This month, the two-time winner of RuPaul’s Drag Race, Jinkx Monsoon, will fly her broomstick to Ohio for her international tour, Everything At Stake.
As a practicing witch, Jinkx sees the show as an opportunity to draw parallels between the persecution of witches and the rising hostility against LGBTQ+ people in America.
“We’ve seen communities scapegoated throughout time, and right now, the queer community is being scapegoated by conservative zealot assholes–insidious people,” said Jinkx, who has long used drag to center her activism.
Recently, the Buckeye State has seen threats to queer youth and their ability to safely express themselves with bills, such as HB 8. HB 8– referred to by conservative lawmakers as the “Parents’ Bill of Rights”– would require youth professionals to out queer children to their parents even if it may jeopardize the child’s safety in the home.
Issues like these hit close to home for Jinkx. As a high schooler, Jinkx started performing in drag at a queer all-ages nightclub in Portland, OR. They attribute their success as a performer and their confidence in themselves to growing up in a supportive environment while also having access to resources such as the Sexual Minority Youth Resource Center.
“I didn’t realize until adulthood and traveling around the world and really learning that what I had in Portland was really unique and really special,” Jinkx said.
The larger-than-life drag queen will land in Cleveland on Saturday, July 8 at The Agora and then in Columbus on Tuesday, July 11 at KEMBA Live! There are low ticket warnings for both shows.
The Buckeye Flame caught up with Jinkx to talk about her upcoming tour, what inspires her activism and the importance of creating spaces for youth to celebrate their queerness. Click play directly below to listen to our chat or read our conversation underneath.
It is so lovely to have you here. My first question is, have you been to Ohio before?
Jinkx Monsoon: I’ve been to both Columbus and… Cleveland’s in Ohio, right? I had to go, “Cleveland Rocks” in my head. Anyway, both places are compulsory stops on the drag musical chairs that we play around North America.
Basically when you go on Drag Race– after your season airs–you go on the Gay Bar Tour of America where every gay bar wants you to come and you spend about six months just touring America, going to every last gay bar and nightclub. That’s how I got to see most of this beautiful country.
What goes into making one of your shows and what inspired Everything at Stake?
I’ve been using the word holistic, but you can also use the word organic for my show creation process. It typically starts with something going on in my life, something I’ve recently dealt with that I’ve kind of processed and now have a lot of feelings about. Then you take in some current events and add in original music, and that’s how the show gets created.
What I can say about this year specifically is a lot of people resonated with my candor about practicing witchcraft and self-identifying as a witch and demystifying the words around witchcraft and mysticism.
I also wanted to bring attention to the fact that women as witches were a scapegoated community at one point. We’ve seen communities scapegoated throughout time, and right now the queer community in America is being scapegoated by conservative zealot assholes– insidious people.
And it was just kind of easy, like people like my witchiness and we’re experiencing a witch hunt. Let’s do this. That’s how the show came to be.
I’d love to know at what point you decided to use your art and your persona to amplify issues that you cared about. Has it always been something that you knew from the get, or was there a moment that it felt like the lights just went on and that’s what you wanted to use your art for?
I could say that every time I get on stage and realize I have people’s attention, it’s always been a special benefit of being someone who’s very comfortable on stage, very comfortable being candid. If I’ve got points I wanna make, I’ve got a great place to make them.
I’ve said for a while now that I am a more positive person in my day-to-day life because I get all my demons out on stage. And with this show, it’s very literal. Demons play a big part in this show. Not that I am a satanist or that I commune with demons or anything, but more so that I like to take things like the neuroses that I deal with and turn them into characters in my show. My friends Brandon Rogers and Liam Krug– who are both well known in the YouTube verse and in sketch comedy– they actually play my inner demons.
I get to talk about mental health in a way that’s funny. And I think what I strive for is to be funny and accessible, but also share my unique perspective and show people how I specifically deal with these issues. And then if that resonates with them–or as I say, if that sparkles with them– then they take it into their life.
I think comedy is a really non-threatening way to introduce new ideas to people. So I’ve always been doing that with my work, like introducing my ideas of sexual liberation and gender identity and my ideas about sexuality and all of that stuff.
When I started doing a political slant and started becoming more of an activist, [that] is really when I felt like my hands were tied and I had to become an activist. I’d say I’ve always been an advocate, but I wouldn’t have used the word activist before Trump began running for president. As I saw the Trump cult form, I was like, Oh God, my hands are tied and I have to go to battle now.
