Blog Posts

Virgin’s first Trans-Atlantic Flight.

Virgin Atlantic will be celebrating 2019’s  pride with the world’s first-known completely LGBTQ-staffed flight, reported Pink News.

The “Pride Flight” is set to depart London Heathrow in June and fly to a rapturous reception in New York, which is to be host to the next World Pride event.

Broadway actor and “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” star Tituss Burgess has been cast as the master of ceremonies and is reported to have said that he is “proud” to take part in the historic flight.  “At a time when we’re seeing the rights of minority groups under threat, it is more important than ever we stand up and make our voices heard,”

I applaud Virgin for this celebratory marketing ploy.  I do however, take issue with the fact that the Transgendered element of the LGBTQ appears to be represented only by drag queens.

Please don’t get me wrong, I love drag queens.  I adore them.  But they are not necessarily Transgendered women, but generally are female impersonators.  It could be argued that they are a parody of women.  This, in my opinion, reinforces the stereotypes that the Transgendered community have been fighting against for decades.

So why couldn’t Virgin have their promotion shots with actual Trans women?  Or even a cross section of LGBTQ community?  Why use the titillation of an over-the-top profession to market a service designed to celebrate the acceptance of the LGBTQ community?  Where are the LGBTQ members within this marketing campaign?

Instead we have, arguably very talented, drag queens giving the subconscious impression that they are representative of Transgendered women.  How is the general populace to know that this is not the norm?  When Trans women are fighting to be taken seriously, how is subliminally portraying them as drag queens going to help them with their every day struggle for validity and acceptance?

When we have Trans men and women hiding who they are because they fear the public’s response to them, would it not be better to use actual Trans people to portray themselves?  The Netflix show Sense8 actress Jamie Clayton plays a transgendered woman, and although this was only three years ago, Netflix took a bold leap of faith that their audience would, and certainly did, take her to heart.  Acceptance and information on Transgendered people is now more widely spoken and posted about, so why then does Virgin appear to struggle to cast a Transgendered woman, or indeed man, in their marketing for their LGBTQ celebratory flight?