like that. And it's the thing that's created by that [...] It's like going to see a movie.
...
Someone: Me and Ru were talking about this before, but the male-- it follows nature that the male was always the most beautiful of the species.
[they all laugh]
...
Rupaul: Well, We've all been drawn here because of the popstar phenomenon. What do you do if you want to be a popstar? You go to New York and you become a [unintellible]. And then once you're here, to be able to make money, as for me-- people love to pay me for my drag. [...] Drag is what the people want. I don't know what came first, the chicken or the egg...
Fenton: Do you think this will become a big American taste? Like, drag will be popular?
Lahoma: I hope so! It's a wonderful flavor. It is! [...] It's not hard to do, and it works every time, and it's fun!
Someone: Just say yes! Just say yes!
...
Lahoma: One thing I think is amazing. When I was in band, we went to dump little towns, and we played, and I was a boy, and that was one thing. But then I started doing a girl in the band, and I would go to these dump little towns, in like Memphis, Tennessee, [...] we'd go into a club, and there'd be nothing but rednecks drinking beers, waiting for the band to come on. [...] And so I'd go out on the stage, and I'd see hostile faces at first, but within the course of the show, the fantasy, when it got to work. By the end of the show, they were screaming and hollering and having a good time. [...] It's something going on in their head, that at first they're hostile, and then it's like, you... y'know.
Someone: Because they see you're okay! They see that you're just an adorable girl.
Lahoma: But it's still a breakthrough in their heads. Who would've thought that these drunk fraternity boys, next to their drunk fraternity buddies, would say "Okay, that's okay!" when any other time they'd drag you out and beat you up.