The answer lies deep within the text of Cosby's speech.

Blame Wal-Mart.  ;D ;D ;D

Where do you buy a pair of $500 sneakers?
???

Mr. Cosby sounds like he gets his talking points from the RNC.  This is sloganeering and stereotyping.  It does not address the roots of economic racism.  It doesn not even approach discussion of the true causes of poverty among blacks...or whites, or anybody else.  It's jus the old right-wing shuck of blaming and shaming.

I wish this was an urban legend, just like the last piece of racist bile Mr. Saver posted...but it's not.  Let's take the names game.  Blacks loved Mr. Cosby for forty years.  African-Americans watched his televison programs, bought his records, bought the Coca-Cola and Jell-o Pudding Pops he pedaled, and helped make Mr. Cosby a multi-multi-multi-millionaire.  He rewards them with this kind of hatred:
"With names like Shaniqua, Taliqua and Mohammed and all of that crap, and all of them are in jail."

a. It is only a tinyl percentage of the African-American population that is in jail.  Mr. Cosby knows this.  Ann Coulter made the same racist remark about Afrocentric-sounding names, "How many boys named Jamal are on death row?" I dunno Ann, how many boys named John are on death row?
b. Mohammed is one of the most (if not the most) common male-given name in the world.  What's "crap" about that?  Got a problem with Muslims too, Bill?
c. Mr. Cosby asserted about the same time last year that the Afrocentric names hurt the chances for success of the men and women who bear them.  Funny names is it?  There are lily-white youths in elite prep schools with names such as Piper, Dakota, Tapley-Ann, McKenzie, Tomato Joplin, and Riverchild.  They seem to do just fine in life.

Vulgarity, coarseness, and ignorance are not exclusive to "ghetto" culture.  The dull-minded, foul-mouthed, pornographic, and socially-retarded nature of white America would make your head spin.  I'm not talking about Jeff Foxworthy's white America.  I am talking about the white America of wealth and privilege.  Look at "Girls Gone Wild."  'That black, huh, Mr. Cosby?  Those bawling jocks downing vodka and those dizzy blondes flashing their breasts on Cancun spring break are not just like that on spring break.  It's a short trip from your Shelbourne Falls compound down to Amherst, Mr. Cosby. I invite you to come down any Friday night, I will show you white popular culture every bit as crass.  Talk to the same college students at 10:00 a.m.  You will find them wholely uninterested in intellectual pursuit and incurious about the world around them.  Our president, George W. Bush, for whom you voted, Mr. Cosby, is a prime example.  It's nothing new.  However, it has gotten much worse, as has black popular culture, in the past couple of decades.  Yet somehow these same white kids go on to climb the corporate ranks, buy big suburban homes, and raise their 2.5 kids.  Why is that, Mr Cosby?
http://www.inthe00s.com/smile/07/nixweiss.gif

Of course Cosby's opinion as a black man does not count for anything.  I mean, after all, he came up in the ghettos and worked his way to the top.  Clearly this means he is right wing, a sell out, an "Oreo" if you will.  Shame on him for having a viewpoint.  Just because he made it out of the ghetto and worked to get an education does not give him the right to opine about these matters.  It is obvious to everybody.

Bill should be held up as the enemy, as he strongly believes in personal accountability (despite of course a few peccadillos), the value of education, and the need to pull yourself up, as well as the basic civil rights that he has supported over the years.

I certainly hope that Bill as an educated, successful black man learns that he still has to express the stereotyped political position that is expected of him.

I think all Americans are stupid and deserve to be eaten by the bastard child of a 26-headed hydra and Joan Rivers. As are all French (dirty, pompous...), Germans (too efficient for my taste), Israelis (honey, they're goyim at heart, obsessed with war), Chinese, Japanese, Zimbabweans, Lithuanians, Latvians, Moroccans, Moldovans, Swiss, Cameroonians, Pakistanis, Tobagans, and Bolivians. I believe in death; it is my primary religion. I believe in murder, crime, chaos, and apple pie.

I also happen to think nobody is right. White culture and black culture are very stupid at this point. Young people are no stupider than their parents, who are giant sell-outs. We need a massive stupidity cleansing program involving stupid farms where Americans are sent to be de-programmed of fratboy binge drinking and violent rap music. Or else, like Rome, we shall burn in our own accumulated vomit and blood, our slaves taking over and drinking and reconfiguring our culture.

Ah, America! Ye are like a great tree, plugged and bricked, masturbating with its branches, and with a belly-button job for the hole in its center, where a bald Republican owl lives. I want to slap George W. Bush and 50 Cent with a giant piece of rancid steak and some starving children. Where's your policy and bling bling now? I wish I were born 80 years earlier.

