HARVARD University has been branded a “joke” for hiring drag queen LaWhore Vagistan to teach students about a popular US reality show.
A storm of backlash has erupted online after the Ivy League school welcomed the performer to lead a class titled “RuPaulitics: Drag, Race and Desire”, based on RuPaul’s Drag Race.
Drag queen Vagistani LaWhore, pictured, has been invited to teach classes at Harvard University[/caption]
Kareem Khubchandani, a professor of theater, dance and performance at Tufts University, will be leading a class titled “RuPaulitics: Drag, Race and Desire”, based on TV’s popular RuPaul’s Drag Race[/caption]
LaWhore — real name Kareem Khubchandani — is a professor of theater, dance and performance at Tufts University, just outside of Boston, Massachusetts.
But he will mainly teach as his drag persona — which combines performance with lecturing about queer nightlife and gender discipline — during his stint at Harvard.
LaWhore will also front a class called “Queer Ethnography”, exploring the “multidimensional aspects of queer culture”.
Critics have taken to social media, slamming the centuries-old private institution for appointing LaWhore.
But a storm of backlash has erupted online after the Ivy League school welcomed the Indian performer[/caption]
In a scathing attack on X, Sarah Perry, vice president and legal fellow at Defending Education – a national organization that aims to “restore schools at all levels from activists imposing harmful agendas” – wrote, “Harvard just hired Indian drag queen ‘LaWhore Vagistan’ as visiting professor.
“He’s teaching Queer Ethnography & RuPaulitics: Drag, Race, and Desire.
“Harvard also offers remedial math.
“Harvard is a joke.”
Khubchandani will also front a class titled “Queer Ethnography”[/caption]
Just Questions Radio (JQR) echoed Perry’s views on the social media platform – and also trashed some of the books the drag artist has authored.
“As the reputation of Harvard University is in freefall, the once great institution has decided it would be a great idea to destroy themselves even quicker by hiring Kareem Khubchandani as an associate professor,” reads the JQR post.
“He’s going to teach a few classes that should not even exist: Queer Ethnography & RuPaulitics: Drag, Race, and Desire.”
Taking aim at three books written by Khubchandani – Lessons in Drag: A Queer Manual for Academics, Artists and Aunties, and Ishtyle: Accenting Gay Indian Nightlife – JQR added, “He’s written some absolute garbage.”
While another X user ranted, “Dr. LaWhore Vagistan teaches ‘lessons in drag’. A Harvard education isn’t what it used to be.”
Harvard welcomed the visiting professor to the college community in a July message, revealing that he will teach in the Studies of Gender and Sexuality program, thanks to the Harvard Gender and Sexuality Caucus, reports The New York Post.
RuPaul’s Drag Race
RuPaul’s Drag Race is a reality television series on VH1.
The show first aired in 2009, fronted by American drag queen and actor, RuPaul.
The show features a group of drag queens who compete in a number of performance challenges in hopes of becoming the next drag queen superstar.
Contestants’ progress throughout the series is critiqued by a panel that includes RuPaul, Michelle Visage, and one of four rotating judges.
The show’s title is a play on drag queen and drag racing, with the series’ song, “Drag Race” also having a drag-racing theme.
RuPaul’s Drag Race became the highest-rated television program on Logo TV.
The series airs globally, including in Ireland, Spain, United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, Mexico and Israel.
So far, the show has earned RuPaul eight consecutive Emmy Awards between 2016 and 2023 for Outstanding Host For a Reality or Competition Program.
The LaWhore character has been the professor’s personal project for over a decade. It inspired his music video titled “Sari”.
In 2015, Khubchandani revealed the origin of his stage name in an interview with his alter ego published by Johns Hopkins University Press.
He said his preferred pronouns are “she” or “aunty”.
“I chose ‘LaWhore’ because my family traces its origins to Pakistan: Lahore is an important city in Pakistan, and well, I’m a bit of a w*ore,” he wrote.
“And Vagistan because I see the subcontinent as one, big, beautiful Vag … istan.”
News of Khubchandani’s latest teaching role came just days after President Trump unfroze $2.4 billon in federal grants to Harvard upon an agreement the institution would run new trade schools.
“This would be a giant trade school, or a series of trade schools,” the president told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday. “It would be run by Harvard.”
