Bill Has Done it Again!

[Sundance]

"They're standing on the corner and they can't speak English.
I can't even talk the way these people talk:
Why you ain't,
Where you is,
What he drive,
Where he stay,
Where he work,
Who you be...
And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. 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.
In fact you will never get any kind of job making a decent living.
People marched and were hit in the face with rocks to get an Education, and now we've got these knuckleheads walking around.
The lower economic people are not holding up their end in this deal. These people are not parenting. They are buying things for kids.
$500 sneakers for what? And they won't spend $200 for Hooked on Phonics.
I am talking about these people who cry when their son is standing there in an orange suit.
Where were you when he was 2? Where were you when he was 12? Where were you when he was 18 and how come you didn't know that he had a pistol? And where is the father? Or who is his father?
People putting their clothes on backward: Isn't that a sign of something gone wrong?
People with their hats on backward, pants down around the crack, isn't that a sign of something?
Isn't it a sign of something when she has her dress all the way up and got all type of needles [piercing] going through her body?

What part of Africa did this come from??
We are not Africans. Those people are not Africans; they don't know a thing about Africa .....
I say this all of the time. It would be like white people saying they are European-American. That is totally stupid.
I was born here, and so were my parents and grand parents and, very likely my great grandparents. I don't have any connection to Africa, no more than white Americans have to Germany, Scotland, England , Ireland, or the Netherlands . The same applies to 99 percent of all the black Americans as regards to Africa . So stop, already! ! !

With names like Shaniqua, Taliqua and Mohammed and all of that crap ......... And all of them are in jail.
Brown or black versus the Board of Education is no longer the white person's problem.
We have got to take the neighborhood back.
People used to be ashamed. Today a woman has eight children with eight different 'husbands' -- or men or whatever you call them now.
We have millionaire football players who cannot read.
We have million-dollar basketball players who can't write two paragraphs. We, as black folks have to do a better job.
Someone working at Wal-Mart with seven kids, you are hurting us. We have to start holding each other to a higher standard..
We cannot blame the white people any longer."

Dr.. William Henry 'Bill' Cosby, Jr., Ed..D.
WELL SAID, BILL
It's NOT about color...It's about behavior!!!

[Wales2004]

I am confused. This seems to be that speech that was labeled as "pound cake" which caused some people's heads to nearly explode.

[juppiter]

*Barf*

[alphanguy74]

I think it is... and it's brilliant. Somebody needed to say it, and I'm glad it was him. People of his generation died and got hit with dobermans and tear gas to make these strides, and many young people are just throwing it away. For what reason, I don't know. And wales... yes, it caused many people's heads to explode, but that's too damn bad, if people can't handle looking in the mirror, it's not Bill's problem. The anger and vitriol just means he the nail right on the head. Us in the gay community had the AIDS crisis as our rallying call and "come to Jesus moment", and now see where we are. In pretty damn good shape. It's not to late to make changes, that bus ain't off the cliff yet.

[Money]

I love every single word he said because it's all true. Time to look in the mirror and hold ourselves responsible for our attitudes and behavior. I know there's a great divide between "African American" and "Black" among the black race in America so I say to each their own.

[Wales2004]

Bill Cosby made some excellent points but it's still only applicable to a certain portion of the population and I believe he only meant it to apply to whom the shoe fits. People who went nuts because they feel he aired "dirty laundry" in public must live in some special place since the perception was out there and Bill Cosby's words did nothing to change that.

Thoughts cannot be legislated and that seems to be the root of the problem. All the "experts" do is compound the problem.

The "one size fits all" approach that is prevalent in discussions about the black race in America is more of a detriment. The idea, for instance, that the President should fix the unemployment rate for black Americans implies that the only reason that black Americans are unemployed is because they are black. So all these people are qualified for all the same jobs and the only reason they don't have those jobs is they are black. The same with education. Apparently, all the black children come from the same economic background, the same domestic situation, have the same medical background, and they are all alike in every way and the reason they all score the exact numbers on tests is because they are black and whatever solution might help them improve has to be based on black. And of course, there are no black criminals in the prison system because the only reason that a black man would end up in prison is his skin tone.

As long as all those "experts" keep perpetuating the lie that all black people are the same exact person, they'll keep complaining about the same things.

Bill Cosby's right about the people who don't try but there are people who do try and have a different set of circumstances that require different attention. Everyone is not the same. One day people will be able to not only acknowledge that but they will be able to do it without contradicting themselves in the next breath. There's no point in saying that black people are not monolithic and then claim that the "black experience" is multifaceted.

[juppiter]

It just bothers me that Bill Cosby implies that Black Vernacular is somehow inferior or less than white vernacular. I don't see what makes the examples he gave worse than Southern vernacular or NYC vernacular, which are accepted in the work place. And people wearing backwards hats and baggy jeans somehow means society has fallen irreparably? Please.