Where do you buy a pair of $500 sneakers?
???

Mr. Cosby sounds like he gets his talking points from the RNC.  This is sloganeering and stereotyping.  It does not address the roots of economic racism.  It doesn not even approach discussion of the true causes of poverty among blacks...or whites, or anybody else.  It's jus the old right-wing shuck of blaming and shaming.

I wish this was an urban legend, just like the last piece of racist bile Mr. Saver posted...but it's not.  Let's take the names game.   Blacks loved Mr. Cosby for forty years.  African-Americans watched his televison programs, bought his records, bought the Coca-Cola and Jell-o Pudding Pops he pedaled, and helped make Mr. Cosby a multi-multi-multi-millionaire.  He rewards them with this kind of hatred:
"With names like Shaniqua, Taliqua and Mohammed and all of that crap, and all of them are in jail."

a. It is only a tinyl percentage of the African-American population that is in jail.  Mr. Cosby knows this.  Ann Coulter made the same racist remark about Afrocentric-sounding names, "How many boys named Jamal are on death row?" I dunno Ann, how many boys named John are on death row?
b. Mohammed is one of the most (if not the most) common male-given name in the world.  What's "crap" about that?  Got a problem with Muslims too, Bill?
c. Mr. Cosby asserted about the same time last year that the Afrocentric names hurt the chances for success of the men and women who bear them.  Funny names is it?  There are lily-white youths in elite prep schools with names such as Piper, Dakota, Tapley-Ann, McKenzie, Tomato Joplin, and Riverchild.  They seem to do just fine in life.

Vulgarity, coarseness, and ignorance are not exclusive to "ghetto" culture.  The dull-minded, foul-mouthed, pornographic, and socially-retarded nature of white America would make your head spin.  I'm not talking about Jeff Foxworthy's white America.  I am talking about the white America of wealth and privilege.  Look at "Girls Gone Wild."  'That black, huh, Mr. Cosby?  Those bawling jocks downing vodka and those dizzy blondes flashing their breasts on Cancun spring break are not just like that on spring break.  It's a short trip from your Shelbourne Falls compound down to Amherst, Mr. Cosby. I invite you to come down any Friday night, I will show you white popular culture every bit as crass.  Talk to the same college students at 10:00 a.m.  You will find them wholely uninterested in intellectual pursuit and incurious about the world around them.  Our president, George W. Bush, for whom you voted, Mr. Cosby, is a prime example.  It's nothing new.  However, it has gotten much worse, as has black popular culture, in the past couple of decades.  Yet somehow these same white kids go on to climb the corporate ranks, buy big suburban homes, and raise their 2.5 kids.  Why is that, Mr Cosby?
http://www.inthe00s.com/smile/07/nixweiss.gif



He tends to overgeneralize an entire group of people, which is quite unfortunate. As he preaches, he tends to forget the things he's done (e.g. extramarital affairs). Quite frankly, Mr. Cosby has some things he needs to address as well.


Of course Cosby's opinion as a black man does not count for anything.  I mean, after all, he came up in the ghettos and worked his way to the top.  Clearly this means he is right wing, a sell out, an "Oreo" if you will.  Shame on him for having a viewpoint.  Just because he made it out of the ghetto and worked to get an education does not give him the right to opine about these matters.  It is obvious to everybody.

Bill should be held up as the enemy, as he strongly believes in personal accountability (despite of course a few peccadillos), the value of education, and the need to pull yourself up, as well as the basic civil rights that he has supported over the years.

I certainly hope that Bill as an educated, successful black man learns that he still has to express the stereotyped political position that is expected of him.


He has a right to his opinion, no doubt. But he also should help those who cannot make it to college (as he tends to do). I came from the same area (North Philly) that he was born and raised. He's hardly there, except to speak at the commencements of Temple (which included mine).

Of course Cosby's opinion as a black man does not count for anything.  I mean, after all, he came up in the ghettos and worked his way to the top.  Clearly this means he is right wing, a sell out, an "Oreo" if you will.  Shame on him for having a viewpoint.  Just because he made it out of the ghetto and worked to get an education does not give him the right to opine about these matters.  It is obvious to everybody.

Bill should be held up as the enemy, as he strongly believes in personal accountability (despite of course a few peccadillos), the value of education, and the need to pull yourself up, as well as the basic civil rights that he has supported over the years.

I certainly hope that Bill as an educated, successful black man learns that he still has to express the stereotyped political position that is expected of him.

