The drag event, which will feature men named “, is scheduled for Friday, Nov. 3 at the Debartolo Performing Arts Center.
Merlot Fogarty, a Notre Dame a senior, tells AFN the university is defending the show in the name of “academic freedom” while ignoring the crude nature of drag performing. No one in the administration, she says, is willing to publicly speak out and object.
“Even if nothing that's being put on has anything to do with academic discourse,” she says, “or following what the university actually says about academic freedom and providing a Catholic perspective.”
The drag show is associated with a one-credit class about drag that some students sat through in the university’s Film, Television, and Theater department.
Fogarty, who is studying theology and political theory, has emerged as a main voice objecting to the upcoming show. She co-wrote a letter to the editor in The Observer student newspaper condemning Notre Dame leaders for allowing it, and The Federalist published her article that reminds readers of Notre Dame’s religious history and Catholic Church teaching.
“Opponents of the performance argue that a drag show is a violation of this university policy because drag harasses and degrades women, perverting the truth of God’s creation of man and woman,” the senior student wrote. “After all, as a Catholic university, Notre Dame’s mission statement says, ‘The University is dedicated to the pursuit and sharing of truth for its own sake.’”
