Bill Cosby attacks some in black community again

Great Debates
101

[QUOTE=TeaElle]

Enough of this Reader’s Digest version of poor people in America

Ignoring taunts is easy, ignoring an asskicking every freaking day is something else. What about a 9mm in your face if you don’t run with the thugs? 14 year old Timmy is morally weak because he would rather run with thugs than have them run over him? Is Timmy morally weak because his parents are screw ups and he wants things? Clothes, food, protection? Timmy should be responsible enough to know there are programs to help him? What choice should Timmy make, the snake pit that is foster care/child services or the streets?

Turn on your TV? To what pray tell? Beautiful people living in apartments that only millionaries can afford, but somehow they manage to do it a waitress’ salary? Or the celebraties that have mulitple wives, husbands, lovers, children, dwi, drug arrests, ODs with little or no penalties? The investment bankers and politicians that steal millions and still get to keep their stuff.

Oh I’m sorry I forget, money makes the rules change…they can AFFORD their lack of morals; the poor can’t.

What are people telling them to be? Doctors, Lawyers, Capenters or Like Mike? This country treats working people like crap and rewards entertainers regardless of their ability like kings…this is what these kids are drowned with everyday. If you have enough cash in your pocket, they will leave you alone; you will have whatever and do you want and that’s the truth.

Uncle Timmy works everyday and is driving a 1987 dodge, was late with the rent and the knock on the door comes. Mr. Smith shot a guy, did a nickle and is driving a 2007(that’s how much juice he has) BMW and the cops leave him alone because they’re getting a piece. NO ONE knocks on his door.

That’s the lesson they’re learning and if you don’t think running a stable of girls and dope isn’t HARD work, you’re fooling yourself…hell the Italians did it and they’re doing just fine now, but THEY were different.

I know, I know, they should know better, they should have morals… Morals are just a handshake we with have with each other and lasts just as long.

Unusual Uncle? What are you talking about? I’ll say it again cause you don’t seem to get it, most, as in the majority of poor people in this country are hard working, God fearing, Flag waving people…The UNUSUAL uncle is the one that’s NOT working, not the one that is. The problem is that even working everyday they can, it’s still not enough money…they can’t afford private school and even if they moved they’ll just end up in a neighbourhood that just as bad or WORST…lack of money is limited thing. They can’t change their environment and while we can all point to our own personal heros who did, I promise you, EVERY ONE of them had help. Even Bill Cosby.

As much as is necessary.

102

That’s the question, obviously. If you’re mired in poverty and there is no precedent for success in your family, and you’re living in the moment following prevailing modes of behavior in a dysfunctional culture, how do you snap out of that and take it on faith that a long, unchartered route will lead you somewhere unknown but good? Will being shamed by Bill Cosby do it? I would think, if shame and scorn are such great motivators, blacks would be on top after so many years of prejudice.

And, as holmes pointed out, people deep in poverty often don’t get second chances. They can make a mistake that sidetracks their entire future, while others with more/better resources enjoy many second chances. I know people who worked hard and tried but never got anywhere, so I can see how someone in the most dire of circumstances could view “getting out” as being about as likely as winning the lottery–certainly nothing to bank on.

We’re talking about trying to effect a profound cultural change in these areas. It would take drastic measures to achieve such a thing: busing kids to middle class schools, breaking up the ghettos and projects and integrating the people into strong communities with high standards, and having a lot of people really care and participate in what would essentially be a massive long-term rehabilitation and support effort. Why would that be our responsibility? Because we let this situation develop. We, as a society, created the conditions that allowed the ghettos and ghetto culture to form, in large part by blaming these people for everything that came their way and acting as though they chose it. In any case, it would be practically impossible to pull off such a thing, which is why I’m certain Cosby’s “conversation” in the media is not going to make a whit of difference.

103

I apologize if this makes me come across as sensitive, but I don’t think having some money in the bank and a Ph.D. behind my name gives me permission to denigrate others in that fashion. Bad behavior is simply bad, and I will say so to whoever is listening. But calling it “niggerish” conjures up bad images in my head. I’m not a house slave. I refuse to do the master’s bidding.

