What does manhood truly mean to the African-American man? Is it through earning your stripes in the streets as a "real nigga", riding with your crew with reckless abandon and without your morals? Is it hitting the books college, as you receive a better education your family always wanted for you to have? Or is it through our experience with family that determines our idea of black manhood? It could be based on the environment we live it that warps our mentality (I.e, Compton, Newark, Philly) For awhile, this question of what it means to be a black man has shifted, whether it is positive or negative. It has always been up to the black man to change for the better, and for the most part it works. With multiple paths ahead of us, it is truly up to we black men to choose how we want to live.
If you don’t know what I’m talking about, take Ricky, Tre, and Doughboy from Boyz n the Hood for example. In the classic hood drama written and directed by John Singleton, we are exploring the lives of these three characters as they survive the Crenshaw ghetto of Los Angeles. I say surviving, because living in that time and place was absolute chaos in which no one could escape from. However, we aren’t going to talk about the early 90s era of urban decay (for that will be for another subject to discuss in the future). In the movie, the group each have to figure out what it truly means to be a black man, all while answering questions of race, relationships, violence, and their futures. The easiest character I am going to analyze is Ricky, Doughboy’s brother.
Ricky is a star running back for Crenshaw High School, who has a girlfriend named Shanice and an infant son. Ricky hopes to grab a scholarship so he can get into USC, and was even considering joining the Military in hopes of properly taking care of his family. However, Ricky will not live to see his goals realize, as his life is tragically cut short in a drive by shooting. The audience automatically feels the emotion of grief, as Ricky had aspirations. He understood the responsibilities that come with being a man and was just on the brink of applying himself. In the end, we were the ones felt pain stronger than a gunshot wound: the loss of human life.
Next on the list is Doughboy, local Crip and all-around thug. Loud, belligerent, and unapologetic, Doughboy learned that being a man means to toughen up in a world that forces you to do so. If you want something, you take it. If someone does you wrong, or look at you funny, you set things straight and show them whose boss. Being a Crip, you get to have that exact power. Growing up, Doughboy had no power, nor proper parental figure to show him the way. It didn’t serve him well in the end, considering he shares the same fate as his brother. What was tragic about Doughboy is that his path to manhood involved the complete opposite of Ricky’s. We wanted him to redeem himself, and so did he. However, there are no happy endings.
Now we reach the final character to analyze: Tre. In the movie, Tre has grown into a responsible and mature teenager, staying out of trouble and keeping a steady job. However Tre still has a lot to learn, as he deals with issues from relationships to the amount of violence that causes some serious PTSD. All the while, we are still rooting for Tre, just like we root for Ricky and Doughboy. Sure he isn’t a Crip or football star, but we can all relate to him being a regular kid trying to find out what it means to be an adult. In the end, he goes to college, and the credits roll there.
There's a lesson to be learned here. With a cultural significant movie we got here, we also learn that theres more to it to this movie people previously thought. With Boyz n The Hood, We've learned the many paths a black man this day and age will take.
