Bill Cosby has more harsh words for black community

[Liqaye]

 

 

CHICAGO, Illinois (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.

[NGONGE]

I could only imagine Rudeboy looking lost and amused at the comments of Bill Cosby. He would probably say something along these lines:

 

Why you callin da guy in da picture Bill Cosby, blud? Dat is Dr Huxtible, ya get me?

He’s a old fart, blud. What does he know about music? Aks him to read the lyrics of Tupac, blud, aks him. I bet you he don’t know, ya get me? He talking about civil right movement and all dat nonsense, he talking about grandfather struggle but what does he know about da struggle of da Rude boys? Aks him to tell you who killed Tupac and Biggy, blud? He is an old man who knows nothing, blud, nothing. He’ll probably say some black guys killed Tupac and Biggy. WRONG, star, wrong. I’s heard from my mate who’s a very good DJ in West London, dat Tupac and Biggy was killed by dem heavy metal geezers, blud. It stands to reason, ya get me? Da heavy metal guys can’t sell dier rubbish music anymore because everybody listen to hip hop and everybody loves Tupac and Biggy. So da heavy metal crew got togeder and killed Tupac and biggy, blud. For real.

 

Dese old people always think they is right, blud. Dey is not in the street to see da daily struggle of da brothers and sisters, star. Dey don’t know how hard a man got to work to make money to buy hisself stuff to make him look good, blud. I’s remember when I’s worked in my paper round and I’s had to wake up early every morning to deliver dem papers, blud. It was hard work but I got nuff money to buy me a fubu top and pierce my ear to look bling, ya get me? What does Dr Huxtible know about all a dat, blud? Nothin I tell you, blud, nothing. So he should shut up and never talk about tings he knows nothing about, ya get me?

[Jaabir]

i watched his address and i dont think he said anything offensive or insulting to the black people... in the contrary.. he pointed out some issues black people need to deal with..

[Blessed]

"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."

Thank you Mr. Cosby!

 

I ask the youth that I work with, if they want end up like the guys Mr. Cosby is talking about. They say no, but still carry on acting istubidh and how can they not? It is accepted by the adults responsible for them, promoted in the media.

 

Black people including Somalis run away from their responsibilities too much. Life might be tough but you still have choices...!!

 

P.S

I still thinks Rudboy is cute...

[OG Moti]

First his words are right.... but one thing is bothering me, isnt this the house negga now talking like Malcom X... man i saw him using the word negga now he is saying this...,. he is just looking for last minute fame... he aint gonna get it.... once house negggga will always be a house neggga... peace

[Valenteenah.]

^^ What's a house neggga then?

 

I think there's an element of truth to Cosby's words, but he is being too general and too negative. Not all blacks are illiterate or make grammatical errors. Similarly, not all black kids want to become thugs or gangsters. :rolleyes:

 

@ Rudeboi!

[NGONGE]

A sort of an Uncle Tom. The type that would start shuffling at the sight of a white man and keep saying “ Yes, Messah” “ No, Messah”...Something like an Uncle Tom I suppose. Come on work it out! A successful black man who made his name in the darkest days of segregation and racism must be a house negga, right? :rolleyes:

[Valenteenah.]

Yup...he must. Or he could simply be a brilliant, determined and eloquent fella, noh?

 

'House negga' must be the most offensive phrase I have heard for a while.

[Qac Qaac]

Black americans, Somalies, and all the immigrants need to have more FIELD NEGROES.

[Paragon]

^^^ what are the achievements of field ones? What was Martin lurther King, a field one or a house one? Who said cosby is a house one by the way, proofs?

 

I think cosby's words were right on the spot. Same needs to be said to Somalis.

[Gediid]

What Cosby said was meant strictly for the African American community and was not intended for Somalis.Whether he's a house nigger or not is really not the issue here and I find it rather demeaning to refer to a person of Cosby's stature as such.

I would therefore suggest to keep the argument to the subject matter and not say things out of the blue just to ridicule someone's perspective.

Gracias

[SomeAlien]

Originally posted by maansoor:

Bill Cosby is the man,

 

of all his years as a comedian he has never cussed or anything like that like talking about sex.

 

this guy has SOMALI humor

ummmmm, someone needs to check bill's earlier works.

[SomeAlien]

also,id like to add that i think your usage of the terms field and house niggers to be completely disgusting and unnecessary. all black people are either house or field niggers, right? and always niggers, right? wth?!?!

 

ps, maybe you guys should read the book, uncle toms cabin.

[Lake Da agony]

By Tim Wise

 

Perhaps Bill Cosby should have known better.

 

After all, just because you're a black man whom white folks love, doesn't mean you can actually count on them receiving your words in the spirit you say you intended.

 

Such a lesson became obvious in late May, when word spread about Cosby's remarks at the NAACP's 50th Anniversary Commemoration of the Brown v. Board of Education decision, striking down school segregation.

 

Instead of taking the opportunity to discuss the ongoing struggles for educational equity, or to address the remaining barriers of unequal funding, racially-disparate tracking and discipline, and other obstacles to meaningful parity in our nation's schools, Cosby spent his time bashing the black poor, ridiculing them for the clothes they wear, the way they speak, even the names they give their children.

 

It was a shameful and classist diatribe, littered with inaccurate stereotypes, all of which proved that Cosby hasn't known any poor black folks for a very long time, since few commit crime, most place a high value on education, and only a small percentage get pregnant as minors, contrary to Cosby's apoplectic rant.

 

But putting aside the inaccuracy of Cosby's statements that night, what was most disturbing was the way much of white America took them.

