University’s Drag Ban Taken to the Supreme Court

When LGBTQ+ students at West Texas A&M University weren’t able to come to a proper resolution of the drag ban put in place by University President Walter Wendler, they took matters into their own hands. Taking their complaints up with the Supreme Court, the students felt this ban to be a violation of their freedoms of speech. The situation took place when the University president canceled all on campus drag performances in 2023 after stating he feels as if drag is a misogynistic art form similar to blackface.

I see how some non-LGBTQ+ people might misunderstand or need an explanation of what drag really is, but what I can’t understand is being so misinformed to where you think it even compares to blackface in the slightest. Blackface was used in minstrel shows: a so-called “form of theater” created by white racists in the 19th century and were used to dehumanize, polarize, and discriminate against melanated people in America. Something as disgusting as that can’t be compared to the art form of drag which is meant to embrace and creatively exaggerate the glamor in femininity through more campy and over the top looks. Wendler has other thoughts as he exaggerates that drag does not preserve: “a single thread of human dignity.”

FIRE, or the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a nonprofit, free speech group, stated in their letter to the Supreme court: “Only this Court can halt an ongoing violation of two of the most fundamental First Amendment protections: the bars against prior restraint and viewpoint-based censorship.” 

They continued to serve the university’s president a federal lawsuit for the drag ban and cancellation of the March 22 drag fundraiser for the Trevor Project, a suicide prevention organization for queer youth. It’s unclear whether the Supreme Court will take emergency action but one thing’s for sure. As Adam Steinbaugh said in a statement: “College presidents can’t silence students simply because they disagree with their expression,” and, by law, “The First Amendment protects student speech, whether it’s gathering on campus to study the Bible, hosting an acid-tongued political speaker, or putting on a charity drag show.”