I don’t think that upper-middle class blacks have some special moral authority. Coz doesn’t have it, at least in regards to sexual responsibility. I’d like to see more public condemnation of bad-behaving people, period. Black people regardless of class have always shied away from public condemnation when it’s one of their own. R. Kelly, Michael Jackson, and OJ Simpson are cases in point. Regular people on the street need to condemn these people, not just the “elite”. I don’t think the black community needs class warfare…which is essentially the stance your post seems to take. Upper income blacks don’t hold a monopoly on positive values. Poor blacks aren’t all trifiling.

I think it’s leadership that needs to feel more comfortable issuing condemnation. Not rich people. It will not only be more effective, but it will be less divisive.

104

All in all, BC made some good and valid points. Still, the way he made them seems to indicate he is approaching the Bitter Old Man stage of his life.

He has been through a lot. Death of his son and all. He must have a lot of pain inside.

Or not. I am no expert.

105

And this isn’t even enough, not when there is such a thing as discriminatory tracking, whereby so-called integrated schools become segregated within to the detriment of black children.

106

So true, but you’ll notice Cosby still has the protection of “not airing dirty laundry” in public that he denies the lower classes.

107

Again, I really don’t know what good being condemned by people who have it better off is going to do. The people who are perpetuating this cycle are adults, or very nearly adults and a “good talking to” from the upper middle class isn’t going to do much to change ingrained attitudes. A lot of people all ready feel that upper middle class blacks think that they’re better than poor blacks. How is scolding these people going to change these feelings, an make them take the message to heart?

A lot of upper class black people aren’t interested in helping because they don’t think that the poor are their problem, and they’re not. The well off have been in their own neighborhoods for decades. Why should they have to make any real effort to help the less fortunate? The majority of other Americans don’t.

(bolding added)

Not to hijack this thread, but I hate to see that word used in this context. It’s just as annoying as the people who use it as a term of endearment in an attempt to change it’s meaning. I think that the word nigger has a specific meaning, no matter what Chris Rock says, and that it shouldn’t be applied to anyone. No wonder that the blacks in trouble don’t listen to those that have “made it” when they refer to them with the same words and hatred that racists have used for decades.*

*Askia, this last part isn’t necessarily directed at you specifically.

108

Whew! So many people to comment on! Okay, to back-track, quickly:

Omega Glory. It’s not condemning the people… rather, the behavior.

Paul in Saudi. Age, and Ennis Cosby’s death does seem to be the impetus for a lot of this on Cosby’s part. I might also add that his daughter’s dating (I forget which one) uber-thug Mike Tyson back in the 90s has something to do with it, too.

monstro. We’re probably closer in agreement than is readily apparent by our posts. While I agree that upper-middle class blacks don’t have any special moral authority speak out, it’s probable that by simply BEING middle class they can at least speak to experience about adopting middle class values re: work, valuing education and economic sacrifice going farther to get you out of poverty than say, banking on your skills as an entertainer or athlete.

It can start within families: there are plenty of middle class families who don’t talk to Cousin so-and-so because she doesn’t have a job, fucks around and doesn’t do anything with her kids. It’s not class warfare I’m advocating, per se – it’s class responsibilty. FAMILY responsibility, across socioeconomics. What Cosby said about ‘poor people not living up to their end of the bargain’ is largely (but not univerally) true. It’s also true that in many black families those who are better off often don’t lift a finger to help their fuck-up relatives. It’s a silent shame. It might help if people were more vocal about it. I also agree that vocally condemning suspected molestors and murderers like MJ, R. Kelly and OJ.

