Outside of Joe Biden and maybe Bloomberg, none of the other Democratic candidates would go full mask-off racist during a goddamn morning show. The venue isn't the problem. The problem is Biden on race.
That depends. Full mask-off racist? Maybe not. Racially insensitive or just plain boneheaded? We already saw that. We had 5 candidates at the end, all white, and all of whom at some point having made a racially insensitive comment (or several) due to either their proximity to Black people (Biden) or having no Black people on their team influential enough to say
...maybe don't say that.
The problem with Biden is that it fits a pattern of him taking his comfort with Black people (Black leaders who have earned trust with our community, in particular) as a sort of "hood pass." That is a mistake. I don't believe that Biden went on TBC with the intent of revealing his racism, and I don't think the sheer number of Black people who know Biden and have worked with him would so enthusiastically throw their support behind him if they thought he was racist (and at some point I do allow room for that).
To me, the problem is more pervasive. Biden here reveals a lingering mentality that Dems ain't got to work for these Black ass votes. And the only reason I,
personally, don't come down too hard on Biden specifically about this is because this is not a Biden specific problem. Voting Republican may be a non-option for the majority for us, but that is not an effective salve against the stinging reality that Democrats don't do nearly enough to reciprocate the hard work, discipline, loyalty, and frankly
passion that Black people as a demographic infuse into this party. That goes well beyond Biden.
