Whatever you are, it doesn't matter what you do,
Wasteland is welcoming.
It's like a renaissance fair mixed with, like,
post-apocalyptic world.
In normal society people look at you strange
if you're different.
Out here people look at you strange
if you're not different.
It's appealing to imagine a world where
society has sort of broken down those, like, social
codes that we have about right and wrong.
A lot of those are really harmful to queer people.
Being trans, trying to blend in
in modern day society, I go somewhere
and I know what the looks are.
I know what people are doing.
Even if you're not against it, you still
look at somebody and giggle or whatever.
Those things even hurt us because
we're way more astute.
We see way more than the average person because
we're looking for it, because we feel the
pain from it.
People half the time won't even talk to me.
If I say hi to somebody, in real life
a lot of times, they'll just look away or they'll
just not talk to you or they'll pretend
they didn't hear you kind of thing, you know?
Whereas everybody in the Wasteland is friendly.
You can stop by any camp and just say hi
and people will generally say hi to you.
A lot of the pain that I see in the world today is
people being ashamed of something
within them and I don't think that's the way
to a good world.
I think you got to embrace...
embrace whatever your dark side is,
if you're into kinky sex,
if you like to cross-dress.
We've been taught a lot of ways of being
and a lot of shame around the ways that we deviate
from the norm.
Here, my whole concept for Wraith was
to be the desert ghost.
I try be quiet.
I try not to make a lot of noise and try and
blend in with the area around me, much like
I try to do in society
except for here it's easier to do.
Try to look like you belong on a set of a
"Mad Max" movie or somewhere in the post-apocalypse,
Try to be...just try to be, you know,
somewhat in theme and you're going to find yourself
in a good spot.
I am H.P. Loveshaft and I am the figurehead
of the Pangaea Queer Cabaret.
So Pangaea first came to the Waste last year
and we wanted something evocative of like a...
like an everything of a togetherness
because it was going to be a pan-sexual and
pan-gender space.
Here, the reaction for the little points of diversity
is very open and welcoming.
Everybody finds it really liberating.
Like, I see so many dudes that are walking around
in, like, dresses and its their very
first time, like, experimenting with any kind of
feminine expression and they, like...
they find it so freeing and it's so amazing.
Nobody out here is going to treat you poorly.
Like, if anything, they'll all stand up for you
everywhere.
So having Pangaea, having the LGBTQ thing,
having drag shows, having these is because
we have that audience here.
For them to feel, you know, open and welcome,
it's very eye opening, a lot more festivals
need to do things like that.
There's every walk of life, every
type of person here.
It doesn't matter who you are,
what you are, what you do.
You're going to be...you're going to be in a safe
general place where people will razz
on you, but not for the reasons that
you get razzed on in society.
To me, coming to Wasteland,
also just like building the society that I want to see and
building a model of the world
that I would like to inhabit,
you can do that a lot more freely
at places like Wasteland.