Joe Biden was racist and patronizing in his speech to Morehouse grads
Joe Biden is right. Black people are treated as negatively different, inferior and undeserving of being seen as equals.
The culprit of such behavior: Joe Biden himself.
He’s incapable of speaking to black people without reminding us of past plights, or ones that we’re all supposedly dealing with today, as an emotional ploy to leverage our votes.
Worse, even in the face of success and celebratory triumph, like graduating from college, Joe Biden is unable to let us have our moment to reflect on what we were capable of doing.
Instead, he patronizes, telling us what he believes we won’t be able to achieve.
On Sunday at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Joe Biden gave a campaign speech that was masquerading as a commencement address.
It was littered with identity politics, black trauma narratives, and an emphasis on how our existence is determined by how much struggle we must endure.
“The pandemic robbed you of so much. Some of you lost loved ones — mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, who were — aren’t able to be here to celebrate with you today — today. You missed your high school graduation. You started college just as George Floyd was murdered and there was a reckoning on race,” Biden lamented.
He continued, “It’s natural to wonder if democracy you hear about actually works for you. What is democracy if black men are being killed in the street? What is democracy if a trail of broken promises still leave black — black communities behind? What is democracy if you have to be 10 times better than anyone else to get a fair shot?
“And most of all, what does it mean, as we’ve heard before, to be a black man who loves his country even if it doesn’t love him back in equal measure?,” he said, followed by a lackluster applause.
I don’t throw statements like this around often because I take them very seriously: Joe Biden is a racist.
Matter of fact, he’s the worst type of racist because he pretends to be your friend while pulling you back every time you attempt to move forward.
He’s the friend who only calls you when he wants something and is never there for you when you’re in need.
Joe Biden only showed up at Morehouse and other meetings featuring black people recently because his polling numbers among black Americans are decreasing and he needs us again to stay in power.
But every time he shows up and speaks to us, he can’t help himself. He’s the black cloud ready to rain on our parade, or in this case, our graduation.
Biden talks about being black and loving this country when it doesn’t love you back, but the only relationship I see lacking love is coming from Biden, not America.
Joe Biden doesn’t like or love black people, and he made that clear when he declared our identity is contingent on if we help to give him power back in 2020. “If you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you ain’t black,” he famously said.
Friends don’t use our times of celebration to make it about themselves, and they don’t use painful narratives to extract love from us, either.
The Morehouse commencement speech should have featured words of wisdom to prepare these young graduates for what they might encounter and encouragement to push through life’s obstacles.
These young scholars needed inspiration, not condescension.
Instead of using the trope of how we must work in multiples times harder than white people to find the same success, he should have told them to fight for what they want in life despite any obstruction placed in their way.
But this sentiment is impossible to get from Joe Biden — because the Democratic playbook is to reassure our victimhood status, not overcome it.
Adam B. Coleman is the author of “Black Victim to Black Victor” and founder of Wrong Speak Publishing. Follow him on Substack: adambcoleman.substack.com.