Live Better Electrically! A key failure is lack of a close familial role model for middle class success, because there’s so many little steps that have to be learned early that lead to a better life that need, ideally, to be modeled: respect for the law, punctuality, good grooming, good facility with the language, valuing education, travelling, interacting positively with people different from you, exposing yourself to high culture, having a strong familial support system, etc. You might be right: maybe Cosby’s conversation won’t make a visble difference. I see him as part of a tide of change in black leadership speaking out on miscreants. Maybe we’ll look back on 2004 as The Year American Black Leadership Began To Be Publically Critical About Lawless Behavior In The Nation’s African-American Communities. Heh. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle.

holmes I don’t often evoke spiritual advice in human affairs, but here’s one I do believe: “There Lord Helps Those Who Help Themselves.” Hand helping is fine, if it gets them out the mud. But if after helping someone they KEEP falling down I reserve the right to talk about their ass.

109

How long do people get to lean on systemic disenfranchisement as a reason for acting like idiots? I’m legitimately asking. How long? And what exactly is “systemic disenfranchisement” at this point in time, anyway? Especially for people under 30 in urban areas, especially in the north? I’d really like someone to explain it to me in realistic terms.

How often are you suggesting that this actually happens? Are you really trying to tell me that every little illiterate thug on the streets is there because he didn’t have a choice and he was afraid for his life? Are you honetly trying to pull off the easiest and most morally neutral argument to explain away that particular lifestyle choice?

False dichotomy. I’m not even going to try to refute something so obvious on its face.

Did I say to watch “Friends” or Entertainment Tonight? No, I don’t think so. There’s more to life, and television, for that matter. Think hard before dish up another stupid generalization.

Actually, you’re exactly right in a very important way – when people with money get arrested for DUIs and have serial divorces and commit serial adultery, we’re only involved to the extent which we want to be. We’re not paying for public defenders, nor for their children to be cared for in foster homes. We’re not paying them AFDC benefits until they can get their mitts into another sugar daddy to “take care of” their kids. We don’t foot the bill for their court-mandated rehab. When they’re ordered to make restitution to the courts, they actually do it. When you have money, the burden that you place on society even when you do fail in very large ways (hi Kobe!) is considerably smaller.

Then they’re not looking very far. They’re not thinking very hard. And you’re falling into exactly the same all or nothing thinking which is so abysmally shortsighted as to be sickening. There is a pretty damned wide gulf between workaday people and the rich and famous. And if a kid can’t live in a city and look up and think that maybe there are people who go to work in all those big tall buildings and do things other than run the shoeshine booth or clean up at the end of the day (not that there’s anything wrong with either, btw) and maybe think that it’s worth finding out what those people do and think about wanting to do that themselves, well, who exactly is to blame for not using the brain God put in his skull?

And yes, some people are recognizing that there are kids in the worst situations who would be very fine as doctors and lawyers and skilled craftspeople, and are encouraging them to reach for those goals. And thank God that there are – I wonder where I’d be if the message I got was so dismal when I was growing up (in considerably more wretched circumstances than most of today’s urban youth) that all I could aspire to was to be a cleaning woman or a store clerk, the jobs my parents had when I was born.

Quantify “help” in your vernacular. I have a feeling that our definitions of that word are vastly different.

110

I’d say longer than a generation. It took longer than a generation to get black people in the situation they are today. It’s going to take longer than a generation to fix it.

Note that I said a legacy of systematic disenfranchisement. It doesn’t matter if the playing field is equal now. It wasn’t equal when our parents were coming up. It’s unfair to ask black people why they are still screwed up when 1) the people who were directly screwed are still alive and 2) the people who were doing the screwing are still alive as well.

We’ve had numerous threads about Racism Today. Hopefully one or more has some cites that you may consider useful:

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=243699&highlight=institutionalized+racism

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=152876&highlight=predatory+lending

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=150125&highlight=racist+hiring

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=195159&highlight=racial+profiling

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=175516&highlight=racial+profiling

Also, the North is no bastion of racial justice. The most racially segregated cities in the US are located in the North.

