Activist and drag diva Harsh Babe is the true vibe for Dyke Out August! [Cover photo: Jude Durr]
Thotyssey: Hi Harsh, happy August! How has the summer season been treating you so far?
Harsh Babe: Hey diva! With Pride Month straight into Lez Out July, it’s been a hot steamy magical whirlwind! Hoping to keep the party going as we head into Dyke Out August.
Sizzling! Everyone’s complaining that there hasn’t been a real musical bop this summer. Is there a song or artist or album, new or old, that’s been giving you life this sweaty season?
Honestly, how were we ever going to follow Brat Summer and the lesbian pop renaissance of 2024 up? I welcome the lack of a strong sense for the Song of the Summer as almost like a memorial to that period. My personal Song of the Summer is “Franco” by Colette March! She’s a local pop diva doll I just adore! And who doesn’t love a gay pop banger about lusting after DL Italian boys? And as for new albums: as a hag at heart, I’ve been loving the new Addison Rae and MARINA and Lady Gaga.
Good choices! Might you be seeing Gaga as she comes through town this month?
If I’m lucky enough to snag a ticket last minute! I’m actually seeing My Chemical Romance this month. I was an emo kid, and I’m one of those drag queens who fell down the MCR-to-Lady Gaga pipeline. Turns out, many such cases!
Can you tell us a bit of your origin story? Where are you from originally, and how did you begin as an artist / performer?
I started drag in college at University of Michigan, with my drag origin story being at a protest this group I was in called RAD FUN (Radical Anti-Capitalist Deviants For United something or other?). During graduation season we got up in drags, carrying signs reading anything from “Hands off Syria” to “Queer Liberation Not Rainbow Capitalism,” or whatever we felt like shouting about. We marched across campus chanting and causing chaos. It was my first time in drag — hot pink body paint penis antennae drag at that — and where I met my first drag mom, Ariana Grindr. She took me under the wing of her haus and I started performing almost weekly… mostly badly. And that was important! I developed my voice and vision, in campy but conceptual performance art, and always based in a strong community. My chosen family and my politics were my artistic life force.
When I moved to NYC permanently amid lockdown in 2020, I did monthly educational virtual drag shows for ACT UP (the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power). But then when the world opened up again, I felt too scared to really put my drag out there in the big city. Now I say, fuck that self-doubt and anxiety! I feel like I’m really putting myself out there, on stages across the city and at my own parties. It’s really rewarding to be making my own productions where I can foster community and express myself creatively alongside so many of my heroes here in the scene. I feel like I’ve really built out my unapologetically high femme camp diva drag persona alongside my social justice, political organizing voice.
“Harsh Babe” sounds almost like an Adele-ism! Where did that name come from?
So actually, my bio mom also went to University of Michigan, and she had a girl group called the Harsh Babes. I took it on as an ode to her! But a lot of the queens, kings and things in Michigan still know me by my old drag name, Daya Bee-Dee. But another type one diabetic drag queen has really taken the spotlight since then. Shout out to Daya Betty!
That’s our gworl! How might you describe the sort of drag you do today, as far as looks and numbers go?
I’ve kind of always seen my drag as a hyper-exaggerated version of my everyday high femme lesbian life. I love rhinestones, pink, glitter, showing off my girls, extravagance, you know — girly things. One thing that stays true between my in-drag and out-of-drag is the yellow hair, a pretty new development encouraged by my other mother and bestie Briar Blush. As my political life and drag blend together more, I realized how off it felt when I was sharing a dressing room with Zohran, and he was meeting me without my signature yellow hair… how he’d seen me before at the “Rise Up for Trans Youth” rally I co-organized earlier this year.
My favorite performances also play on that exaggerated, high camp femme sexuality. I consider my signature performance to be my wet t-shirt contest number to “Coconuts” by Kim Petras where audience members soak my tits. Another recent fav is a Femme4Butch reimagination of “Fabulous” by Sharpay Evans in High School Musical 2 where Ryan is my service bottom butch who feeds me grapes and collects my dollars in a pink Hot Girls for Zohran tote.
