ANALYSIS/OPINION
Comedian, educator and actor Bill Cosby, now 77, came of age during a particularly nasty time in this country for race relations. In the late 1940s and 1950s, the regime that controlled the Jim Crow South was baring its lethal fangs in the face of increasing agitation by blacks for legal and social equality.
Though Mr. Cosby is widely known for taking a more conciliatory approach to race relations, one wonders if his formative experiences inside the crucible of America’s race wars may have produced resentments that ultimately spilled over into his mistreatment of women.
The Supreme Court’s 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education brought an abrupt end to the de jure segregation that the court itself had ratified a half-century earlier in Plessy v. Ferguson. In the aftermath of Brown, efforts to actually enforce school desegregation were met with vitriol and violence by the citizens and governments of the South.
This intense backlash in the face of earnest attempts by blacks to achieve progress through education was a major factor leading to a conflagration of black activism and rebellion, the flames from which threatened to engulf America in the ensuing decade. And while Mr. Cosby was a product of this generation, his take on America’s racial divide was decidedly conciliatory. Though hailing from a poor family who lived in the public housing projects of Philadelphia, he attended racially integrated high schools during the 1950s and ultimately went on to letter in football at Temple.
As a comedian, Mr. Cosby made it a point to avoid some of the more risque racial comedy of contemporaries like Richard Pryor and Dick Gregory. In a biography of Mr. Cosby published in 1987 by Ronald Smith, the comedian says: “A white person listens to my act and he laughs and he thinks, ’Yeah, that’s the way I see it too.’ Okay. He’s white. I’m Negro. And we both see things the same way. That must mean that we are alike. Right? So I figure this way I’m doing as much for good race relations as the next guy.”
So while Mr. Cosby never participated in 1960s radicalism, he certainly rode the era’s wave of increasing opportunities for blacks in the media. He was one of the first bona fide black television stars in now-iconic shows ranging from “I Spy” to “Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids.” One wonders, however, how the experience of the racialized violence and upheaval of the 1950s and 1960s may have affected a young black entertainer trying to break into the mainstream. By all appearances at the time, Mr. Cosby was the ultimate good guy, a family man who presented a clean-cut, family-friendly image to the public.
In light of sexual assault accusations that have surfaced over the past year — now totaling 39 women (and counting) — one wonders whether Mr. Cosby’s studiously sanitized image belied a private darkness that expressed itself in the drugging and raping of women — primarily young, blond, white women. While none of these accusations have been proven in court, and each deserves to be scrutinized in light of its own unique circumstances, the sheer number of accusers, and the similarity of their stories, hints at a pattern of abuse covering five of the seven decades of Mr. Cosby’s entertainment career.
Given Mr. Cosby’s superstardom, money and power, it is indubitable that he could have, and probably did, have completely consensual sex with many attractive women. But the pattern of drugging and incapacitating women seems to point to predatory behavior that has to do more with humiliation than sex. The fact that Mr. Cosby could get away with this type of behavior for so long says a lot about a potentially sociopathic personality. On the outside he appears to be all smiles and pudding pops and fuzzy sweaters. But underneath the veneer is a snarling, angry beast that preys on the vulnerable and the naive.
But Mr. Cosby’s pathology also seems to be directed particularly toward the aforementioned young, blond, white women. Perhaps his behavior stems from a misdirected anger at America’s glamorization of all that is white, as fetishized in the prototypical young, white blond actress or model.
Though he does not revolt openly, he takes his anger out in other ways. To him these women may symbolize a way to get back at “the man,” to rape the system that may have frustrated his ambitions.
Though he achieved wealth, stardom and a certain degree of power in America, perhaps he felt that he was nonetheless still under the thumb of the same system that had oppressed blacks historically and, within which, to this very day, few blacks achieve major success. The more successful he became, the more he began to feel isolated and hemmed in by the societal contradictions his personal success highlighted. The only way he could retaliate against this feeling of ambivalence was to strike at one of the sacred symbols of white power and prestige.
While unproven, the accusations are too substantial to just ignore. If any part of them is true (and there is reason to believe that at least some of his accusers are telling the truth), it points to a dangerous situation that needs to be addressed in a clinical setting.
It is probably too late for Mr. Cosby though. His taciturn and trite reaction to these charges suggests that he is set in his ways, beyond even the capacity to acknowledge that he may have harmed others.
Perhaps, however, Mr. Cosby will be concerned enough about the value of his legacy to seek help and seek forgiveness from the victims of his behavior. Many powerful men over the years have been brought to their knees at some point during their careers by accusations of sexual misconduct. It seems that those who’ve accepted the truth and worked to change their behavior have had the most success at redemption in a country known around the world for its unique propensity for granting second chances.
• Armstrong Williams is sole owner/manager of Howard Stirk Holdings and executive editor of American CurrentSee online magazine.
• Armstrong Williams can be reached at 125939@example.com.
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