111

by Askia

The elite coming out to publically condemn this “niggerish” behavior will do what, really? Scolding words are easy to throw out, but stopping actions and breaking cycles that are generations old is hard work, and takes more than speeches. The intentions may be in the right place, but really, it looks as if you are advocating that the Good blacks publically separate themselves from the Bad blacks by regularly getting up on soapboxes and talking about what “they” are doing.

by Askia

What does public condemnation do that non-public condemnation not do, except serve as a way to prove to the mainstream that “Look, not all of us are like this! Some of us are good and some of us–no, not us…them–are rotten! So it’s okay to treat them like niggers, because they’re different!” This may not be the intent behind publically condemning stupid courses of action, but I think many blacks will use it as a way to remove themselves from a stigma that has been unfairly attached to them because of their race.

It’s apparent that a lot of people on the outside think Cosby’s comments are groundbreaking and unheard of from a black person’s mouth, but that doesn’t make that true. Why do our so-called black leaders need to be on the six o’clock news berating lower class black people in order to prove that they are working to make things better?Black preachers, teachers, and the average joe have been saying the same things Cosby has been saying for a long time. We’ve always had bourgi black folks who disassociate themselves from the ghetto segment, and the black community knows why that is. Maybe the mainstream is unaware of the nuances to the black community that most within the community take for granted, but we sure as hell don’t need more permission to split ourselves up along class lines.

112

Each one who comes along has to deal with it anew. It isn’t as though there is a Great Ancient Black Person who simply refuses to learn from his/her situation.

You seem very angry about this, as does Cosby. It’s a frustrating and dangerous situation, but as I said earlier, I don’t think scorn is going to remedy the problem. There has already been plenty of that, and look at all the good it has done.

Besides, turn it around for a minute. If a popular spokesman for the poor uttered some hard truths about racism, classism, exclusion, unpunished crime and greed among the upper classes, would they suddenly sit up and take notice? Would people say, “I’m happy this dialogue is finally taking place, because now we’ll totally restructure our business models and offer stable, reasonably secure jobs that pay living wages and promote the formation of communities.” Perhaps the upper classes, too, should take personal responsibility for the consequences of their actions.

113

Forgive me for posting so much–and this is going to be a bit of a rambler–but I’m bored today.

This whole talk about condemnation is making me think of what happened when I was in the fourth grade.

I was bussed across town all throughout school. Anyone who lives or is familiar with Atlanta knows Buckhead. That’s where I went to school, but I grew up on the south side of town. The “bad” side, in other words. All of the black kids in my fourth grade class–nine or ten of us–were bussed. Most of the white kids lived near the school.

The black kids were, in some ways, more sophisticated than our white classmates. We knew the city. We knew where the white kids lived and we knew where we lived. We knew what southwest and southeast Atlanta looked like, just as we knew what Midtown and Buckhead looked like. We knew because we saw these different places every day, twice a day. However, to generalize, the white kids were more provincial. There was no real need for them to leave their neighborhood. Buckhead has everything. It’s almost like it’s own city. They didn’t know Cascade Heights from the West End to save their life. I don’t even think they realized how far away the black kids lived (in more ways than one).

My fourth grade teacher–a black woman from the “old school” (we had to address her as “ma’am”, Southern style)–recognized this and decided to take our class on a field trip to the southside of town. We’d first explore southwest Atlanta, the West End, drive through Auburn Avenue (aka Sweet Auburn) and stop by the King Memorial. This was around the time when MLK’s birthday was being nationally celebrated for the first time, so this was a big deal. I remember being excited because I lived in the West End, and it thrilled me that we might be able to pass by my house. The teacher then told the class that before we would return back to school, we’d stop and have lunch at a elementary school on that side of town.

Everyone groaned. I can’t even remember if I hadn’t groaned too, but I remember laughing at the reaction. It was as if everyone had experienced the same thought. And yet, even to this day, I’m not able to really articulate what we all might have been thinking.

Five minutes later, the teacher called out a list of names. I could tell from her demeanor that she was pissed. The people being called were obviously on her shit list. Which is why I almost died when she called my name. She herded us into the hallway and we all stood there–all nine or ten of us–and waited to be killed. We knew we were all in some Serious Shit. My brain raced trying to figure out what I had done wrong. The infamous floodgates known as my eyes were about to open.

