Guest Post by Eileen Dover for Grabhim.net
We’ve all seen the ads, even in the “Pre-Grindr/Scruff” days when a dude would put an ad in the back of a magazine or a recording on a phone line with his stats, size, girth, and phone number, waiting for someone to call, someone hot, someone young, someone sexy, someone……..Straight acting, Straight appearing, certainly not fat or femmie and if they’ve ever worn a dress please, don’t waste your time.
Even men who themselves, are not jacked and masculine reject men who don’t live up to their preconceived notions of a man that both mainstream and gay media perpetuate. It strikes me hilarious when an average looking, heavy set, Madonna loving, Golden Girls watching, cocktail party throwing, gay guy has so much to say about the level of tolerable femininity or desired amount of masculinity a potential suitor is allowed to portray… For shame!
Misogyny, the struggle is real. Sadly this is misogyny within the gay community. It’s existed as long as I’ve been out and that’s 26 years and I’m told by all of my predecessors that “it’s always been that way”, but at varying levels. I was always amazed that gay publications would allow “no fats no fems” into a personals ad (and now they’re in the apps!). Certainly they wouldn’t allow an ad that said “no Jews or no Catholics”, so I wondered to myself, and in many bar brawls aloud, why the fat/fem thing was so “acceptable?” Was I an alien in my own community? Did I knock on the right door when I walked into my first teen support group for LGBT urban youth in 1989?
Some cranky old queen I know said to me once, “ya know honey, you’ve committed the 2 cardinal sins of homosexuality amongst gay men, You let your gym body go, (you’re pudgy), and you’ve done drag”. “Done drag”, as in “committed homicide?”
I was floored, “Hello!?” I’ve raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for so many causes, I’ve made people laugh, entertained them, and I was one of the loudest proponents of gay marriage, trans rights and research for AIDS. How can this be?” I knew he was right though. I knew it because I’d dated extensively. I knew it because I was always alone at the end of any given night. I knew it because I’d been living with the rejection of my gay male peers for a long time, settling for men who fetishize drag queens to satiate my sexual desires.
In my travels, one question I always asked every drag queen I’d ever met was, “How do you handle dating?” or “how does Dating handle you?” The answers I received varied. Some queens said they dated other drag queens specifically to avoid the frustration of the whole ‘dance.’ Some said they had given up on dating long ago, “I give the straight guy up the street a BJ every night when I come home from a show Mary, that’s enough for me.”
One queen told me she paid for it while other queens were selling it. At one time or another I tried it all. I wanted the Holy Grail though… I wanted the husband who sat in the front row, cheered me on, and brought flowers on opening night! I wanted the back-up dancer husband. I wanted to truly be loved no matter what I was wearing. I wanted someone to see through my weave-glued lashes and Dermablend and say, “Baby, you’re the greatest!”
Would You Date Me If You Met Me As A Man And THEN Found Out I Did Drag?
Click here to see side-by-side pictures of me in and out of drag. Be HONEST. Would that be a deal breaker for you?
I’ve had 4 relationships of significance and thousands of none!
There was Vinnie, a Guido from Rhode Island who loved drag queens and was himself a male escort. He hooked up with gay guys for money but was super turned on by queens. I tricked myself into believing he’d like me underneath the paint. Nay!
There was Joey, he was closeted to his family and believe it or not because he was so distracted trying to throw his family off of his sexuality he never found out I did drag. He actually found out very little about me at all.
There was Mark, we were together for five years (four formally and one where we lived in separate bedrooms). I didn’t tell him anything about Eileen Dover for about 3 months. He had a lesbian best friend and roommate who loved drag queens and she herself found herself in a relationship with a Transgender man. It took him a while but he loved ME and got used to it.
John was someone I met online. I fell hard. He knew I was a DJ (I do this in and out of drag) and surprised me at this dump I was playing at. He kissed me on the cheek and all was well until the bartender asked him, “What’s it like to date the one and only Eileen Dover?” That was the end of John and my dating life for the next 5 years.
My last relationship was with Nick. We met on Scruff and I had been through an extremely difficult part of my life which kind of gave me this “Fuck it, take me as I am,” attitude. We went on date number one and before the poor guy knew it he was hearing about dressing room drama, coke parties with celebrities and the pain of tucking.
Something different happened though, because I was so candid it put him at ease to talk about some of his more personal attributes and within a lesbian minute we were boyfriends. We dated for about 7-8 months during which he and I supported each other’s creative ventures, he decided to take a class in hat making and I launched www.eileendover.net, Eileen Dover TV, signed up for a gaggle of drag events, and started a screen-printing business. We quickly fell in like with each other and became friends, a category I’m used to. He had no problem with drag but the timing was abysmal. Frustrated I went on an eating binge, swearing off men forever. One guy in my whole dating career who has a healthy attitude about the “D” thing and we aren’t compatible as lovers. FML!
I was feeling pretty empty as an artist….yes, I am an artist, not just a man who wears funny clothes on occasion. I decided since I’d received some encouraging words from my celeb pals, Lady Bunny “go for it girl while the syphilis is in remission” and Boy George “you’re such a talent, and so funny when you’re sober” that it was time to stop settling for one or the other. At first I thought Eileen Dover would just be an online character and that I’d be her master. (How misogynistic is that, internal homophobia and chauvinism all in one foul swoop, control the female part of yourself virtually), but I began to miss the applause. I began to miss the looks of joy (or horror, especially the horror!) on the faces of the people I had the pleasure of entertaining. Or dating. The bottom line for me is that my career is more important than my dating life, but still, why should I have to choose between the two?
Would You Date Me If You Met Me As A Man And THEN Found Out I Did Drag?
Click here to see side-by-side pictures of me in and out of drag. Be HONEST. Would that be a deal breaker for you?