Story highlights Peniel Joseph: Meeting with president-elect doesn't make Kanye West a black political leader

Trump's mostly white Cabinet is a bigger statement on race than meeting black celebrities, he writes

Peniel Joseph is the Barbara Jordan Chair in Political Values and Ethics and the Founding Director of the Center for the Study of Race and Democracy at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin, where he is also a professor of history. He is the author of several books, most recently "Stokely: A Life." The views expressed here are his.

(CNN) Kanye West's meeting with president-elect Donald Trump suggests that, symbolically at least, black people did not just lose the presidential election -- we've lost our damn minds.

No matter that West's actions stand in stark contrast to the feelings of hip-hop artists, black voters and civil rights advocates. His very presence at Trump Tower offers a dramatic symbol of the racial bait-and-switch that the president-elect has perfected as entertainment: a 21st -century minstrel-meets-reality-show, starring disgraced rap stars, aging sports icons and an assortment of other rogues

Peniel Joseph

West is mercurial and his entertaining mixture of talent, ego and unpredictability has a long narrative in popular culture. His meeting with Trump represents a dénouement of sorts, the closing of a political circle begun over a decade ago in the aftermath of his comment that "George Bush does not care about black people" during a live fundraiser for Hurricane Katrina victims.

But Yeezy's participation in the president-elect's traveling reality show comes at great cost to the black community.

President-elect Donald Trump and Kanye West pose for a picture in the lobby of Trump Tower on Dec. 13, 2016.

When it comes to Trump, we are always better off following his political actions rather than spending time on photo-ops. His interaction with West, whom he called a "good friend," has gone predictably viral. But it dangerously overshadows actions that carry political weight, such as his choice of Jeff Sessions, an Alabama Senator and notable enemy of racial justice, for Attorney General.