[VirginiaHamilton]

Considering that Dr. Cosby's criticisms include made snide comments about certain Black names by deeming them 'ghetto' (i.e.: Aisha, Hakeem, etc.) in spite of the fact that they date back further than the names that he finds 'acceptable' (Ashley, James, etc.), I refuse to take his Outreach to Black America seriously. Add the fact that he has the gall to rant about folks having children out-of-wedlock in the wake of that Autumn Jackson fuckery and, well, he needs to look in his own mirror before hollering about others being a discredit to the Black race.

[alphanguy74]

So I guess someone who used to be on drugs and is now clean can't speak against them? I'll keep that in mind. So since drugs and cigarettes have never passed my lips, I guess that gives me the right to say that both of those items are bankrupting our country, and maybe people who smoke should be denied insurance coverage?

[VirginiaHamilton]

Not when they hold themselves up to be the moral arbiter of Black America, they don't. Nor does one have the right to presume that every Black woman that chooses (since contrary to Dr. Cosby's preconceived notions, not every Black single mother is living high off the hog on public assistance) to be a single mother is a morally bankrupt cancer on the community.

[All My Shadows]

I couldn't agree more. While is purpose is legit, I can't get over his need to belittle people for the way they talk and their names. Open a college graduation program, and you'll see PLENTY of so-called "ghetto" names. Come down here to Louisiana, and you'll hear PLENTY well-educated people speaking in the dialect they grew up in. Things like that do NOT make the person.

[alphanguy74]

Well, for me, it depend on how you speak in your personal life and in a professional setting. There are some ozark bumpkin terms that I don't use when speaking to clients (I use them if I know them well) but if you went into a doctors office and he used the words "Yo", and "Homey", would he still have the same amount of credibility in your mind?

[VirginiaHamilton]

Frankly, I'd no problem agreeing with the whole 'We Got to Do Better' spiel if it wasn't dripping with Eurocentric (and sexist) condescension (that of which plenty of others do and have done without getting a tenth of the publicity that Dr. Cosby has received).

[All My Shadows]

If that's the type of thing he addressed, then it would be different. But "Where he stay" is a sign of a bad upbringing? Really? Damn. I've been in professional settings where everyone committed some kind of grammatical foul-up. Who cares? A person's character/integrity isn't properly judged by how well they can keep up false appearances. Someone can speak like a RADA-trained actor and be a real piece of sh!t.

Same.

[Wales2004]

If Bill Cosby stood up and singled out people just for the sake of implying that he was somehow better than they are, I might agree with certain criticisms. He was speaking on the occasion of the NAACP marking the anniversary of Brown vs. Topeka so his point about education was relevant. He in no way said that people have to speak perfectly all the time. He said there is a place for ir. He could use slang with his friends but it wasn't allowed n his home. I don't see what the problem is with that.

I am nowhere perfect when it comes to grammar but I find it annoying that people try to pretend that bad grammar is some sort of black cultural thing. Everyone makes a choice to speak a certain way at some point in life. All those people who use "they" as a pronoun choose to do it. Unless a person has a learning disability then there is no reason why he or she cannot learn basic grammar. It's a choice and society tends to give certain people a pass and claim it's because black people are backwards.

Since this country was turned into an English speaking country then what is the problem with learning to speak the language properly.? The idea that there is a white way to speak and black way to speak is nonsensical and could only fly in this country where people get to act as if it's some imposition for people to be grammatically correct at certain times. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want to hear the President or Secretary of State, Ambassador, etc. go to any meetings using atrocious grammar and claiming it's because he or she is from the south, the hood, the valley, the ghetto, northwest or whatever.

Bill Cosby is absolutely correct in saying that none of it is African and it makes it laughable that slapping "African" in fromt of the word "American" not only creates confusion but a portion of the population that either does not want to be seen as American or feels they are not American and they clearly are not African. In fact, some of them scoff at African immigrants and make fun of them. He's no different from any of the black people that I hear making fun of names like Shaniqua, Shanaynay, and others. People have the right to name their kids whatever and people have a right to shake their heads at some of those names.

I don't condone Bill Cosby's adultery any more than I condone Bill Clinton's. If Jessie Jackson stood up and condemned the same things, I wouldn't say he didn't have a right to do so. I heard Al Sharpton say that there was noting worse than preaching a funeral of an irrelevant negro. Yet there he is on MSNBC. Bill Cosby has as much right to express himself as those who disagree with him. No one has to take him seriously because that's the beauty of freedom, isn't it?

I was under the impression that Bill Cosby had paid and was willing to pay and he didn't say people should not have kids out of wedlock. He seems to be making a case for taking responsibility. Why have several kids if you cannot take care of them at the time that you have them? That's a whole lot different from having several kids and then being unable to take care of them later because you have fallen on hard times.