There's a big hubbub a-brewing because of what somebody at Advocate.com said about RuPaul. (Don't confuse the website with the Advocate magazine: evidently this media conglomerate is so big it can't be contained by a single infrastructure.)

Writer Parker Molloy is furious, simply furious, that RuPaul routinely uses words like "tranny" and "she-male," even taking to Twitter to announce, "I fucking hate RuPaul." After much thought and a soupçon of K, I totally agree. I believe I'm uniquely qualified to comment on this argument since I was nearly a Human Sexuality major in college. (Want proof? The pronouns I use for myself are Shem, Shep, and p*ngo, and the last email I sent to GrubHub was 87,000 words long.)

Though RuPaul has been, without doubt, one of the gay/queer community's all-time iconic figures and role models for gender fluidity, he needs to know he's not above the law. C'mon, since when are members of a minority group free to use words that are offensive when spoken by others? Ms. Molloy points out that the folks on Mike and Molly were hauled over the coals for using the word "she-male," while nobody says a word about Ru. The double-standard is ridiculous: if two Midwestern heteros are castigated for laughing at alternate gender expression, why should a man in a bouffant and spandex catsuit get a free ride? I mean, would it be so hard to change the phrase, "You've got she-mail!" to "You have received a small package or parcel that has arrived via the Non-Cis-Gender Express"?

Where Advocate.com falls short, though, is putting this in perspective. RuPaul ran way out of a limb before any of us even knew there was a tree. He preached to our parents that queer is good since we were gluing sequins to our nappies. He deserves our eternal thanks for literally defining the queer community, for uniting us behind a message of peace and love, for giving all of us the courage to step out of the closets and into society, and for raising our self-confidence so that we can stand up and tell the world, "Christ, that RuPaul is just such a fucking asshole."

As for Ms. Molloy, I hope she continues on her crusade. I only wish Jackie Robinson had lived long enough to hear her say, "'Negro'? It's 'African-American,' ya jerk!"