No, no, no, no, and no again.

The Right still suffers from the old Horatio Alger delusion.  You cannot replace all factors of sociology, history, economics, and culture with one man's personal narrative.  The Right uses success stories such as Bill Cosby's not as inspiration, but as justification of p*ss-poor social policies. 
It's like saying because Einstein was a German Jew, all German Jews can become great physicists--if they'd only just apply themselves a little more!

I don't dismiss all of Cosby's points.  I think he does care.  He is angry about the state affairs in black communities.  Again the problem is the shame and blame speech.  His rhetoric is counterproductive.  It bolsters white prejudice and insults black people. There is a a worldwide myth that shame is a positive force for social change.  It isn't and it never will be.  Cosby is a highly educated and thoughtful man.  I was shocked at the tone he took.  He's smart enough to know better. 

I don't think Mr. Cosby is an "Oreo cookie" because puts down poor black people.  We are often hurtful to the ones we love and to the ones with whom we identify.  Critics such as Michael Eric Dyson and Jesse Jackson understood this, but the media just dismisses them as apologists for the bad things black people do.  Cosby is right.  It does a black youth no good to always blame the white man.  His critics are right too.  There is such a thing as racism and reasons other than lack of "personal responsibility" why blacks have a harder time succeeding than whites.

I think all Americans are stupid and deserve to be eaten by the bastard child of a 26-headed hydra and Joan Rivers. As are all French (dirty, pompous...), Germans (too efficient for my taste), Israelis (honey, they're goyim at heart, obsessed with war), Chinese, Japanese, Zimbabweans, Lithuanians, Latvians, Moroccans, Moldovans, Swiss, Cameroonians, Pakistanis, Tobagans, and Bolivians. I believe in death; it is my primary religion. I believe in murder, crime, chaos, and apple pie.

I also happen to think nobody is right. White culture and black culture are very stupid at this point. Young people are no stupider than their parents, who are giant sell-outs. We need a massive stupidity cleansing program involving stupid farms where Americans are sent to be de-programmed of fratboy binge drinking and violent rap music. Or else, like Rome, we shall burn in our own accumulated vomit and blood, our slaves taking over and drinking and reconfiguring our culture.

Ah, America! Ye are like a great tree, plugged and bricked, masturbating with its branches, and with a belly-button job for the hole in its center, where a bald Republican owl lives. I want to slap George W. Bush and 50 Cent with a giant piece of rancid steak and some starving children. Where's your policy and bling bling now? I wish I were born 80 years earlier.


Actually my Dad was born 80 years earlier and he had to put up with WW1, WW2, the depression, and so on.

Life sux no matter when you're born.  :-\\

I think all Americans are stupid and deserve to be eaten by the bastard child of a 26-headed hydra and Joan Rivers. As are all French (dirty, pompous...), Germans (too efficient for my taste), Israelis (honey, they're goyim at heart, obsessed with war), Chinese, Japanese, Zimbabweans, Lithuanians, Latvians, Moroccans, Moldovans, Swiss, Cameroonians, Pakistanis, Tobagans, and Bolivians. I believe in death; it is my primary religion. I believe in murder, crime, chaos, and apple pie.

I also happen to think nobody is right. White culture and black culture are very stupid at this point. Young people are no stupider than their parents, who are giant sell-outs. We need a massive stupidity cleansing program involving stupid farms where Americans are sent to be de-programmed of fratboy binge drinking and violent rap music. Or else, like Rome, we shall burn in our own accumulated vomit and blood, our slaves taking over and drinking and reconfiguring our culture.

Ah, America! Ye are like a great tree, plugged and bricked, masturbating with its branches, and with a belly-button job for the hole in its center, where a bald Republican owl lives. I want to slap George W. Bush and 50 Cent with a giant piece of rancid steak and some starving children. Where's your policy and bling bling now? I wish I were born 80 years earlier.




I can't tell if this is someone else's crap you copy/pasted or if this is your own.

Actually my Dad was born 80 years earlier and he had to put up with WW1, WW2, the depression, and so on.

Life sux no matter when you're born.   :-\\


so did my great-grandparents - only they had to do with the added thing called black skin.

Life doesn't suck. It's those that make life harder for others when they are trying to survive.

I can't tell if this is someone else's crap you copy/pasted or if this is your own.

Well, I agree with Herman. (...and I'd like a little of whatever he's been smoking!)

Well, I agree with Herman. (...and I'd like a little of whatever he's been smoking!)



The opening line should be clue enough that whoever came up with that was full of it when they wrote it.

