TheBlast.com is reporting that Bill Cosby was served vanilla pudding as dessert for his first meal in custody at the Montgomery County Jail as he awaits placement in a permanent penal facility. No word on whether it was Jell-O pudding. The response to his incarceration has been a mixed bag and was the subject of discussion on my appearance on the Isiah Factor last night. The panel included myself and three other Houstonians: (1) Willie D of the Houston hip-hop group the Geto Boyz who equated his sentence with the burgeoning racism in Trump’s America; (2) a University of Houston-Downtown professor who conflated Cosby with Kavanaugh and our President; and, finally (3), a “comedian” who forced her personal experience into the narrative by recounting a lurid email she once received from a comedy booker.
We are not all “victims.” A lurid email from a creep is not in same ballpark, Hell, the same universe as being the victim of a serial rapist who drugs then molests women who he was mentoring. Cosby was Bill Cosby. There was no shortage of women he could bed. It was not about sex it was about power and domination. To proclaim victimhood while discussing true victims is the ultimate narcissism.
The conflation of Kavanaugh and Cosby is disgusting. A vague claim of attempted groping from childhood coupled with an allegation of whipping it out while drunk at an undergraduate party is, again, not in same realm as a serial rapists with scores of victims who were actually sexually assaulted by a man after he rendered them helpless with prescription narcotics he surreptitiously slipped in their drinks. Cosby’s sentence has nothing to do with Trump’s alleged normalizing of rape. It is the end result of being a disgusting rapist.
Finally, my dear friend Willie D’s allegation that racism was the true motive for Cosby was the blight of racism in America is the most absurd position of the evening. Cosby was once one of the highest paid corporate endorsing and endearing spokesmen in the world. He was the highest paid television and comedic personality. America loved him. I loved him. He anchored the Thursday night of sitcoms on NBC throughout the 1980’s that I and most all of America set aside time every week to watch and discuss. The American cult of celebrity may be exemplified by our current President, but Cosby benefitted uniquely from said cult by being allowed to avoid responsibility and culpability and continue his crimes for decades without repercussion.
Cosby is in prison. Justice prevailed. Good riddance.