The teacher launched into a very loud tirade about how embarrassing we were. How utterly sorry our asses were. It slowly dawned on me that she had singled out only the black kids. In near-tears, she yelled at us for our reaction to her announcement, about eating lunch over on the “south side”. It was obvious that we thought we were better than our other brethen for some reason, and she spent the next few minutes knocking us down a peg or two.

We were a sorry lot, she said. We were disruptive. We didn’t do our work. We were always giving her a hard time. Worse, we were embarrassing in front of the white kids. Rage formed in my chest hearing all this. I was a good girl, goddammit. I had all As and Bs. I was never sent to the office or called out in class. I was good, and here I was, being yelled at like I was scum.

But then the teacher singled me out and said that I was the only one in the group that did not embarrass her. She essentially appointed me the Good Negro of the class. Being nine-years-old, I thought it was the greatest compliment anyone could have given me. I was a Role Model. The others could learn a thing or two from me.

Almost twenty years later, my response to the whole thing is “UGH!” That decribes how it is to be a lauded member of your “race”. You get yelled at for crimes you haven’t done in one breath, and in the next you’re praised for being “special”. One moment you love being Black–you want to show everyone the beauty of your heritage and culture–and the next, you just want to run away and be something or someone else. One moment you think you’re a part of a unified community, and the next you realize it’s you versus Them.

And what about the bad white kids in the class (and there were a-plenty, believe me)? The teacher did not care about them. It was Us who had hurt her soul so much.

I hear my fourth grade teacher’s emotional sermon every day. That’s why my first reaction to Cosby was “please shut the fuck up already”. There are thousands of people who need to be scolded, but I’m not one of them. I want to help, but it’s hard when people keep yelling at me. The sins of others should not taint me. I will insist this to the day I die.

Hopefully this story sheds some light on my feelings about all of this.

114

you with the face. You almost have my position. I’m advocating that ANY African American who works hard to better themselves and their families get up on soapboxes, message boards, talk shows, editorial pages – whatever handy venue – and begin an open and honest dialogue about what some other black people are doing that, I’m sorry to put it this way, fuck things up. I want it to be as vocal, open, proactive in assigning blame and demanding justice among our OWN people as we were during our fight for civil rights. I agree with you! It will take hard work. He will take more than preaching speeches. It think public condemnation of illegal and immoral behavior is a long-overdue aspect of helping the masses of African-American in this country. It will require people to not just stand idly by in righteous silence while people whose ties – familial and cultural – not bog down our progress and other people’s perception of us. This isn’t a problem of the elite needs to tackle. All of us need to do our part.

Don’t kid yourself: Cosby’s comments are groundbreaking. It’s almost unprecedented to hear this level criticism from a widely-known black person’s mouth. I’m hard-pressed to think of anything Cosby’s said so fair that isn’t essentially true. But you’re welcome to enlighten me.

This is superficially a class issue, but more pertinently one of individudal responsible behavior. I’d much rather have a black leader publicly berating a black subculture that celebrates “bling-bling” materialism, disprespect and objectification of women, unplanned parenthood and violence than public leader privately doing it, or not at all – and I’d rather have private disapproval than none at all. I’ve been a black man accused and suspected of actions for no other reason than the color of my skin. Other people validating the worst suspected of us is no damn good for any of us.

You’re absolutely right: black preachers, teachers, and the average joe on the street have been saying the same things Cosby has been saying for a long time. BUT NEVER SO PUBLICLY BEFORE. I think that a public commitment to disallowing and disapproving this kind of backward mentality is just what we need – as long as this is the beginning of a trend and not a fluke.

I’m all for unity. But some black people reject brotherhood, the idea of nationalism, of envisioning balck culture as anything but vulgar, coarse and low and accepting personal responsiblity. We can still try and reach out, help them, help their kids. But at some point, enough’s enough. We as a people damned well ought to be able to get out of the way of anyone who is pathologically hell-bent on destroying themselves and their own families by myoptically blaming everyone else except their own stupid, narrow, short-sighted decisions, actions and inactions.

you with the face, reading over this post – which took me a good half-hour of re-writing to respond to – I do apologize if this post seems shrill. You have some very good points I agree with, but I wanted to clarify my position.