Drag and activism have traditionally been interchangeable, and we’re certainly in times where both are needed and both are under fire. Do you regularly try to insert activism into your numbers, and / or pepper some drag into your civic demonstrations?
This is maybe where we get into my hot takes! You know, my drag very much started out with “activism” themes being the heart of my numbers. But then I really developed my praxis as a community organizer, and while I respect that yes, the personal is political! All art is political! Drag is political! It isn’t usually what’s changing the world. That takes people power: mass mobilizations, organizing, organizations, campaigns, strategy. And for awhile, I really put my life towards that with organizations like ACT UP, JVP (Jewish Voice for Peace), GLM (Gender Liberation Movement), and such. And I always felt like my arts informed everything I did in those spaces, even if it wasn’t front and center to most people. I mean certainly a signature of anything I organize is the fun, whether it’s protesting GLAAD’s complicity in genocide with a 50 rhinestoned banner drop and a drag queen (Chiquitita I love you!) interrupting the award show, or what have you.
Now as I try to develop my drag here again, I do think there are activist nods in my numbers. But mostly the community building in these drag spaces is the political component for me these days. My political work is no longer pulling Pride flags out of my ass to “Born this Way” by Lady Gaga or wearing a bodysuit with slurs on it! And thank G-d for that.
And I think it’s worth saying that what’s going to win us any liberation always requires a diversity of tactics. I appreciate the way drag artists around this country are incorporating politics into their work, and I think it’s so important to make like Megami and Protect Queer Art right now!
Queer art will be front and center this Wednesday at C’mon Everybody, for an event you’re co-producing: “Good Jewdy!”
Yes! I’m so excited to be co-producing “Good Jewdy” alongside my longtime organizer and drag friend, Chava Goodtime. We wanted to create a space for Jewish entertainers of all kinds to be unapologetically queer and creative. But it was important to us that we not center Zionism at all. We are proudly anti-Zionist, and that doesn’t mean we have to apologize for it or even center it. We are simply creating our new Jewish spaces where being anti-Zionist is a given. Like duh, our Jewish tradition and history teaches us to resist oppression and genocide and fight for justice! Of course we are fighting for a Free Palestine and raising funds for a Palestinian organization, Denizen’s Society, by raffling off a bedazzled yarmulke and tatreez literally smuggled out of Gaza! While also celebrating Tu b’Av, aka Jewish Valentine’s Day, with drag, burlesque, comedy, music and everything in between! I am so humbled and excited to be putting this Love Fest on alongside so many incredible performers.
“Dykes 4 Dolls” is another event you’re co-producing — this time at Ginger’s Bar on Friday the 15th, featuring a great cast!
Literally still pinching myself about it! Ginger’s Bar is the first lesbian bar I ever went to, and to be fundraising for Doll Invasion — such an important space and cultural hub for our communities — just a dream! I hope we raise them so much money! D4D forever!
What else is coming up for you?
Obviously I’m excited to attend Doll Invasion, carry on my party Dyke Darty at the Rosemont, and generally hag out. But I’m really looking forward to plugging back into Zohran’s volunteer campaign to guarantee his victory in the mayoral race this Fall. The first canvass back is August 17 all across the city. I’m not just a card carrying member of the Party, I’m a card carrying socialist with the DSA!
Okay lastly: what’s your most essential item in your drag bag, cosmetic or otherwise?
In this heat, you gotta have a fan! Love my simple and compact handheld ones – I go for usually my Qween Jean’s Ranked Choice Voting Ball one, or the Pride Elvira clacker. It’s practical and a pretty accessory, but also for me… a lil’ political!
Thanks, Harsh!
Check Thotyssey’s calendar for Harsh Babe’s upcoming appearances, and follow her on Instagram.
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