Like the brilliant feminist-author-playwright-witch-prophetess that she is, Kate Scelsa had barely let me finish asking how she imagined the world would be different without patriarchy before quipping: “Straight dudes in drag.”
I laughed, sure that she was joking, sure that some bigger, grander, more serious socio-political structural vision was to follow. But Kate insisted. Finally, three years later, on the eve of hosting Lab/Shul’s PPPPPPurim 2020: Prophetic Post-Patriarchy Purim Performance Party in drag(ish) as Shabbottom (pssst…Monday March 9th get your tickets what are you waiting for?), I think I understand what she meant.
As a white heterosexual cis man I am the beneficiary of patriarchy, an imbalanced system of power that privileges people like me over all other people. In many ways I try to resist it, and in many more ways I take advantage of it when it serves me. But in a world with surging gun violence at the hands of men, rapidly dwindling rights for women, catastrophic abuse of Mother Earth, a known sexual assaulter in the Oval Office (like King Aheshverus on his throne), and suicide rates for men four times that of other genders, I am also a victim of its perils. As Liz Plank writes in her new book For the Love of Men: A New Vision for Mindful Masculinity:
“The biggest lie is that the fight to address male suffering is separate or at odds with the battle to liberate women. We all experience gender. We are all limited by oppressive gender stereotypes.”
Hosting as Shabbottom is an annual ritual subverting and critiquing those oppressive, rigid, toxic masculine gender stereotypes that wreak havoc across the planet. And you know what? It’s. So. Much. Fun. I look forward to it all year. I see in these photos a special kind of aliveness in my body, a sparkle in my eyes (and not just from the glitter). In my imagination it’s how Mordechai looked being led through the streets on the king’s horse by Haman, momentarily liberated.
Perhaps most importantly, blurring the lines of my gender expression on Purim night has led to a softening of those same lines the rest of the year. Like Kate prophetically predicted, this one-night-only performance has helped me see how I, and we, perform our gender everyday; that gender is not some static inherited binary, but a series of choices we are constantly making, consciously and unconsciously, in our professional, personal, and intimate relationships. And there are a lot more choices available.
PPPPPPurim is why this summer I was able to finally, after years of wanting one, get my first ear piercing. A small, subtle, superficial change, true, especially in the face of the immense global trauma from what author bell hooks helps us understand as “imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy.” But on the inside this change necessitated crossing an immense psychic chasm of judgment and fear deeply rooted in what my family, friends, and societal norms taught me to believe about masculinity. Good practice, I hope, for other even wider chasms still to go.
Art, theater, performance, masking, and play are all sacred tools for crossing these chasms, for accessing new interior dimensions and viscerally contacting the imagination. Which is why on Purim (arguably our most theatrical of ancient Pagan-Jewish holy days), Lab/Shul gathers a diverse bouquet of artists and commissions new works inspired by the ancient story of Purim to help us imagine a world post-patriarchy and face the reality of why we’re not there yet. So it’s with such passionate post-patriarchy delight that I get to announce our PPPPPPurim 2020 / 5780 artists.
>> Don’t wait to reserve your spot. Seriously, we’ve sold out three years in a row. (PS 50% off for Partners – check your inboxes).
A world post-patriarchy is one in which men like me have less power. Finally. It’s about time. And it’s also a world where men like me get to exist outside of narrow ideas of masculinity that hold us back from the full expression of ourselves. It’s a world where we will get to embrace personal choices that surprise or scare us. A world of spaciousness, fluidity, and fabulous freedom. In other words, it’s a world where we can wear drag – even if for just one night.
So, my fellow straight (and straightish) dudes, I hope you join me this Purim in helping make Kate’s vision come true, with respect and reverence for the feminine within and beyond. One night of some sacred inner soul sexploration and gender subversion. Take it from me and our drag queen turned rabbi and Billy Porter: You’ll look f****** fantastic.
May we all in our own way hear this ancient invitation for blurring and blending beyond the binary. May we mask and unmask, question our I-know-this-to-be-trues, challenge our it’ll-always-be-this-ways, discover our other, and walk in new shoes (or strut in heels).
May it be so. Amxn.
Ezra Bookman
Artistic Director