115

See this is where we disagree. Words without action is just words, words don’t change people action changes people. What you are advocating is just what many blacks in society dream of doing on a daily basis, or at least I do. That’s standing up on a soapbox and exhorting to white America that “Hey it’s not me it’s them”. An action the leads to divisiveness, alienating ‘them’ from ‘us’, a course which allows for distancing oneself from the problem, with a false sense of “having tried” because, well “at least I said something right”. This is not a “them” vs. “us” problem, neither among upper classes of blacks, or with America as a whole.

[quote]
Cos has a better chance of most to get away with it because A) he himself is from the culture he’s condemning and B) anyone who knows his history knows he came from the rough streets of Philly and C) all his life he has worked as the very best kind of integrationist, someone who insists on certain standards of professionalism and character-building from people around him, D) has always been very visible and vocal about the importance of education, producing clean and uplifting entertainment and giving back to the community and E) has backed up his rhetoric with his considerable resources: his wealth, his celebrity, his time.

[quote]

While I admire the works he’s done in these areas, most of these things do little to address the problems he’s addressing. Making scholarships available only helps those who’ve already seen the goal and have been taking steps in that direction. It doesn’t help the 14 y/o whose only example of someone who’s made it is the drug dealers on the corners wearing Nike, driving SUVs and flashing cash. This kid doesn’t see the value of hard work; this kid sees success with little risk. The fact that those same drug dealers will cycle in and out of the prison system, returning to the streets and taking up there previous corners (I mean they’ve got felonies now, what else are they gonna do?) just reinforces the normality of a tragic cycle.

Those scholarships could be more effective in a direct way. By also encouraging those same recipients to return to the communities they’ve escaped to improve the community from within. They now know the path, and how difficult it is to follow, if just some of those would take it upon themselves to guide others, if only as a visible alternative, would go a long ways towards changing the dumps some of our inner cities have become.

The thing is, how many are doing something and not receiving the least little bit of recognition outside the communities wher eit’s occuring? I bet everybody here knows of the Terrell Owens Sharpie Incident, but how many know he gives to Alzheimer’s Research or has testified before a Senate sub-committee? Not that I’m excusing bad behavior by black athletes, but they’re more a function of ‘what sells’ in news context, they’re almost cliche.

116

My nana had a spiritual advice too, “Pride before the fall…” She always said that most people fell into two catagories; too prideful or not enough pride and both flaws in character can be deadly. That goes for both the person needing help and the one with the ability to give it.

I don’t think most of us are really disagreeing here, I think it’s a matter of degrees. You want call you’re cousin a screw up? I’m with you, but you don’t go his place of business or his kid’s school or a crowded diner and do it…especially if he’s NOT there.

117

Grr!!! I screwed up the coding! See I black man taking personal responsibility. :smiley: I was responding to a post by Askia Everything starting with "While I admire the works he’s done in these areas,… Is me, not Askia.

118

monstro – I’m from the ATL. Booker T. Washington High school, c/o 89. Sup?

I, too, walked a funny line in school. Up until high school I went to predominantely white or integrated schools in solid middle class neighborhoods in Flint, Michigan. Then the bottom dropped out of the local economy and I saw my family’s options quickly go from bad to worse. My mom and I moved to Atlanta, I left her and moved in with my Pops.

On the one hand I went to Booker T. Washington, whose most famous son was Dr. King himself, and I was proud of that fact. On the other hand it was indelibly a ghetto school with a poor academic reputation along with Crim, Carver and Therrell. It was no secret that if you wanted a summer job you better not write that you went to ANY of those schools – you had to lie and say you went to Mays.

