Abstract
In 2014, an episode of the A&E television series Beyond Scared Straight entitled “Facing Foxxxxy” was released. While the reality television show features a group of at-risk teenagers undergoing a youth crime prevention program encompassing a day-long prison visit, the principal focus of this episode was Cedric, a Black gay teen who had beaten and hospitalized a female classmate. Throughout the episode, it was revealed that Cedric attacked her after she teased him and spread rumors related to his sexual orientation. Recently moved in with his uncle after his inability to get along with his mother, the fiery and flamboyant teen, who described himself as a “proud gay man,” never hesitated to stand up for himself, even if it culminated in extreme consequences. Although a high level of defensiveness landed the troubled teen in the intervention program, it was particularly visible in a sequence in which he failed to follow the orders of an officer who proceeded to discipline him. Nevertheless, his troublesome actions were the functions of his adaptation to an environment and society that is hostile toward Black gay men who often suffer at the crossroads of racism, homophobia, and hypermasculinity. As a result, his past experiences of trauma and marginalization caused him to adopt a defensive and outspoken demeanor as a coping mechanism in the midst of a harsh world with limited opportunities for rejected Black youth from disenfranchised backgrounds. His counterproductive actions are finally quelled when he is introduced to Foxxxxy, a transgender inmate who comprehends his rage and inspires him to improve his actions. It has only been recently that popular film and television has dedicated a significant level of attention to the traumas of Black gay men from childhood to adulthood in works such as Beyond Scared Straight (2014) and Moonlight (2016). Flor and Oppenheimer’s documentary Check It (2016) explores a group of Black gay and transgender teens in Washington, DC who have morphed into a “gang” out of a need to adapt and protect themselves in an urban environment rife with violence, racism, and homophobia.
At the beginning of Check It, the focus is on the formation of the organization, referred to as the Check It, which primarily consists of a group of Black gay men and transwomen who have faced highly distressing experiences in their lifetimes. According to introductory onscreen text, the Check It was formed in 2009 by a group of ninth graders who had grown fed up with anti-gay bullying. After viewing background information and several clips of footage from attacks on Black gay men in the urban inner city, the audience is introduced the group’s members. Although many of them have dark, traumatizing pasts that continue to haunt them, their organization provides a sense of nurturing, bonding, friendship, and protection for coping with their experiences and present struggles. Most of the young men are very flamboyant and fashionable, yet maintain a serious demeanor when dealing with outsiders. The dark beginning of the documentary showcases individual members discussing their experiences in juvenile detention facilities for fighting and defending themselves. One particular member, who is a transwoman, discusses how she was criticized by her mother at a young age. While her mother disavowed her gender identity, she desired for her to possess a more masculine disposition as a young boy. This ultimately led her to push her mother down a flight of steps, causing her to be sent to a juvenile facility and eventually a mental institution. Many members have been raised in inner city households with either absent or rejecting parents, leading to homelessness, which has rendered them vulnerable and at-risk for various health disparities. In order to support themselves, most members live together in supportive units, as some succumb to crimes such as stealing, fighting, and prostitution in order to defend themselves and survive economically.
The clip at the beginning of the film, which shows young Black straight men attacking Black gay men, almost appears to lead the assembled storyline into a direction that pathologizes Black youth; however, it later redeems itself by highlighting committed Black community members who assume responsibility for assisting local youth, including members of the Check It, in avoiding crime and succeeding in life. The gloomy introductory storyline reveals that the members face a high degree of social oppression that can be likened to an intensified level of the crises and concerns faced by most contemporary gang-affiliated minority youth who are in search of self-identity and coping mechanisms amidst racial and economic struggles. This is best seen in a scene where members of the Check It have been the victims of an attack by rivals as a young, enraged Black gay man continuously antagonizes and shouts at police with frustrations that mirror contemporary discontentment with police brutality and the failure of some officers to protect the rights of African-Americans and other people of color. In representing these experiences in the documentary, the youth are somewhat redeemed from the documentary’s incessant dehumanizing use of the “gang” label that is forced upon the subjects throughout the entire film. Based on their societal circumstances that have caused them to suffer as a result of anti-Blackness, which functions as the root of their experiences of racism, economic depravities, lack of employment opportunities, transphobia, and homophobia, their illegal activities are “derivative crimes,” which is a label that Dr Martin Luther King Jr (1967) once applied to disenfranchised Blacks in large American cities who had been the victims of a greater injustice by the broader “White society”.
