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The transgressive politics of a monster dress-up game
You know who I’ve always admired? Divine. She was only a stage persona, a high-camp drag queen and music act, but one that challenged notions of beauty and decency while entertaining the hell out of you. I first came across Divine in John Waters’s cult classic midnight movie Pink Flamingos (you may know her from Hairspray). In it, she is called “the filthiest person alive” by the newspapers, and it’s a title that she desperately tries to uphold with her “filth politics.” In the film, she’s considered to be a monster, or at least a criminal, but you can’t help but be…