Dana Flor and her partner Toby Oppenheimer have been making a film. Their film is being produced by Steve Buscemi and RadicalMedia. Flor and Oppenheimer also crowd-sourced $60,000 at Indiegogo.
Stories also at City Lab and Daily Mail.
The film focuses on five childhood friends in Washington, D.C.'s Trinidad neighborhood, which is described as extremely violent. They joined a gang...a different kind of gang. Check It consists of gay and transgender kids.
At first glance, The Check It, our documentary subjects, seem to be unlikely gang–bangers. Some of the boys wear lipstick and mascara, some stilettos. They carry Louis Vuitton bags, but they also carry knives, brass knuckles and mace. As vulnerable gay and transgender youth, they’ve been shot, stabbed and raped.
Check It was founded in 2005 by bullied 9th graders. There are now reported to be over 200 members of the gang.
Donning stilettos, lipstick and mascara, the young men take to the streets of one of Washington DC's most violent neighborhoods. But under their clothing - and in some cases, in their Louis Vuitton bags - they are carrying knives, brass knuckles and pepper spray. Check it is the only the only documented gang of gay and transgender youths in America.
Aided by Peaceaholics founder Ron "Mo" Moten, Check It has started a fashion line, formed with the aid of a DC government jobs program.
Members don't refer to Check It as a gang. The call it a family.
Check It is a real family, a warm supportive family, but a dysfunctional family, too. It can be negative, scary and mean. And it can be supportive. Law enforcement may call them a gang. They won’t call themselves a gang; they call themselves a family.
We fall in love with people and microcultures. . . . They are funny smart, witty, sarcastic, wry. . . . They have dealt with so much for so long but still have this ebullience.
--Oppenheimer
A portion of the money raised by Flor and Oppenheimer goes to Check It for the purchase of fabric sewing machines and other equipment.
During filming, it was at first difficult for some members to open up to the cameras and share the difficulties they faced, and they worried that telling their story might cause pain to others, Check It’s Warren said. But the filmmakers “have been good people to us,” and telling their story might change the lives of others.
I hope our story will touch a lot of youth that are going through what we have been through. There is a way out. It wasn’t easy coming out and being yourself. But as all of us stuck together, it was easier to be yourself.
I just hope it helps.
--Check It leader Tray Warren