I wrote a show the year that he was running called, “I Want You!” as a playoff of Uncle Sam, and it was about Jinkx running for president against Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. One of my first lines was, “Fuck, Donald Trump is running for president. Oh God, this means I have to start giving a shit.”
And that was kind of the mentality in the queer community. A lot of us were kind of sleepy when it came to politics, and Trump made us wake up and say, “Fuck, we really have to give a shit!” And I have seen the queer community step up just immediately to this battle because that’s what it’s been. It’s been an ongoing battle with conservative zealots ever since that man got given that opportunity to run for president.
Right now in Ohio we’re seeing some really scary laws coming down the pipes targeting queer youth and their ability to safely express themselves. As someone who got their start so young in Portland, OR at the new closed all-ages nightclub, The Escape, can you talk about the importance of having these spaces as a young queer person?
Yeah, I didn’t realize until adulthood and traveling around the world and really kind of learning that what I had in Portland was really unique and really special. I look on it as a privilege. I not only had a queer all-ages dance club to go to– I still don’t know how we had that for as long as we did as a bunch of 15 year olds staying up till 4:00AM on a Saturday night– but you know what, it was a safe place.
It was like 400 teens dancing together instead of out doing god knows what. We were just putting on drag shows for each other and having, mostly wholesome fun. But like there was also the Sexual Minority Youth Resource Center in Portland, which was just one of the hugest privileges of my life.
That was a completely different setting. Basically we had community forum meetings to discuss how we wanted to take care of issues in the community. And there were job resources, there were tons of resources for homeless youth because lots of queer kids for one reason or another end up homeless or unhoused.
You know, it was this really, really wonderful place, and I can sum up what is so important about these spaces is that it allowed queer kids to interact with their peers, like people the same age as them who were also queer.
Growing up queer– especially in public schools and stuff– where not only are you one of the only queer people probably at your school, but the attitude towards it is very mixed. And to know other people my age, it allowed me to go through my adolescence as myself rather than hiding a big part of myself and having to go through a second adolescence in adulthood, which is what a lot of queer people end up kind of doing, because basically they play a character all through high school and then sometimes all through college.
And then when they finally feel safe enough to come out– whether they have moved to a different city or their situation is different or they just can’t live lying anymore– they come out and it’s like they have to learn to walk again. It’s like they’re Bambi, you know? And I think part of why I’m very well accustomed to who I am at this point in my life is because I did not have to hide much of myself. I did sometimes for safety, but otherwise I’ve been me my whole life, you know?
It’s such a beautiful sentiment. I appreciate you sharing that with me.
One of my favorite things is parents telling me through watching Drag Race or becoming a fan of drag, they finally had some kind of common ground with their kid and they were looking for some common ground. Then their kid opened up to them and then now their relationship is great because it helped break down these intergenerational barriers around gender and sexual identity.
Drag just kind of welcomes people in and says, “Hey, look, all we’re doing is just being kooky little weirdos over here, and it’s a lot of fun and you’d like it too.”
What advice do you have for queer youth and families who are struggling to find their voice and connect?
I always like to say to queer youth struggling that self-preservation is key.
It sucks when you live in a place where it’s not safe or you don’t feel empowered to be yourself or there’s laws being made against you. I know how hard that is and I know how much that fills us with complex emotions. I wish there was a better solution rather than to be patient and remember that there are people just like you out there and you are not alone.
And as soon as you are able to, you can migrate somewhere else and find your community that’s waiting for you and waiting to accept you in. I know the waiting sucks, but it’s a dangerous time and we cannot decrease in numbers. We cannot welcome aggression or violence or negativity towards us right now. So please, please, please keep yourself safe.I absolutely promise there’s another side to things.
Then to parents with queer kids, I can’t imagine why a parent could turn on a kid because of their sexual identity. It just seems like one of the most cruel things. You know, you brought this kid into the world, you’re supposed to love them as they are, and I promise they did not choose to be this person.
They are this person because you brought them into the world. So love that person. And just be a good parent, like you always have been, hopefully, or maybe now’s the chance to be a really good parent and love that kid.
My mom and I didn’t have a perfect time around my coming out, but it got better with time and she and I have a great relationship now. I had to be patient with her at times. She had to be understanding with me, but also it was just like– the love won out, you know, and that’s how it should always be. The love should win out. 🔥
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- Jinkx Monsoon will be in Cleveland on Saturday, July 8 at the The Agora (LOW TICKET WARNING) and in Columbus on Tuesday, July 11 at KEMBA Live! (LOW TICKET WARNING). Full schedule here.
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