Ruthless Envy struts onto the stage and the crowd bursts into joyous cheering. The show has begun.

She wears a beautiful red corset. Her makeup is meticulously crafted. She glides across the stage like royalty.

Envy is performing in front of a mostly Latinx crowd at the Precinct in Downtown Los Angeles.

Growing up in a church that tried to change her sexuality and told her that being queer is wrong, Envy wants to be a drag queen who inspires all gay children who could not be themselves.

“I grew up not having that,” Envy said. "So at the end of the day, I want to become that person that I never had.”

Envy’s dream is to become that light at the end of the tunnel for a community lacking many queer Latinx role models.

When Envy was around 15 years old, a family member outed her, leaving her to navigate her family’s disapproval of her queerness and reconcile her relationship with her religion.

“Being a first-generation gay Latino, we have a lot of sexism, a lot of homophobia in our community that has caused parents to not act like parents,” said Envy.

Fear boiled inside Envy for being queer. She asked herself, “What would happen if I came out?”

Envy’s sister, Michelle Serrano, recalls how difficult it was for Envy growing up with a mom who was a devout Christian.

“My mom grew up really religious. And so when she immigrated over here, she actually tried to find a church right away. We were pretty much raised Christians our whole life until 18,” said Serrano.

When Envy was five, her family started attending Family Bible Church in La Habra. They’d go every Sunday, Wednesday, and Friday.

Envy’s childhood centered around the church and she said it was heartbreaking to find out that the church did not accept her for who she was.

“In the first month of me coming out, I had to come out to the church as well because I grew up with them,” said Envy.

She remembers the pastor felt it was his responsibility to tell her being queer would keep her from being saved by the Lord.

“I dealt with the pastor pulling me aside and telling me that I needed to change. He said that they do not want to see me go to hell and that I will never be happy,” Envy said.

In addition to the pastor’s intervention, the congregation also wanted to “save” Envy. Being queer was considered a flaw that God could fix and they wanted that part of her to be prayed away.

“I literally would be pushed to the front of the church and had everyone pray over me for a good extended time,” Envy said. “It was kind of like praying the gay away.”

Envy describes the feeling of sitting in front of the church and being judged for who she was.

“It was mind boggling,” she said. "Like, sitting there, having people judge me for who I was and them not understanding that I have always been this person.”

After she came out, Envy said she stopped going to church little by little and then finally at 17 she decided never to go back.

It was difficult for Envy because she was taught that God loves everyone, but according to her church, God rejected her queerness.

Envy’s mother also responded very negatively to finding out that her child was queer. With her religious upbringing, she felt her child should change.

“My aunt told me that at one point she actually tried to take me to therapy to change me. To fix the gay I guess you can say,” said Envy.

Envy’s family tried to persuade her mother that she could not change her child. He will be who he wants to be and you cannot change that decision.

“It amazes me that parents do not have that comprehension,” said Envy. “If your son is acting this way from a young age or if he wants to express himself in another way. Why stop him from that?”

Her parents’ rejection affected her throughout her life. Now, finally, her family has come around to the fact that Envy loves being a drag queen and how passionate she is to make her art.

“It just shows that he has a lot of love and passion for this,” Serrano said. "And that’s why I love to support him because this is what makes him happy and I want to see him happy.”

Religion can build a sense of belonging in the Latinx community, but it often hinders acceptance and understanding in the Latinx LGBTQ+ community.

According to a report done by the National Council of La Raza and Social Science Research solutions in 2011 called LGBT Acceptance and Policy Support: The Hispanic Perspective, Latinx people of various faiths were less likely to support relationship recognition and more likely to believe that being homosexual is a sin.

Strong differences exist in the views between Protestants, Catholics, and other Christians. Thirty-seven percent of Latinx Catholics believe that homosexuality is a sin while 65% of Protestants and 53% of other Christians believe that homosexuality is condemned by God.

The strongest difference across religious lines is not on personal religious importance or one’s own religious denomination, but is based on whether one’s clergy voices pro, neutral, or anti-gay messages in church.

Over three times as many churchgoing Latinx people believe that homosexuality is a sin if their clergy uses anti-gay messages in church compared to those whose clergy promotes pro-gay messages.

In a similar light, twice as many Latinx people agree that one should love the sinner but condemn the sin compared to other Latinx people whose clergy are pro-gay.

Dr. Harmony Rhoades, a USC professor who is researching the LGBTQ+ community talks about how religion is a driving factor in keeping the LGBTQ+ community from full acceptance by the church.

“On that concept of love the sinner and hate the sin, the way that that is a faux acceptance because that absolutely is no level of acceptance of that human being,” said Rhoades.

Sexual orientation and gender identity are fundamental human rights. If anyone cannot love that part of a human being, then that is not real acceptance.

Rhoades says the lack of that love can be extremely marginalizing and traumatizing for a LGBTQ+ person.

The report also found differences across levels of acculturation. Acculturation is described as the assimilation to a different culture, usually the dominant one.

While differences for whether gays are more likely to commit deviant sex acts are non-significant, considerable differences exist in feelings about whether gay rights will undermine traditional family values.

