Lights! Camera! Drag! at the Grad Club this Pride Month.
On June 18, the Grad Club turned back the clock, hosting a 90s-themed drag show NOW! That’s What I Call Drag. Proceeds support Trans Family Kingston (TFAM), an organization focused on forming a community of support for transgender and gender diverse individuals in the Kingston area by providing them with guidance on how to access necessary health and legal care, including gender-affirming services and name changes.
Yuni Verse, a trans drag queen based in Kingston, took to the stage hosting the show, which marks her second performance with the Grad Club, and her first time hosting a fundraiser for TFAM. For the Grad Club, this fundraiser is yet another addition to the Club’s long history of providing LGBTQ+ artists and community members with safe spaces for performing and connecting.
In a written statement to The Journal, the Grad Club Board said that over the past decade, the venue has hosted “everything from vibrant drag shows and Queer open mic nights to Pride Week celebrations and community fundraisers.” The Board called its drag shows one of the Club’s most “beloved and popular events.”
According to the Grad Club Board, their “collaboration with TFAM has recently become more direct and exciting.” By hosting this charity event, the Club will support TFAM’s mission of providing the transgender community in Kingston with resources and support, including aiding with access to gender-affirming care.
Transgender individuals in Kingston have long faced barriers to gender-affirming care, including lengthy wait times and clinical descriptions of gender being limited to binary “male-female” language.. For residents of a city, in recent years, has reported the highest rates of transgender and non-binary people in Canada, this lack of access can have serious impacts on wellbeing.
For Yuni Verse, TFAM’s mission of supporting trans people and their medical needs is a cause close to her heart. “I personally wouldn’t be where I am today in my transition without their guidance and support,” Yuni Verse wrote in an e-mail statement to The Journal. For her, organizations like TFAM are essential to help provide the trans community with the resources and support necessary to navigate the world. TFAM declined to provide The Journal with a comment on their collaboration with the Grad Club and Yuni Verse.
Aside from benefitting TFAM’s services, NOW! That’s What I Call Drag! also demonstrates the power of personal artistic influences on drag performances and their connection to social activism. Yuni Verse shared that her performance’s 90s-inspired themes are a tribute to the decade’s celebration of “social justice and non-conformity,” and that her drag persona honours her transition to “becoming [her] true self.”
2SLGBTQIA+-centered celebrations of identity are essential for the Grad Club’s mission of serving as a space for 2SLGBTQ+ performances and community events. For the Club’s Board, the “immense and loyal support” they receive from members of the queer community during Pride month are fundamental to who they are.
The Club continues to honour their commitment to the Kingston 2SLGBTQ+ community with their monthly Open Stage Drag Night, which continues to captivate audiences all year long.
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