Drag queen Carmen to be farewelled in Auckland

Published: 5:28PM Tuesday January 17, 2012 Source: ONE News

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Drag queen Carmen Rupe will be farewelled in New Zealand at a memorial service held in her honour next month.

Rupe, who died of kidney failure at age 75, was buried at Sydney's Rookwood Maori Cemetery on December 20.

Friends and family in New Zealand can now farewell her at a public memorial service on February 11 at St-Matthew-in-the-City church.

The service will be followed by an after-bash at Karangahape Road bars' DNA and Family.

Jordan Harris, an organiser of the service, said many friends and family in Sydney have already said goodbye to her and that people in New Zealand will be able to do the same.

"Some of her close friends from Sydney are coming too and they will be bringing her portrait which was used at the tangi in Sydney," Harris said.

Carmen led a very public life as a gay rights advocate, fighting for equal rights for a marginalised community.

Born in Taumarunui as Trevor Rupe, she adopted the name Carmen after she left the army in the late 1950s and entered the Australian sex industry.

After returning to New Zealand she ran for Wellington mayor in 1977, campaigning for a number of changes including hotel bars to be open till midnight or later, the drinking age to be lowered to 18, prostitution to be made legal and abortion to be decriminalised.

She also campaigned for homosexual acts to be decriminalised, sex education to be made available in schools for 14-year-olds and for nudity to be allowed on some beaches.

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