The opening line should be clue enough that whoever came up with that was full of it when they wrote it.


http://forums.offtopic.com/images/smilies/hsugh.gif

Thats called "tongue-in-cheek".

http://forums.offtopic.com/images/smilies/hsugh.gif

Thats called "tongue-in-cheek".



Isn't tounge-in-cheek supposed to be somewhat funny? 

Isn't tounge-in-cheek supposed to be somewhat funny? 


Actually, I thought it was kinda funny. http://forums.offtopic.com/images/smilies/dunno.gif

Actually, I thought it was kinda funny. http://forums.offtopic.com/images/smilies/dunno.gif



Oh yeah, this ----> "I think all Americans are stupid and deserve to be eaten by the bastard child of a 26-headed hydra and Joan Rivers." = HILARIOUS. 


We obviously don't have the same kind of sense of humor.

Oh yeah, this ----> "I think all Americans are stupid and deserve to be eaten by the bastard child of a 26-headed hydra and Joan Rivers." = HILARIOUS. 


We obviously don't have the same kind of sense of humor.


I think the fact that you would take a statement that ridiculous in a completely non-humorous way shows you're lacking humor here...

a. It is only a tinyl percentage of the African-American population that is in jail.  Mr. Cosby knows this.  Ann Coulter made the same racist remark about Afrocentric-sounding names, "How many boys named Jamal are on death row?" I dunno Ann, how many boys named John are on death row?
b. Mohammed is one of the most (if not the most) common male-given name in the world.  What's "crap" about that?  Got a problem with Muslims too, Bill?
c. Mr. Cosby asserted about the same time last year that the Afrocentric names hurt the chances for success of the men and women who bear them.  Funny names is it?  There are lily-white youths in elite prep schools with names such as Piper, Dakota, Tapley-Ann, McKenzie, Tomato Joplin, and Riverchild.  They seem to do just fine in life.


A. Where are you getting your facts?
B. african americans arent musslims.
c. it's true. which name do you find more appealing? anthony or ANFORNEY???  how about salleem or raheem? or how about jaquez?

good for bill cosby. every race has it's flaws. at least he's admitting to his.

I think the fact that you would take a statement that ridiculous in a completely non-humorous way shows you're lacking humor here...



Just because I don't find the same things you do funny, doesn't mean I don't have a sense of humor.  It means we find different things funny.  I didn't see the humor in that statement.  I just thought it was stupid.

A. Where are you getting your facts?
B. african americans arent musslims.
c. it's true. which name do you find more appealing? anthony or ANFORNEY???  how about salleem or raheem? or how about jaquez?

good for bill cosby. every race has it's flaws. at least he's admitting to his.


Check your spelling and punctuation, son.

This is just general knowledge.  I would have to research what the exact percentage of African-Americans in prison as of 2006.  Remember, African-Americans and prison is a controversial topic.  There are more blacks in prison proportional to their percentage of the general population than whites.  Conservatives like to say (duh) that's because they commit more crimes.  Liberals, and I consider myself one, say it's more complex.  African-Americans are less likely to be able to afford competent legal representation, for instance.
http://www.doc.state.ok.us/DOCS/OCJRC/OCJRC94/940650k.htm
I'd rather not dwell on that.  I'm not even sure if Cosby was referring to the African-American population as a whole, or just blacks with certain first names! There's also a difference between "jail" and "prison."  "Jail" is used colloquially to refer to any form of incarceration, but statistics parse "county jail" from "state prison" and so forth.  Cosby's statement about how "It's all crap and they're all in jail" doesn't sound like a man with an advanced degree in education.  It sounds like Archie Bunker after he's had a few!

Some African-Americans are indeed Muslims.  This again is controversial.  Wallace Fard Muhammad  founded the "Nation of Islam" in 1930, but it didn't really become popular with black Americans until the 1960s as introduced by Malcolm X.  Thus most African-American men named Mohammed are young to middle-aged.  But what does it matter?  Do you have to be Jewish in order to be named Joshua?  Come on.

My point about names was this--why should it matter what African-Americans want to name their children?  It doesn't seem to bother anybody when whites name their kids unconventional names.  I've heard people say, "Well, black kids can't afford to go into the world with those ghetto names."  Isn't that the problem?  Doesn't that make economic inequality and race prejudice the problem, not what syllables black parents find euphonious?

The way Cosby was speaking did not sound like he considered the rest of black America "his race," but a race that had become alien to him.  The message didn't come across as, "All races have faults.  Blacks have faults.  I'm a black man, and I have faults."  It sounded more like, "I'm a shining paragon of success...and you suck."  I don't think Cosby intended his words to sound so arrogant, but when we speak out of anger, the results are hurtful.

