Graphic By Rylie Deyoe

Challenging the black community

Bill Cosby's statements on self-destructive nature of black America long overdue

By: Nicholas Davis

Posted: 6/22/04

It's time to lay it on the line. There is a problem in black America today, and it's high time someone said something about it.

"The Blacks of the 1960s marched and were hit in the face with rocks to get an education, and now we have these knuckleheads walking around.

These lower economic people are not holding up their end in this deal.

These people are not parenting. They're buying things for their kids: $500 sneakers, for what? And they won't spend $200 for Hooked on Phonics. I can't even talk the way these people talk: why you ain't, where you is."

Anyone have a problem with these remarks? Is someone out there chomping at the bit to label the speaker of these words a racist? Most likely the answer is yes, and this is precisely why the vast majority of Americans steer clear of acquiescing to such statements because they fear being deemed a racist also for doing nothing more than speaking truthfully.

However, these words belong to America's favorite TV father, Bill Cosby, who stated them at the Constitutional Hall event in Washington D.C., commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education ruling.

Remarkably, the comedian's speech received applause and laughter, though the fact that it was a multicultural convention may have had something to do with that. Regardless, reactions in the black community have been mixed. Some agree with Cosby, while others either acknowledge the truthfulness of the remarks but criticize the callous manner in which the statements were made or simply condemn his words altogether.

For example, Fox News reported that after Cosby's remarks the NAACP President Kweisi Mfume and NAACP Legal Defense Fund Head Theodore Shaw approached the podium looking "stone faced." Shaw reportedly announced to the crowd that most people on welfare are not blacks, and that many of the problems his organization addresses are not self-inflicted.

To illustrate further, in his article, "What Bill Cosby Should be Talking About," Time Magazine's Christopher Farley chided the comedian, not for what he said, but for where he said it. Or, more appropriately, in front of whom he said it.

Farley stated, "Cosby broke the unwritten rule of keeping black dirty laundry in black washing machines." That is, Cosby should have refrained from speaking his mind in the presence of other racial groups, specifically whites, even if the statements were truthful, for as Marlon Brando put it, "you never discuss business outside the family."

Such an outlook is ridiculous. If the NAACP is to continue proclaiming that American society, again mostly referring to whites, has culpability in the problems lower socioeconomic blacks face, and a responsibility to rectify them, then there is no need for "behind closed-door discussions."

All possible explanations to the plight must be raised out in the open, regardless of the blame they ascribe to specific groups.

Perhaps what Farley, and many others in the black community prefer is for lower socioeconomic blacks to obtain somewhat of a "free pass" or excuse for the self-destructive conduct in which many, but certainly not all, engage in.

Here's the bottom line: 50 years after the Civil Rights Movement, the black community can no longer expect American citizens to believe that blacks do not have opportunities at their disposal to live the American dream and become successful. Though many in the inner cities face tremendous hardships, this cannot exonerate parents from their responsibility to raise their children properly by teaching them right from wrong, to develop self-discipline and pursue higher education.

When 13 percent of African Americans fail to complete high school, when 70 percent of all out-of-wedlock births are to black mothers and when the incarceration rate for black males between the ages of 18 and 24 is eight times that of whites, something is wrong.

This is a social problem and, as Bill Cosby stated, "You can't just blame white people for this, man, you can't." And it's not rational to assume that some public policy will rectify this situation entirely. Nothing can, except the people themselves. This is what Cosby was stating and he hit it right on the nose.

So instead of writing Cosby off as a black elitist, or preferring that such comments be kept in "black washing machines," perhaps its time to accept the truth and work toward rectifying it through a cultural transformation that places more emphasis on families and education.