(upbeat dance music)
- Hey loves, I'm Miss Peppermint,
And I'm here with some of my fierce, fabulous friends
for Billboard's Spillin' the Tea,
and today we are gonna talk about race and drag.
- Dun dun dun.
(Miss Peppermint laughs)
Bob and June you tweeted that no black queens except
for RuPaul have ever have over a million followers,
and you said that it's not the show, it's the fandom.
So how do we fix that?
- You know, I don't know that I have the answer on how to
fix racism. - [Aja] Racism.
(Aja laughs)
- Let me get my pen.
- Could you imagine if I was the one, and like if all
these people before me (Miss Peppermint hollers)
like Gandhi.
(group laughs)
Bob the drag queen. - Bob the drag queen.
- Why can't you be?
- That's the answer.
- I wish that I could, you know I think that the
answer to maybe fixing racism is acknowledging racism.
People saying "I'm not racist" drives me crazy.
First of all, and I'm bout to get,
the comments section about to get lit the fuck up.
All white people are racist.
Period, point blank, end of story.
You cannot be white and not racist.
It's not possible, because if you are born in this country,
in this America, I'm all white America,
I don't live in Australia but they racist too,
if you (hysterical laughter)
Them Australians they are nasty.
- I'm so done.
- If you are white and you're raised in America,
you are raised through TV, through books,
through every single thing to have racial bias
towards white people and against people of color.
White folks do not have to open up their history books
and see their people being hanged.
In my history books in school - I think it's hung.
- Hanged, it's hanged.
- Oh okay.
- No it's hanged, hung is-
(hysterical laughter) - I'm sorry, okay.
(group chatters loudly)
- That wasn't in my book girl.
- [Gia] Okay, I'm sorry.
- Hung is on the Grinder profile.
(group laughs loudly)
And the idea of saying,
you being racist does not make you a bad person.
It makes you a person. - Person.
- Because you are a product of your
surroundings. - Amen.
- You are a product of a country that was made
through racism, you know what I mean?
Reparations for black people will never happen.
We don't even have enough money to pay back the people
that we owe money to.
- Nope.
- Let alone pay back black folks
for what they made for this country,
and there's a lot of voices being like,
but I didn't do that, but that was hundreds of years ago.
First of all it wasn't a hundred years ago,
it was about 155 years ago, it wasn't that long ago.
And on top of that you are still
directly benefiting from all the racism
that happened from when we were first brought here.
That's why black folks don't trust
water in the first place.
(group laughs)
I got invited to a cruise, and they were like
you wanna do a cruise? and I was like
well last time black folks got offered a free cruise
shit got real funny. (hysterical laughter)
So I'm not doing it.
(group laughs hysterically)
So that is why, and everything leading up
to housing discrimination, work place discrimination,
and people online are probably
favoring people that they resemble.
Favoring people they see themselves in,
and there are a lot of white people.
So white folks are following the white folks.
So that is why they get all of the followers sometimes,
you know what I mean?
- So what is the solution to that somehow?
You said acknowledging it.
- I think acknowledgement it and don't
lead in with "well I'm not racist".
Instead stand back, 'cause you know what?
I have sexist qualities in me
because I was raised that way.
Like I have found myself on the road
and I'll see a woman doing something
and my gut instinct is help that lady do that thing
'cause she can't possibly do it herself.
And that is a sexist ideology, but I don't even realize it.
In my head I'm like "I better grab that bag
for that little gal."
'Cause I was raised in Columbus, Georgia,
I was raised in Phenix, Alabama,
and I was raised in Corinth, Mississippi.
- That what?
- That lil' gal.
So my immediate reaction is I need to help this woman
'cause there's no way she can help herself.
And I have to check myself in that moment,
and be like "What you're doing is sexist."
- Very well said.
- On that matter sir, I'm gonna pick up your bag for you.
(group laughs hysterically)
- I'm that girl like please, I am so stupid like that
but I always play the damsel in distress.
- Bitch please
- But it's your right to do that as a woman
but it's not a man's right to place it on you,
to make you a damsel in distress.
If you want to be a damsel in distress,
as a woman you can do that, but I can't
make you that against your will.
- So a lot of people get tokenized and kind of
put into a box as Asian queens.
What have you experienced, you know,
have you experienced any racism?
As far as drag goes.
