A friend texted me on Saturday: "Bill Cosby? Rape allegations? What a world . . ." I share her sentiments.
Bill Cosby, in the midst of a serious PR crisis as accusations about him sexually assaulting women make headlines around the world, has decided to stay silent.
[. . .]
Although Cosby has been accused of sexual assault in the past by more than a dozen women — including in a civil lawsuit settled in 2004 — the story didn’t get much consistent mainstream attention until this fall, when during a stand-up routine, comedian Hannibal Buress called Cosby a rapist.
When I hear about stuff like this, my training, experience and instinct all lead me to take a "wait and see" attitude. There are accusations, and we don't know the truth, so we should suspend jugment till there is good evidence one way or the other. A few things make it look bad for Costby, though, including his silence, the settlement he reached earlier, and just the fact that so many women are making the accusations.
But this is one of those times when I really, really want the accusations to be untrue. Unlike my friend, I wasn't really a regular viewer of "The Cosby Show" -- a little too goody two-shoes, icky for my taste -- so I didn't get into the "perfect TV father" thing.
But years before I started wearing out my favorite music albums, I wore out Bill Cosby albums by playing them over and over. So did a lot of my friends, who would repeat certain bits to each other until we all got sick of them. One routine about his brother Russell had a bit about a dispute over snacks and the line, "Who died and made you the Jell-O sheriff?" We really wore that one out, by saying to each other constantly, "Who died and made you (insert disputed item here) sheriff?"
You just don't want to think someone who has given you so much pleasure might be a monster, you know?