I wanted to go to Grady and almost managed to talk my way into their communications program – but ended up at Buh Ka Tee. When I transferred there my sophomore year I was bored silly with the academic program. I witnessed public sex in the classrooms and a terrible fight involving a teacher’s stolen stapler and someone’s left eyeball. I myself got into an awful fight wth this drug dealer who took a dislike to me because I had the nerve to like school, and almost got kicked out of school because to get his ass off my case once and for all I tackled him through the double doors on the second floor and threw his ass over the balcony. That I wasn’t charged was that he refused to tell school officials that I, a nerd, kicked his sorry ass.

Over that summer I was briefly hospiatlized for surgery, and met another drug dealer – A.K. Trey, who was laid up in the bed next to me because some rival drug dealer shot him through a tree while he and his friends were barbequing. We got to know each other pretty well over the next two days, and I admired the procession of fine-ass women (I mean, like Vanity of the Vanity 6 FINE) who came to visit him in the hospital. On the day I was leaving, he gave me his pager and told me to give him a call if I ever wanted to make some “real money.” I looked at that big-ass hole in his stomach and made a mental note not to get that hard up for cash.

But I skipped school 59 times my senior year. I still managed to graduate on time and post the second highest SAT scores in the school despite no preparation whatsoever. But I hurt myself with poor academic choices; my final grades were nothing to speak of. I took a year off from school, almost got a coworker pregnant.

You clearly have strong conflicted feelings – as I think most black people do, if they’re honest with themselves – about how some of our people drag us back, and how we may have been tempted ourselves to do some stupid things for quick money or peer approval.

Despite my own mistakes, I never felt Cos was talking to ME.

119

Askia, I woulda been at Wash’ton if I hadn’t gone to North Atlanta (formerly Northside & North Fulton before they combined). I grew up on Ashby St, off of Olgethorpe Ave. Good to see someone who knows that neighborhood on the SDMB!

(My brother and sister went to Mays. What kind of school colors are blue and gold?)

I know Coz isn’t talking to me, but it’s like what happened in the story I told: we’re all lumped together anyway. Even if the scolding isn’t addressed to us, we still have to sit in the audience and listen to it. It makes me uncomfortable.

I grew up in the 'hood, but I was never a hood. I heard the pop pop pop of gunshots outside of my bedroom window on a nightly basis, but I’ve never been shot at or know of anyone who has. While kids in the neighborhood were fed with foodstamps, I was taking violin lessons and driving around in a car my dad bought for me and my sister. I have a soapbox just like everyone else, but no desire to sermonize. Maybe you’ve earned the right to do that, but I don’t think I have.

I admit that it’s my problem, not Coz’s. But I imagine many black people feel like me. Tired.

120

monstro. Damn, son. I lived off Sunset and Simpson. This is a small world. Let’s catch the MARTA train off MLK, head east up to Vine City, scoot over the arcade at CNN Center and do the Bankhead Bounce listening to V-103! LOL. Oh, wait, you had a CAR. We can ride to Club Nikki or the Blue Flame.

On a serious note, you have another good point. (No surprise.) My tendency to want to sermonize corresponds to my profession, teaching, and my getting older and wanting to see some meaningful social changes. A few years ago I might have blown off Cos’s rhetoric too, but he’s absolutely right about the things children are exposed to. Where’s the innocence? Flip on the TV: there’s Kelis yammering on about her milkshake. I rarely see innocence anymore – just street-smart stupidity and dangerous naivety.

I’ve read a little bit of you and you with the face’s comments on that other Cosby thread on the IMHO forum. (or was it MPSIMS?) I do respect y’all’s opinions even as try not be as cynical – although I understand that FEEL, too. I hope to hell maybe something lasting will come out of this decision by Dr. Cosby to openly talk about some things that have been simmering for too long. I dunno.

P.S., to eveybody else: Don’t let monstro fool you. It’s ghettoly pronounced “Wah 'N Tun”. Say it with me! Buh Ka Tee Wah N Tun Hise Cool. Let it, y’know, just flow… or y’know, you can drop the “Ka”: Buh Tee Wah N Tun…