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"Whiteness shapes the discourse of queer visibility even when the constitutive role of whiteness is often left out of accounts describing crucial moments in the history of gender visibility." - Kohnen, 2015. Queer Representation, Visibility, and Race in American Film and TVPermalink On Internet Archive
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"The closet-as-screen appears as a blank surface - a white screen upon which queer images are projected. In the moment of projection, we focus our attention on the images, forgetting that it is the blank, white screen that makes these projections possible."Permalink On Internet Archive
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Kohnen's metaphor of the closet-as-screen is particularly effective at drawing out a crucial but rarely remarked upon facet of queer visibility in media and culture: that queer visibility is tied up with whiteness.Permalink On Internet Archive
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Despite the foundational role of LGBTQ+ people of colour in queer history such as their central role in the Stonewall Riots, LGBTQ+ representation in film and television tends towards white LGBTQ+ people and their experiences.Permalink On Internet Archive
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That's why Moonlight (2016) is such an important film. With an incredibly light touch, Moonlight focuses on the experience of a gay black man without foregrounding his race. Race is the sphere within which the film takes place but the narrative doesn't draw attention to this.Permalink On Internet Archive
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The central character, Chiron, is both gay and black and, as significant as that it extratextually and emotionally for the character, the film doesn't focus on Chiron's blackness. It's incidental to the story that the film is telling about Chiron's queerness.Permalink On Internet Archive
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I'd argue that we see a similar light-touch representation of black queerness in Netflix's Sex Education (2019-) in the character of Eric. Eric is exploring his sexuality and while his blackness does have an impact on his journey, it's not foregrounded as worthy of pointing out.Permalink On Internet Archive
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Yes, Eric's blackness impacts on his discovery of himself and his family's attitudes. But for Eric as a character his blackness is not a personality trait. It's part of who he is - a significant part - but his emotional journey is not predicated on his blackness.On Internet Archive
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I'm wary of making Moonlight and Sex Education seem exceptional since that risks falling into "[t]he pattern of willful forgetting" that Kohnen identifies as part of the discourse of queer visibility. There have been, I'm sure, meaningful black queer characters before.Permalink On Internet Archive
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But Eric's character feels significant in its unremarked-upon intersectionality in the same way that Chiron's character does in Moonlight. He certainly feels different for a mainstream comedy-drama for young people.Permalink On Internet Archive
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It's also significant that Eric's journey is not about 'coming out' as traditionally defined. Eric is out as gay from the start of the narrative. Eric's journey is about exploring the nature of his queerness and his forms of self-expression.Permalink On Internet Archive