Lionel was funny on All In the Family.....he’d always play up to Archie, and Archie didn’t even think anything of it.
There was an episode of All in the Family where Mike was being his typical smug, paternalistic white liberal self and Lionel called him on it. I don’t remember the context, but it ended up with Lionel saying, “I don’t mind Mr. Bunker, because that’s how he was raised and he doesn’t know any better. You should.” I think Mike might have been throwing around “Uncle Tom,” which I generally find to be an unadvisable thing for a white guy to do. “He’s not a real black!” Bill Maher thinks he can make that kind of judgment.