- Honestly 110% honest, I feel in my career, in my life,
I honestly have never felt or had an experience
where I felt like I was discriminated against
because I was Asian.
I think maybe it was always either like a gay thing,
or maybe now like a transgender thing, but never Asian.
One thing that is a little bit more relevant though,
and I don't know if it's racism,
but like as you guys know I speak fluent Spanish
and I'm very influenced by Latin culture.
I just came out with a song "La China Mas Latina",
available on iTunes, and you know,
I got a lot of feedback from people that were like,
why is she trying to be Latina?
Like why is she trying to be something that she's not?
And it just kinda made me feel like
why can't I be that?
I've worked so hard on accepting myself
as a Japanese-American trans woman that,
yes, probably speaks Spanish.
Obviously not trying to be anything,
but just trying to be myself.
And why is that a problem?
- I don't think there's anything you can't embrace.
If people think you're trying to be Latin,
you can't be Latin 'cause you're not Latin.
- Exactly.
- But you can embrace Latin culture.
- Correct.
- People need to understand there's
a big difference between, there's appropriation,
there's appreciation, and there's assimilation.
And they are not the same thing.
Appropriation is when you take someone else's culture
and you pawn it off as your own.
Appreciation is when you appreciate
what other cultures have,
and assimilation is when a smaller culture
assimilates to what a larger culture's doing
because they have to to survive.
It's like code switching, you know what I mean?
- Why do you think that
many of the black queens don't have as much of a following?
You think about drag and you think that
we can kinda do whatever we want,
and especially, you know, if you've gotten
this bigger platform and you're on a show like Drag Race.
Drag is a lot of times, about being a renegade
and kinda saying and doing what you want.
But I found myself as a black queen,
not only on Drag Race but before that,
being really held into a really tight lane
by the White folks that would come to the show.
And I felt like there was a little bit of,
what they would accept from me
wasn't necessarily what I wanted to present.
And I don't know if this is kind of
how you felt with La China Mas Latina,
but for me people wanted to see,
they only wanted to see this.
That's all they wanted.
They want this all day long.
There couldn't be any other, for lack of better words,
shade or color to what I was tryin' to portray.
And yes, I got all that in me,
but there's so much more.
And I think that's part of the issue with race
is that people will accept a black queen,
but only on their terms.
And you know not in any other way that challenges
what a Black queen, or an Asian queen,
or a Latin queen could do,
or a multiracial queen - And what their idea
of a Black or Asian queen is.
- For me, when I came out with my album,
it's full hip-hop
- T.H.O.T. Process available on iTunes
- T-H-O-T Process
- A lot of people were questioning why hip-hop?
Because this is the music I grew up loving.
- It's because we hood - This is what I wanted to do.
- She Vanjie.
- I grew up in Queens, New York,
and the music I grew up listening to
is LL Cool J, Missy Elliott, MC Lyte.
That's the stuff I like.
So that's, of course that's the music I'm going to present.
And then, I remember one time
there's a picture I posted of me in braids.
And my Instagram was just like
you're culturally appropriating
(mumbles)
Actually, I didn't know how to respond
so I just kinda left it alone.
But I'm like, I'm just trying to live
my Janet Jackson Poetic Justice moment.
- I would love to go back and see
how many of those White folks being like
you're culturally appropriating.
- Basically.
- And they go to Miami and get braided up.
Bitch and it's cute.
- You know here's the tea, 'cause it happens to me a lot
'cause I'm biracial and a lot of times
it's usually White people who are
trying to be an ally like of race,
and what happens is that they speak over people of color.
If I see you comin' out with a hip-hop album
I'm like work, good for you.
But sometimes they'll be like "but you're not black."
And it's like this is not your conversation to have.
- Y'all didn't have a problem
when Eminem came out with an album.
Why are you bothering me?
- People are always trying to find out why people,
why Black folks will choose to embrace this person and not,
They're like "Well why do they like Macklemore
but not like Iggy Azalea?"
Well because it's our business and we decide what we like.
And we don't like that bitch.
(group laughs)
It's because I don't like her, that's why.
That's why, 'cause I said I don't like her.
What's next? Next question.
- What were you gonna
- But another thing that happens to me is
people assign race, they assign a race to me.
They assume your race and they say you're this.
And you're like no, I'm this.
