cosby show photo taken from eonline
I’ve known about these allegations for years. I’m not sure how many, but I’ve known. But now everyone is talking about it, and that’s a good thing. What Bill Cosby has done is terribly wrong. Yes, I believe that these women are telling the truth. Yes, I believe he must be held accountable. I want to make that perfectly clear before I say what comes next.
All over the internet right now are expressions of doubt. Why did they wait so long? Why did they keep quiet? Why did no one report what happened?
Because they knew they wouldn’t be taken seriously. And they were right.
I watched the Cosby Show as a kid, and I enjoyed it. It’s very funny. It still is funny, but as a grown person I watch it a little differently. I saw Bill Cosby do stand up when I was sixteen. I sat in front row, and I laughed.
Bill Cosby has donated an extraordinary amount of money to charity, given to colleges. There are buildings with his name carved into marble and concrete, museum art collections bearing his name on brass plaques.
These are good and decent things to do, even if a rapist did them.
Sometimes rapists give to charity.
Sometimes rapists tell good jokes.
Sometimes rapists love their families.
Sometimes rapists make good art.
We need to get rid of the idea of pure evil. It’s a fairy tale as comforting as the godmother with wings. We want to believe that evil people do nothing but twiddle their mustaches and do evil things.
I think horror movies are so popular because evil is instantly recognizable. He’s got a face like a bloody booger and knives for fingers. Once he is caught or killed, the rest of us are safe, and we haven’t lost anything.
More than anything, we need to believe that evil is somehow separate from us.
This is a damaging narrative. It allows people to continue to hurt other people. He’s so nice. He’s a prominent member of the community. He gives back.
So what?
A few months back a fairly prominent poet was caught with a substantial collection of child pornography. He has confessed, and he will be sentenced soon. Like Cosby, I believe this man should be punished for his crimes.
This whole affair caused quite the ripple in the literary community, and poets whom I call friends have worked closely with his man.
There was quite a bit of ranting and sounding off. I heard things like: I never liked him. I never really thought he was good. Well, someone thought he was good. He was a tenured professor at a private university.
People who were connected to him started to question themselves. I was friends with him. How could I not have known? He worked with me on my poetry. Does this tarnish my own work? Am I an idiot for not catching on?
People who commit crimes are usually aware that they’re punishable even if they can’t admit that it’s wrong. They get good at hiding stuff.
We can’t let this all become an issue of pride. If he was pure evil (no one is, haven’t you been listening?), we would have known. We would have sniffed him out. We would have rejected him from the start. Since we didn’t, it can’t be true.
Rape culture persists for many reasons. One of them is the inability to believe that someone we respected is capable of doing it. We believe our former respect makes us culpable so we reject the women who make the claims. It’s easier.
History ends up being sanitized, cleansed and historical figureheads reduced to 2-D caricatures of virtue because it’s easier. Look into Mother Theresa sometime. Or Gandhi. These were not perfect people. Time has made them figureheads of unattainable perfection because it makes us feel good. Problems and brokenness in society get brushed under the carpets because it’s easier.
Human beings are capable of absolutely awful things. Human beings are capable of heroic and decent things. Sometimes simultaneously. Evil is not separate from us. We can’t kill it with bug spray and a sophisticated mousetrap.
Like I said, I’ve known about Cosby for many years. I just didn’t want to know. I looked back on all the times I laughed and felt dirty. I couldn’t reconcile it so I ignored it. Most of us did.
Enjoying the Cosby Show does not make you a bad person, but ignoring these women does.
A Day Late, A Buck Short 