Tom Nichols, senior adviser to The Lincoln Project, writes on USA Today that the photo of 77-year-old Biden and his 50-year-old son might seem “awkward,” but it’s moving. 

“Even strangers to these men would know what it means. All of us, after all, were once children. In this case, to know the circumstances in which it was taken is to know that it is a picture full of pain, love, forgiveness, and acceptance, and to look at it for even more than a moment is to experience at least some of those emotions, especially in the memory of our own parents or children,” Nichols writes, alluding to the fact that Biden stood by his son during his struggles with drug abuse and other troubles.

According to Nichols, the way that right-winger Cardillo reacted to the photo shows how his sense of masculinity has become corroded and shows his inner insecurity.

“More accurately, it is a child’s view of masculinity. Come on, Dad, quit it, guys don’t kiss. This is the insecurity of the boys who did not learn that to accept a father’s embrace is part of becoming a man,” Nichols explains.

He adds that males (not men) like Cardillo are “to be pitied” because they might have had troublesome family relationships that led them to have a “terrified” and “embryonic male identity of a small child.”