No you're this!
- They expect you to say like, yes I'm this.
- But what is "acting that way"?
I hate when people say that to me.
- That's a whole thing girl.
I used to be beat up by the White kids.
- You're pretty for a Asian girl.
- Here's this Black kid, and then the Black kids
would ostracize me and tell me that I was talkin' White.
And I never found a place that I could really fit in.
Because I wasn't what other people wanted me to be.
- Being a Black theater kid, girl oh my God.
- Where's your people? (Miss Peppermint screams)
- There is something about, I will say this.
There's a part of me that really embraces
when someone's like, act Black.
I don't like the idea of saying that someone's acting Black
and that having to be derogatory.
'Cause I wanna act Black and I wanna
be proud of acting Black.
Only Black people, not only Black people,
in my experience Black people
are taught to be ashamed of a lot of their Blackness.
Whereas you would never see a Japanese person
afraid to eat sushi in public,
you would never see a Mexican
afraid to eat a fuckin' burrito,
but Black folks will look left, right, up and down
before eating fried chicken in
the middle of a fuckin' room.
You know what, fried chicken is a part of my culture,
- And it's good.
- Haha yes.
- How in the world did White people
make Black people ashamed to eat watermelon
which is a perfectly fuckin' healthy snack?
- Oh we know how.
- When y'all White asses eatin'
fuckin' mashed potatoes covered in butter.
But I have to be ashamed of what I wanna eat.
How were Black people taught to be ashamed of their names,
ashamed of their food, ashamed of their hair.
- And I really wanted to mention this earlier,
that's why Black people and Black women, I'm guessing,
are the people who are spending
so much money on our haircare.
We've been taught that the hair
that grows out of our head naturally is not acceptable,
it's not professional, it's not pretty
- That's assimilation.
- [Miss Peppermint] Yeah.
- Well it's because the beauty standard
in the world right now is
more easily accessible
(Aja laughs)
by White people because the beauty standards
almost model after White people.
It's not almost, it is modeled
after like Anglo-Saxon features.
A lot of other cultures have to go through like
measures and lengths to be considered beautiful.
- We're slowly inching away from that.
And I have a thing where I can't not call stuff out.
I can't remember what town I was in,
but this guy walked up to me and he goes
Bob I just really love you on the show.
You really just
speak English so well,
and I said well it is my first and only language.
And you know I'm American and this
is where I was born and raised
so what other language would I speak?
He goes no it's just that like
you really speak, you have a great,
and I was like what are you saying
'cause that's not a compliment you give White people.
You don't go to White people and say
you speak English well.
To a person who is born and raised in America.
You would not go to a White person and say
you really got a grasp on the English language.
Like yeah, well that's everywhere I look
so why the fuck wouldn't I have
a grasp on the English language.
- [Aja] That's backhanded.
- Sahara was the one who corrected me one time
'Cause I told her, I was like,
damn girl you sound real White.
Big mistake, Sahara was just like no.
I just speak correctly.
Yo ass is a little hoodrat, that's why.
- But also on the other hand there is nothing wrong
with not speaking proper English.
The way you talk is the way you talk.
If you are from, it's really funny how
a Texas business man can say howdy
and this, that, and the other,
and he's still considered professional.
He can wear a big ass Texas hat,
and a suit and be like well y'all know
round here we get a lot of this, that, and the other.
But if a Black person walked in be like
man y'all niggas is crazy up in this piece.
(Jiggly screams)
It's a motherfucking business son.
Everyone's like you're not a business person.
Everyone else can embrace their culture
and speak the way they do,
but when marginalized people do it
it's like wow you really shouldn't
speak that way in a professional setting.
- Well people have for some reason linked
like speaking AAVE, African American Vernacular English,
to being uneducated and the fact of the matter is that
AAVE was something that has like
built up after years of oppression, segregation.
Like having to be educated in different places.
That is recent, that's like 50, 60 years ago,
and here we are, not everyone is gonna speak the same.
And it doesn't mean that one person
is smarter than the other because I know
a lot of people who can flip between
a very proper way of speaking and a more colloquial way.
They're still smart.
- Sometimes you have to code-switch to make it.
- Yes, that's assimilation.
- And that's assimilation.
(group laughs)
You wanna talk about assimilation?
Let's talk about assimilation.