 

Although Cosby, to his credit, never said that racism was a thing of the past--and indeed such is not his position at all--and although he said nothing to the effect that white folks no longer had any responsibilities to address discrimination or racism, that's what a lot of whites, and pretty much all white conservatives, apparently heard.

 

Fact is, Cosby was merely trying, albeit in an obnoxious, over-the-top manner, to call for "personal responsibility" among poor blacks: an idea that is (contrary to what most whites seem to think) quite common in African American communities, and which exists side-by-side with a keen awareness of the need for continued vigilance against various forms of racism and exclusion.

 

But what whites too often misunderstand is that if personal responsibility is good for the black goose, it must also be good for the white gander.

 

Thus, not only do Cosby's words not let whites off the hook, the spirit of his comments actually require us to be even more deliberate about taking responsibility for that which we have some control over: namely, white racism, and the discrimination that takes place in institutions that we control, every day.

 

Funny how whites want to view personal responsibility as a one-way street: In other words, "they" need to clean up their act, but "we" don't need to do anything but perhaps watch, and scold them for not moving quickly enough.

 

I remember the first time I had this argument with a black conservative--radio talk show host Ken Hamblin--on a nationally-syndicated TV show. He was ranting and raving, much like Cosby, about blacks taking responsibility for their own lives. Rather than argue with him about his views of the black community, I simply said, "Fine, if you want black folks to take responsibility for themselves, that's great. But meanwhile, what are whites supposed to take personal responsibility for? The St. Patty's day parade? Oktoberfest?"

 

In other words, whites too often use "personal responsibility" as a bludgeon against others, when we no longer want to deal with the crap we put out there, whether its discrimination in lending by white banks, racial profiling by cops, or moving away from a neighborhood when too many of "those" people move in.

 

After all, how can black folks take responsibility for the fact that even when they have the same level of education and experience, they still are paid less than their white counterparts, and are more likely to be unable to find a job?

 

How can black folks take responsibility for the fact that black men are twice as likely to have their cars stopped and searched for drugs, even though whites are twice as likely to actually have drugs on us when we're stopped?

 

Black and brown poor folks are doing self-help all the time, contrary to the common media imagery. They have to; after all, they have enough experience with white institutions to know that such institutions have never done much to improve their situation, and nothing at all unless it was demanded and unless they were mobilized collectively to make it happen.

 

But I see very little self-help or even self-reflection in the white community. Rarely do we spend time dealing with our own internalized racial biases and fears, or the discrimination that continues to plague people of color, and which only we have any control over, since the folks doing the discriminating are white like us.

 

In fact, not only do we not reflect on it, we get angry when someone brings it up, which is why whites breathe a collective sigh of relief when someone like Cosby comes along and allows us to think our jobs are over.

 

But our jobs are not over. And if we expect people of color to take personal responsibility, irrespective of racism's existence and impact on their lives, then surely we must apply the same logic to ourselves, and take personal responsibility, irrespective of how we think black folks are behaving, or how dysfunctional we may (falsely) perceive them to be. If they aren't allowed to pass the buck then neither can we be allowed to do so.

 

In other words, it is white folks' job to deal with racism, not point fingers at black and brown folks and tell them to do better. That, after all, is not taking personal responsibility; rather, it's lecturing others about their need to do so.

 

Even worse, many whites actually blame others for our own racial biases. So, for example, whites will often acknowledge negative perceptions of blacks as lazy, violent, dishonest, or whatever, and then blame black folks for feeding that perception by their own actions.

 

Talk about not taking personal responsibility! So because of the actions of a small, unrepresentative sample of the African American community (the three percent or so who commit a violent crime annually, for example), whites feel justified in thinking negative things about blacks as a group.

 

And then, in what can only be viewed as the epitome of silliness, these same whites want everyone to believe that racism is no longer an obstacle for blacks, even though they have admitted to holding negative views about the entire community in question!

 

So we are to believe that persons holding these biases would nonetheless be able to fairly evaluate black job applicants, or potential tenants, or loan applicants; that somehow these stereotypes to which they confess would play no role in their evaluations of such persons in the real world!

 

Just listen to the logic here: "Racism isn't holding blacks back, it's their own laziness!" If one cannot see the irony in this comment go back and read it again; read it three or four times until you get it. If anything, statements like this are their own negation; they serve to disprove their own claim, even before someone has the chance to respond to them.

 

As for Cosby--white America's favorite black man (for now)--perhaps we should ask how most whites felt about his comment several years ago that AIDS may well have been created by the U.S. Government as a plot to destroy certain communities; or the statement of his wife Camille when their son was murdered, in which she noted that America had taught her son's Russian killer to hate blacks. As I recall, most whites either said nothing in response to these claims, or went ballistic, accusing the Cosbys of "playing the race card."

 

See, white folks don't like the race card, unless it's the one that helps our own hand. Whites, by and large, never listen to black people, unless they're saying what we already want to hear. That's how desperate we are to avoid taking personal responsibility for the mess that racism has made of this nation; a mess in which we are more than a little implicated, historically speaking and still today.

[OG Moti]

There are 3 types of Black people... as far as i see:

1. House Negga - such as Bill Cosby, who chooses words to please the White master...

2. Feild Negga - Who tries to fight back the unfairness of his master but dont deny the masterhood of the white man.. such as The two members of Bush Administration and in some extent Martin Luther King...

3. A decent Black man who take no shiit from no one and believes he/she is one of the kind and works hard for him/herselve and him/her people as general.. such as many Somali brothers and the great Malcom X...

 

Peace