The Granite State Room was host to 376 raving students late Friday night. The crowd was united by a single theme that defined the evening: dressing as members of the opposite sex.
The 10th annual Drag Ball Rave, sponsored by the UNH Alliance, was an event focused on inclusivity and acceptance of those who stand against social gender norms, according to Jess Picone, social work major and vice chair of UNH Alliance.
“It is a dance dedicated to breaking down gender binaries and being as inclusive as possible,” Picone said. “It is a safe place for everyone to be for a night.”
The event featured live music, a fashion show, food, drinks and what some at the event said was the largest turnout the drag ball has ever seen.
“The first year was in 2000, and it was very difficult to propose this kind of an event and get people to come,” Kevin Linton, director of the Diversity Support Coalition (DSC), said. “Over the past 10 years, we would have 50, 100, or 150 [attendees] on a good year.”
The turnout early into the rave was relatively low, attributed by some to be caused by the UNH men’s hockey game against Vermont that was being played just down the road. Midway into the evening, however, the numbers attending the event doubled. The attendance level speaks to the support that the Lesbian-Gay-Bisexual-Transgender (LGBT) community has at UNH, according to Linton.
“It is probably safe to say that most of the people here tonight are not part of the LGBT community, so it shows how much support the community has,” Linton said. “That’s not something you would have seen ten years ago.”
“It’s a nice feeling, knowing that more than just our own community is supporting us,” Picone added.
The fact that this year’s event was the tenth of its kind added extra incentive to make it shine among the past decade of drag balls, according to Camilla Brett, a physical education major and finance director at the UNH Alliance.
“We went big into this one, turning it into a rave as oppose to last year’s dance,” Brett said. “It’s nice to see familiar faces come in and get to enjoy an event like this.”
According to Joshua Swanson, co-program coordinator for the UNH Alliance, individuals coming to the event dressed in the clothes of the opposite gender accomplishes more than support a community. In addition, the stereotypes surrounding transvestite individuals and the problems associated with these stereotypes become weakened.
“People who come dressed break down that stereotype and the stigma of cross dressing, for people who want to cross dress and are stigmatized for it,” Swanson said.
The event featured a fashion show, where individuals and pairs of attendees stood before the large crowd and danced to backing music and projected visualizations that erupted in harmony with the music. Out of a couple dozen sets of contestants, a pair of students calling themselves Peach and Clementine took home the show’s grand prize of $40 in iTunes gift cards and an iPod Shuffle.
By the end of the night, organizers of the event and those who attended equally heralded the drag ball a success. Victoria Ritchie, a classics major, praised the atmosphere at the event.
“It’s a chance to have fun doing something you don’t usually get to do,” Ritchie said. “I love it. I liked the people and I liked the music. The whole thing was a blast.”
For some of the people who attended, it was the support of a community that defined the evening.
“I went because it is a fun dance, and you get to see people being themselves, or different people, and being together,” Sara McKinney, an animal science major at UNH, said. “It was fantastic. I thought there would be less people than there really were. I am definitely going next year.”
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Drag Ball raves to record turnout
Published: Monday, February 22, 2010
Updated: Tuesday, February 23, 2010
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