Viewing masculine gatherings and mentoring relationships through the lens of "therapy," is patronizing and another example of filtering culture through the narrative of powerlessness. Here's another take. Most people who say they want you to talk about your feelings are predators looking for angry and vulnerable young people who they can manipulate with sympathy and groom for other pipelines and agendas. The barber shops represent a barrier to those people because heterosexual men typically don't relate well to the sort of enablers who prey on young men, and those personalities cannot navigate masculine environments well.

It's useful to ask whether people who say they are operating on the pretext of "healing," and "trauma," are really just morbidly attracted to weakness and vulnerability, and if so, why. These barbershops are places created by black men as a place to gather and have some community, and the reasons for a CNN reporter to pay them any attention at all should be treated with suspicion. Journalists aren't part of the communities they cover, they are scavengers and mainly a nuissance to what they perceive to be power, so if you start seeing them, it's probably because there is something nearby whose vulnerability or weakness has made it a target to co-opt into their narrative. Those barber shops are community treasures, and I'd wonder whether they benefit from having someone else co-opt their story and re-tell it on their behalf.