Gender locked race?

[Shippuu]

Comparing beast tribes to playable races is a stretch.

It really isn't. They're both new races that have history, lore, and complex relationships with the people of Hydalaen and are part of societies we knew little to nothing about prior to their implementation into the game. The only difference is we would get to play as one, and considering almost nothing about the game's story has any impact about what race you are outside of a comment or two there's little impact there.
We're about to get at least female Viera playable, who are severely seclusive and not seen anywhere else in the world until they're going to be everywhere come 5.0, including the 2.0 story. We also haven't even been to, or see half of the world of Hydalaen, there's a whole lot out there we have no clue about until SE puts it into their game.

Au Ra did not suddenly come into existence at the moment of their reveal.

Except for all intents and purposes, they did. Their inclusion in Heavensward as a playable race offered virtually nothing new to the game's experiencable story. No story acknowledged them, even when you encounter the few other Au Ra that were present in Heavensward (Sidurgu and Mide, for example.) They don't go majorly out of their way. There was no precedence before, and Yugiri talked almost nothing about her race, only that she had a funny tail and ears/horns.

A new race absolutely does not need to have any kind of build up whatsoever. There's no magical rule set forth by word of god that this has to happen. The most negative impact of just dropping a race without build up is some minor lore inconsisties and that's it.

In person requests started in the west and continued until JP and even Korea joined in. Prescreened questions are a thing, yes, but unless they plan only taking written in questions from this point on, its inevitable for a comment to slip through.

It's very rare they take full on live Q&A, with people lining up. Almost every one of their Q&A has been collecting questions before hand and picking which to answer. But of course he's going to be asked about them inevitably. And he is constantly asked about plenty of things consistently, like Egi glamours etc. You seem to think that just because he'll be dogged in the future regarding it means he won't do it? He didn't get his position because he was afraid of saying no. If he does a new male only race, he will have his own justification for doing so, and that will be what matters in the end. He's not afraid to stand to his convictions and decisions, even in the face of blowback. Especially over something as minimally damaging to the game as a genderlocked race would be.

he was "prescreened" as well, after all.

Proof? Because that looked like a straight up, just walk up and ask your question type of Q&A. Show me people screening them and turning away people. There's not much of a way to screen people in real time, especially when they can lie about what they're going to ask.