Charles Barkley Hosting "The Race Card" Is A Horrible Idea

Charles Barkley is set to host a new TNT show entitled “The Race Card.” The six-episode series will feature Barkley traveling the country and confronting racial issues in an attempt to “challenge everyone’s status quo.” While a show like that would be interesting, tapping Barkley to host it is an awful idea.

Before anyone jumps on me, I’m not saying Barkley can’t have informed takes on race relations in America. In fact, my stance that he shouldn’t host it has little to do with Sir Charles and everything to do with the audience that will be tuning in. Barkley has become wildly popular as a broadcaster because of how goofy he is. He’s easy to make fun of and self-deprecating enough to take it in stride. I love watching Barkley on Inside the NBA, he’s fantastic. But for a show like “The Race Card” to be successful, the audience must take its host seriously.

TNT says Barkley will be traveling around America in an attempt to, “bust up the echo chamber mentality that so often has people retreating to corners of the like-minded, where views are reinforced and ideas are distorted into angry, unexamined groupthink conclusions.” Barkley will, “take on the rapidly calcifying positions around today’s hot-button topics. He will seek out the sharpest and most varied viewpoints from today’s cultural leaders and tastemakers. He will then challenge and probe those ideas, even trying them out on himself.”

Again, this is a noble pursuit and it’s an incredibly serious, divisive topic. Which is why I can’t understand how the network chose a guy with Barkley’s temperament to host it. Even Kenny Smith would have been a better choice, given his ability to expound on serious topics without needing to drop in a punchline.

Barkley grew up in Alabama in the 1960s and 70s and surely knows a great deal about racial tensions throughout the United States. I think he’d be a great person to have involved with the series, but just don’t think he’ll be taken seriously enough as the focal point. Here’s hoping he proves me wrong.