http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/07/01/cos....ap/index.html

I went to see Cosby a few times...
The first time was at a stand up act of sorts in town, the second time was when he gave a graduation speech at Temple. He was truly inspirational both times and I found myself holding on to his words waiting to hear what he would say next.

Thoughts?

I am glad that someone is finally saying something about "turning the mirror around" and stop blaming everyone else but yourself. Now, will his words do anything?

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I love him saying this because it is simply true, true, true. Personally, as a black man, I feel that we as blacks do 100x more damage to keep our kids from succeeding academically than white folks could ever do.

I was a bit of an academic, I had great teachers, 99% were white, while one or two seemed to have issue with me ( not necessarily b/c I was black) they all played a part in helping me become who I am.

In high school my parents did not accept B's from me, because they knew I was lazy and could get A's if I ever decided to actually apply myself.

My point in saying this is that while white people can get in the way of success of blacks, we are 10x more likely to get in our own way by not stressing the importance of being good kids and doing well in school, and that has nothing to do with them being black.

A parent stressing the importance of an education is between parent and child and has little to do with whites.

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His words will do nothing except anger some black critics for saying what is VERY true.

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I had a very weird experience at the ball game the other night, which relates to this. My point here is that as much as I am happy to see Cosby saying what he's saying, I hope white people listen, too, though, that there is improvement that -still- needs to be made, and that without more thinking and understanding, we're part of the problem, too.

I was watching batting practice in left field and struck up a conversation with a father and daughter in town from Wisconsin on a ballpark tour of the East - Fenway, Shea, Yankee, Citizens Bank, etc. Nice, down-to-earth honest Americans who drove all the way here and were taking in their second game in the set, not city people at all ... very much small town folks.

The racial composition of the kids fighting for wall space to try to catch the balls from Milt Thompson or Burrell or Abbott, who were out there shagging balls and would toss them out to the kids every so often, was completely 50/50 and just as many girls as boys.

The father, an avid baseball fan, began telling me how the last time he was in Philly, at the Vet, there had been a rape of a young girl by people who worked at the park the night he was there. Apparently the girl had been lost and couldn't find her family, and they took advantage of her. He said he hadn't let his daughter walk down to the bathroom alone that night because he felt the black ushers to be threatening, not knowing if it had been them who had been involved, he just didn't feel comfortable.

I'm all for being cautious in an unfamiliar city, especially out late at night at a ball game. But he actually identified that as a reason for being fearful.

Maybe it's just the part of the country we live in, maybe it's that I've lived in many places and seen all kinds of treatment both of others and myself. What I saw in front of me was kids of multiple races and both genders getting along fine (competing a little yelling for those balls, but generally getting along and being kids).

I imagine he saw something quite different.

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Cosby Has Harsh Words for Black Community
By DON BABWIN

CHICAGO (AP) - Bill Cosby went off on another tirade against the black community Thursday, telling a room full of activists that black children are running around not knowing how to read or write and "going nowhere."

He also had harsh words for struggling black men, telling them: "Stop beating up your women because you can't find a job.''

Cosby made headlines in May when he upbraided some poor blacks for their grammar and accused them of squandering opportunities the civil rights movement gave them. He shot back Thursday, saying his detractors were trying in vain to hide the black community's "dirty laundry."

"Let me tell you something, your dirty laundry gets out of school at 2:30 every day, it's cursing and calling each other n------ as they're walking up and down the street,'' Cosby said during an appearance at the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition & Citizenship Education Fund's annual conference.

"They think they're hip,'' the entertainer said. "They can't read; they can't write. They're laughing and giggling, and they're going nowhere.''

In his remarks in May at a commemoration of the anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education desegregation decision, Cosby denounced some blacks' grammar and said those who commit crimes and wind up behind bars "are not political prisoners.''

"I can't even talk the way these people talk, 'Why you ain't,' 'Where you is' ... and I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk,'' Cosby said then. "And then I heard the father talk ... Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads. You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth.''

Cosby elaborated Thursday on his previous comments in a talk interrupted several times by applause. He castigated some blacks, saying that they cannot simply blame whites for problems such as teen pregnancy and high school dropout rates.

"For me there is a time ... when we have to turn the mirror around,'' he said. "Because for me it is almost analgesic to talk about what the white man is doing against us. And it keeps a person frozen in their seat, it keeps you frozen in your hole you're sitting in.''

Cosby lamented that the racial slurs once used by those who lynched blacks are now a favorite expression of black children. And he blamed parents.

"When you put on a record and that record is yelling 'n this and n----- that' and you've got your little 6-year-old, 7-year-old sitting in the back seat of the car, those children hear that,'' he said.

He also condemned black men who missed out on opportunities and are now angry about their lives.

"You've got to stop beating up your women because you can't find a job, because you didn't want to get an education and now you're (earning) minimum wage,'' Cosby said. ``You should have thought more of yourself when you were in high school, when you had an opportunity.''

Cosby appeared Thursday with the Rev. Jesse Jackson, founder and president of the education fund, who defended the entertainer's statements.

"Bill is saying let's fight the right fight, let's level the playing field," Jackson said. "Drunk people can't do that. Illiterate people can't do that.''

Cosby also said many young people are failing to honor the sacrifices made by those who struggled and died during the civil rights movement.

"Dogs, water hoses that tear the bark off trees, Emmett Till," he said, naming the black youth who was tortured and murdered in Mississippi in 1955, allegedly for whistling at a white woman. "And you're going to tell me you're going to drop out of school? You're going to tell me you're going to steal from a store?''

Cosby also said he wasn't concerned that some whites took his comments and turned them "against our people."

"Let them talk," he said.

07/01/04 19:31

http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/sto...=20040701CX101

jen, did you ask him why he felt that way? Wasn't the rape done by a white guy?

one of the biggiet issues is that some white people will allow idiots to say really f'ed up things like that, but they keep silent instead of telling the person that they are a total idiot, I believe that silence in those situations is agreement.

At the same time, people like this exist out there, but I refuse to allow them to affect the outcome of my life.

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I don't know the race of whomever committed the rape.

My response was that the race of the ushers wasn't likely relevant as to why he felt the way he did, that he was really a fish-out-of-water in the 'big city', and he nodded and said 'yeah, maybe'.

<<one of the biggiet issues is that some white people will allow idiots to say really f'ed up things like that, but they keep silent instead of telling the person that they are a total idiot, I believe that silence in those situations is agreement.>>

I'm not sure that calling him an idiot would have improved things - I opted for subtlety. I'm also not sure I buy the notion that silence is agreement - in my case, it took me a second to figure out how to handle the situation kindly while still making the distinction between race and his uneasiness.

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If anyone ever listened to Bill Cosby when he's not speaking out against black people, they'd realize that he's completely off his rocker and that what he says should not be considered newsworthy.

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Well, since you asked...

I'm mostly in agreement with Wil on this one -- particularly about those who don't speak up... but I recognize that this is not always easily done.

I'm not surprised by this attitude however, especially here. Now that I've gotten to know some people here, I'm a little stunned to find -- in my opinion -- a certain polarization in this city. Staunchly Democrat or Republican. Black and white. That's it, that's all... And yes, I am aware that the people Jenifer mentioned were from Wisconsin, but they might just as well have been from certain parts of this city.

I miss the diversity of New York; it forces a certain tolerance that might not otherwise exist. Living outside of it has definitely been an eye-opener for me.

As for Bill Cosby: He's been on the planet a number of years now and has earned the right to say whatever he feels and he's not far wrong in his assessments, in my humble opinion....

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