Oh, the fracking? RuPaul’s not apologizing for that. In a New Yorker profile released March 1, RuPaul finally commented on the controversy surrounding his association with fracking. “Do you buy gas?†he said. “Before you point the finger, smell it first, bitch.†Ru was first associated with fracking in 2020 following an NPR interview in which he discussed the finances of his husband Georges’s Wyoming ranch. “A modern ranch, 21st-century ranch, is really land management,†he said at the time. “It is — you lease the mineral rights to oil companies. And you sell water to oil companies.†Gizmodo then found that, on just 10,000 of Georges’s 66,000-acre land parcel, there were 35 active oil and gas wells.
The topic has since become a point of controversy (and/or a meme) for fans of RuPaul’s work. Most famously, there was a video of former Drag Race contestants Bob the Drag Queen and Peppermint losing their absolute shit on Instagram Live in 2020, after Bob half-accidentally brings up the fracking, even though criticizing RuPaul is considered a minor form of heresy among former contestants. Since the fracking comments, there have been Reddit posts debating the issue, memes galore, and more heresy among Drag Race queens. “There’s no combination of words I can put together that would soothe the mob,†Ru said regarding the controversy. Okay, but he was the one who brought up the fracking in the first place …