Anti Gay Republican Candidate was Drag Queen
Steve Wiles is your standard Republican candidate for the US Senate: he’s pro-gun. He’s anti-marriage equality. He used to be a drag queen and emceed the Miss Gay America pageant. Totally your typical Republican.
Wait, a Republican drag artist?
That’s right.
Apparently the last Republican mid-term election got a bit nasty in North Carolina…or at least, that’s what Wiles thinks. The Winston-Salem Journal posted an article breaking the news that one Republican candidates who is all for a constitutional ban on marriage equality in North Carolina is a former drag queen.
You could say that this bit of news queered his campaign.
But there is so much wrong with a lot of his beliefs.
For instance, this is his stance on same-sex marriage: “I don't really understand how you can separate the fact that marriage is a religious institution.”
Let’s look at this in a historical context: marriage today is virtually nothing like it was thousands of years ago. Originally, it wasn’t about love. It was also (and this might be a shock to some) not really about religion either. It was a contract between two familiesthat often had to do with money, power, and land—there’s a reason why the bride’s family provided a dowry in so many cultures. Marriage for love only started becoming a thing about 250 years ago, and marriage wasn’t a religious institution until about the 1500s.
Not that logic really matters, because Wiles says now that he has a problem with people who are gay.
Looooooooord, this makes this man a bit of a hot mess. He was a drag queen. He frequented gay nightclubs. He was an emcee for Miss Gay America, of all contests.
According to Business Insider, when Wiles was asked “whether his objection to the gay lifestyle was the reason he stopped promoting Miss Gay America,” he said, “It was. It really was.”
As to whether he also considers himself “ex-gay,” well…when asked about it, he said, “No, no, I really won’t make any comments on that.”
Today, Wiles just says that having been a drag queen named Mona Sinclair is an embarrassment.
He has some other oddities as well. For instance, he went from being a registered Democrat in 2008 to a Republican in 2012. Slate has suggested a very creative explanation for this: the persona of Steve Wiles is actually an act, perhaps the ultimate performance. It’s a man pretending to be a woman pretending to be a man. To quote Interview with the Vampire, “How avant garde.”
The whole thing is enough to make your head spin. Why does he think he should be embarrassed about this past? Should he feel the need to re-closet himself?
Perhaps this is a symptom of a problem within conservative politics: why can’t someone be both a Republican and gay? This should be an important question, as Log Cabin Republicans are being turned away from a conservative convention in Colorado. It’s also important to remember that all of the Republican candidates for president have backed the anti-LGBT law in Indiana.
Maybe the time has come for the GOP to look at itself and see if there is still room for bigotry.
Wait, a Republican drag artist?
That’s right.
Apparently the last Republican mid-term election got a bit nasty in North Carolina…or at least, that’s what Wiles thinks. The Winston-Salem Journal posted an article breaking the news that one Republican candidates who is all for a constitutional ban on marriage equality in North Carolina is a former drag queen.
You could say that this bit of news queered his campaign.
But there is so much wrong with a lot of his beliefs.
For instance, this is his stance on same-sex marriage: “I don't really understand how you can separate the fact that marriage is a religious institution.”
Let’s look at this in a historical context: marriage today is virtually nothing like it was thousands of years ago. Originally, it wasn’t about love. It was also (and this might be a shock to some) not really about religion either. It was a contract between two familiesthat often had to do with money, power, and land—there’s a reason why the bride’s family provided a dowry in so many cultures. Marriage for love only started becoming a thing about 250 years ago, and marriage wasn’t a religious institution until about the 1500s.
Not that logic really matters, because Wiles says now that he has a problem with people who are gay.
Looooooooord, this makes this man a bit of a hot mess. He was a drag queen. He frequented gay nightclubs. He was an emcee for Miss Gay America, of all contests.
According to Business Insider, when Wiles was asked “whether his objection to the gay lifestyle was the reason he stopped promoting Miss Gay America,” he said, “It was. It really was.”
As to whether he also considers himself “ex-gay,” well…when asked about it, he said, “No, no, I really won’t make any comments on that.”
Today, Wiles just says that having been a drag queen named Mona Sinclair is an embarrassment.
He has some other oddities as well. For instance, he went from being a registered Democrat in 2008 to a Republican in 2012. Slate has suggested a very creative explanation for this: the persona of Steve Wiles is actually an act, perhaps the ultimate performance. It’s a man pretending to be a woman pretending to be a man. To quote Interview with the Vampire, “How avant garde.”
The whole thing is enough to make your head spin. Why does he think he should be embarrassed about this past? Should he feel the need to re-closet himself?
Perhaps this is a symptom of a problem within conservative politics: why can’t someone be both a Republican and gay? This should be an important question, as Log Cabin Republicans are being turned away from a conservative convention in Colorado. It’s also important to remember that all of the Republican candidates for president have backed the anti-LGBT law in Indiana.
Maybe the time has come for the GOP to look at itself and see if there is still room for bigotry.
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