Touching documentary to get its debut at Port Townsend Film Festival — The Leader

Still of Director, Aaron Johnson, from Dark and Tender: A Film by the Chronically UnderTouched (CUT) Project

“Even though this happens all over the United States, and is a part of our humanity, it’s not celebrated or not centered” in our media culture, Johnson said.

“For every one image that you see of tender humanity between Black men, there are hundreds of thousands of hours of violence that are shown.”

Johnson believes it is imperative for our culture to counter the prevalence of portrayals of “the Black brute,” a “violent, aggressive, hyper-sexualized” stereotype, which he lamented is “the most invested image of the Black male in America today.”

Johnson believes that “anyone who reads this article, or watches my film,” could help promote an alternative that “we desperately need.”

— Kirk Boxleitner, The Leader