Sixty-nine percent of traditional Latinx people agree with this statement while only 45 percent of assimilated Latinx people agree with this statement.

Ruthless Envy shows that the trauma induced by intolerance and discrimination will no longer hold back any queer Latinx person from being who they want to be in this world. They will continue to make art and bring joy and love to queer Latinx spaces where it is needed the most.

Envy started doing drag at the age of 15. She would dress up in drag at tea parties, hosted by her friends and perform with other drag queens at the parties.

Tea parties were code for queer parties.

The tea parties were a space for Envy to really fall in love with the art of drag and blossom into the beautiful drag queen she is today.

“I saw the drag queens at the tea parties and that allowed me to get out of my comfort zone and for me to understand who I was as an artist and as a gay Latino,” said Envy.

She came up with the name Ruthless Envy when she started out as a drag queen. It was a nickname that combined her blunt personality and wanting to be envied by other drag queens.

“Ruthless has always been my nickname. I am always that type of person where I will always tell you how I feel. Envy has always been my stage name. I wanted to become that girl nobody expected to be where they are in life now,” said Envy.

Initially, Envy was doing drag for fun at these parties with her friends, but eventually she realized she had a real talent.

Now, she takes the time to plan out all her stage outfits, methodically plan oher makeup, and decide which wig fits with which outfit.

Her assistant and photographer, Alexa Galindo, describes what it takes to make her costumes and how much time she spends on each design.

“Most of the time, she will make it herself. She is very particular, she knows what she wants. I think she goes into this mindset of like I know what I want,” said Galindo.

The outfits all depend on the show and the environment. Sometimes her outfits can be very glamorous, they can be grungy, or sometimes they can be silly.

“I think that is another thing that she wants people to expect and at the same time not expect from her. She doesn't like to be predictable. She doesn't like to be just one thing,” said Galindo.

With this rising star in our midst and with the shows that she has been doing, Envy garnered the attention of the promoters of this new show, Que Perra, at the Precinct in Downtown LA.

Envy was excited about this new opportunity, but she was not sure how the audience was going to perceive her.

“In the beginning, I think she was like, is this going to work out? Am I going to be a good host? But then once she saw how things were put together and how the crowd responded to her, she was able to pick up what they like and they do not like,” said Galindo.

Her sister has seen such a stark improvement in her drag. Her sister thinks that she can take her drag to the next level.

“I feel like she can do Rupaul’s Drag Race right now, to be honest with you. I mean, recently her makeup has evolved. She is just amazing at performing. Whenever we go, it’s the energy that he brings…people love her,” said Serrano.

In finding this community for herself, she was able to work towards getting out of her comfort zone and be that performer that she had dreamt of being when she first started drag at 15.

Sometimes it is important for that one person to touch us and help us understand that the world does not need to be a negative or hostile place.

“At the end of the day, we are a community...I love being welcoming to everybody and I want to be that inspiration for anybody in the community,” said Envy.

Jessica Messica is a Latinx drag queen who is taking steps to bring together the Latinx community and fight the intolerance that she faced in her childhood.

Her religious family never accepted her desire to become a drag queen. Nights like Que Perra gives her the chance to be the glamorous drag queen she was meant to be.

“I was raised in a very religious household, very traditional. A lot of us come from similar backgrounds. People are just so welcoming of drag and the artistry that we bring. It makes me want to keep giving them more glamour and I am happy to bring it to them,” said Messica.

Drag and the queer community are extremely important parts of Messica’s life and she wants to spread peace and love to the community that has accepted her drag and the person that she is.

“Just keep being who you are and one day you will find your community and you will find people who are just like you. You are not alone in this world and keep lip syncing to your music in the bathroom,” said Messica.

West Hollywood is considered the mecca for gay nightlife in Los Angeles for white, gay males.

The Latinx and other communities of color do not feel like the music and the clientele represent them.

Que Perra and La Putería are Latinx nights at the Precinct that bring all types of people, bodies, and genders to dance and enjoy the vibrant Latinx music.

The music is not just Top 40 or EDM beats that buzz in your head the whole night. The DJ plays Spanish songs that go back to the early 2000s.

Also, the clientele is not just stick thin, white gay men. The crowd consists of people of color, women, and people who are different shapes and sizes.

Emmanuel Romero is a regular at the Precinct. He appreciates that these nights include Latinx music and that people on the dance floor look like him.

“If you go to any other club, even especially in West Hollywood, you’ll most likely see white folks just wandering through the streets and you don’t feel that sense of representation,” Romero said. “So when you come over here, you see that sense of representation.”

The promoters of these nights seek to create a much-needed space for their community. Nabor Arias and Ricardo Sebastian are the ones who fought for this night to happen at the Precinct.

“We were kind of like, why don’t we create this amazing space...we wanted something Latino...we wanted something closer and we came up with a name and it happened,” said Arias.

These nights allow for Latinx drag queens to make a name for themselves like Envy. She hopes that Que Perra grows larger and that she can continue being a staple in the Latinx community.