Alongside this dark storyline of despair emerges an uplifting, hopeful chapter for the Check It. The inspirational side to the story is seen when Skittles, a Black gay teenage member of the Check It, is inspired to train as a boxer by a gang counselor who seeks to help members discover a way out of their lifestyle of violence and crime. In a desire to see Skittles excel in a positive manner, the counselor introduces him to a trainer and former boxer who owns a gymnasium and begins to serve as a mentor, as Skittles is proven to be a good streetfighter based on his actions as part of the Check It. The trainer builds a fatherly relationship with Skittles despite his sexuality, feminine clothing, and constantly changing hair color. As his trainer observes a rejection of gay men by most of his gym’s patrons, he fully supports Skittles and strives to intervene in his life to build him into a good boxer and prevent him from falling victim to the violence and illicit activities of the streets. Accompanied by his friends, Skittles also begins to attend a fashion summer camp headed by a local fashion designer with a significant level of industry experience. Although they are initially angry due to their perception of an elitist rejection of their street culture and reputation in this space, the accomplished camp director serves as a strong role model who helps them redefine their image and work hard to succeed in their aspirations. This results in Day Day and Tray, two leading members of the Check It, gaining the opportunity to travel with other successful campers to New York City to intern at a fashion show. The commitment and support of community members manages to enhance self-worth and faith while providing members with the ability to make a significant redemptive contribution to society despite their marginalized identities and circumstances. As a result, many of the young men are able to transform themselves from lives of criminality as a result of their own hard work and the efforts of dedicated Black community leaders.
Although he eventually stops attending workout sessions in the gymnasium, Skittles continues to stay in contact with his trainer, who actively pursues him to return and train to box in competitions. In addition to capturing the struggles of the Check It, the film briefly explores the difficulties faced by the trainer, who becomes homeless and lives in his car after he divorces his wife and loses his gym. In a similar fashion to its coverage of the Check It, the documentary also follows his recovery that encompasses him returning to the ring and reviving his boxing career through winning a local fight that Skittles attends. Additionally, the end of the documentary contains a church scene in which Tray gives a testimony on how he was able to escape a life of crime and work to better his condition. While Tray was once raped while engaging in prostitution and sought help from a hotline that downplayed his traumatic experience, he became motivated to help other Black gay youth throughout the city prosper.
At the conclusion of the story, footage embedded within the end credits shows members of the Check It opening a business, referred to as Check It Enterprises, in which the once troubled youth are able to thrive as entrepreneurs through their newly established fashion line. In reflecting on their experiences with the Check It, most members display a sense of comfort that their struggles and examples of self-defense have motivated Black gay and transgender youth to confidently stand up for themselves against incessant opposition and social oppression. In a similar fashion to associations of organized youth that transformed into “gangs,” formed in urban Black communities throughout the 1970s to initially fight institutional racism at a time when mainstream Black leadership had been assassinated and Black community organizational structures had demised, the Check It began as a positive effort to protect Black gay men who had been targeted due to expressions of femininity in an environment starved of educational and economic advancement and opportunities. In essence, they were forced to prove their (stigmatized) masculinities through defying perceptions that characterized them as weak in order to adapt to a negative environment.
While urban, economically disenfranchised Black communities are often vilified as homophobic, irresponsible child raisers by the mainstream media, Check It presents troubled youth who have engaged in criminal activity to survive in a nihilistic, urban Black community. Although many of the members have unsupportive or absent parents, they rely on themselves for physical, mental, and emotional support. Moreover, the storyline occasionally defies stereotypes of Black communities as backward through documenting strong Black gay and straight community members who are interested in helping Check It members succeed in life and have acknowledged the difficulties of growing up Black and gay while seeking to improve the harsh realities faced at the intersection. Unlike in films such as Paris is Burning (1991), On the Downlow (2007), and Leave It on the Floor (2011), which focused on Black gay and transwomen who served as support systems for each other alongside backdrops of rejection and bigotry, the support systems in Check It expand beyond these relationships and include the external assistance of people such as the boxing trainer, fashion designer, and gang counselor. Although these characteristics produce a highly inspirational, hopeful, and transformative story of resilience, the viewer is constantly bombarded with the term “gang” that is used to characterize the Check It, which is a term that seems overused when it comes to discussing groups of traumatized, disenfranchised Black youth and seems to possess a negative connotation akin to the anti-Black usage of the term “thug” to vilify Black youth. In a similar manner to bell hooks’ concern with Paris is Burning (1991) in her essay “Is Paris Burning?,” perhaps the documentary would have benefitted from a greater interrogation of Whiteness and its historical role in shaping Black crime and other facets of anti-Blackness such as homophobia, racism, and economic and educational disparities in the modern American context (hooks, 1992: 145–156). While the personal narratives of the young Black men and transwomen are inspiring alone and contain frustrations with racism, police brutality, and economic gaps that are key emphases in the contemporary Black Lives Matter Movement, which has prominently featured highly influential Black queer voices and activists, a complex discussion on the social context of White hegemony and anti-Blackness would have helped to advance the conversation in a contemporary relevant direction, improving the overall quality of Flor and Oppenheimer’s work.