PS.  I think a lot of this "race" business is a lot of horsepucky scientifically speaking, and the more we find out about the human genome, the more apparent this becomes.

PS.  I think a lot of this "race" business is a lot of horsepucky scientifically speaking, and the more we find out about the human genome, the more apparent this becomes.

I agree, Max.  Hell, don't we have about 98% the same DNA as chimpanzees? If thats true than the difference between races of homo sapiens has got to be almost nothing genetically speaking.

I agree, Max.  Hell, don't we have about 98% the same DNA as chimpanzees? If thats true than the difference between races of homo sapiens has got to be almost nothing genetically speaking.

As one British geneticist put it, "we share half of our genes with the banana" (banana-sapiens?)

I don't think our emphasis on differences in appearance will go away as long as we remain a visually-oriented species.  Thus, I think it is vital to emphasize how utterly wrong the eugenicists of yore were, especially about the black vs. white question.  The racism injected into our culture over hundreds of years dies hard. 

Check your spelling and punctuation, son.

This is just general knowledge.  I would have to research what the exact percentage of African-Americans in prison as of 2006.  Remember, African-Americans and prison is a controversial topic.  There are more blacks in prison proportional to their percentage of the general population than whites.  Conservatives like to say (duh) that's because they commit more crimes.  Liberals, and I consider myself one, say it's more complex.  African-Americans are less likely to be able to afford competent legal representation, for instance.
http://www.doc.state.ok.us/DOCS/OCJRC/OCJRC94/940650k.htm
I'd rather not dwell on that.  I'm not even sure if Cosby was referring to the African-American population as a whole, or just blacks with certain first names! There's also a difference between "jail" and "prison."  "Jail" is used colloquially to refer to any form of incarceration, but statistics parse "county jail" from "state prison" and so forth.  Cosby's statement about how "It's all crap and they're all in jail" doesn't sound like a man with an advanced degree in education.  It sounds like Archie Bunker after he's had a few!

Some African-Americans are indeed Muslims.  This again is controversial.  Wallace Fard Muhammad  founded the "Nation of Islam" in 1930, but it didn't really become popular with black Americans until the 1960s as introduced by Malcolm X.  Thus most African-American men named Mohammed are young to middle-aged.  But what does it matter?  Do you have to be Jewish in order to be named Joshua?  Come on.

My point about names was this--why should it matter what African-Americans want to name their children?  It doesn't seem to bother anybody when whites name their kids unconventional names.  I've heard people say, "Well, black kids can't afford to go into the world with those ghetto names."  Isn't that the problem?  Doesn't that make economic inequality and race prejudice the problem, not what syllables black parents find euphonious?

The way Cosby was speaking did not sound like he considered the rest of black America "his race," but a race that had become alien to him.  The message didn't come across as, "All races have faults.  Blacks have faults.  I'm a black man, and I have faults."  It sounded more like, "I'm a shining paragon of success...and you suck."  I don't think Cosby intended his words to sound so arrogant, but when we speak out of anger, the results are hurtful.

PS.  I think a lot of this "race" business is a lot of horsepucky scientifically speaking, and the more we find out about the human genome, the more apparent this becomes.


Consider the detailed information attached excerpt of radio show host Larry Elder(Los Angeles/nationally syndicated),responding to an LA Times article of Earl Hutchinson which did not give fair debate from David Horowitz about comments on 'black' crime figures. Here's some of what it's about out there:

according to the FBI Uniform Crime Reports for 1993, blacks (who comprise 12% of the population) accounted for 57.6% of the arrests for murder and non-negligent manslaughter; 41.3% of the arrests for forcible rape; and 62.1% of the arrests for robbery. Altogether, blacks accounted for 45.7% of the arrests for violent crime (murder, forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault).

Actually, it's much worse. Most of the crime is committed by black men, approximately 6% of the population. Furthermore, most of the crime is committed by young black men, approximately 3% of the population. Rarely have so few done so much to so many.

As for the fact that most drug users and abusers are white, and that most of the poor are non-black, well, duh. Seven times more, remember? But ,while 12% of the population, blacks comprise 40% of welfare recipients, and 50% of the prison population.

Which brings us to another brain-dead Hutchinson assertion: "The prisons are increasingly jammed with poor, young blacks due to Draconian drug laws that target African-Americans." What? When federal and state legislators around the country drafted anti-drug laws, they slipped into the back room and said, "Hey, what can we do to nail the brothers?" While I happen to believe that the war on drugs is stupid and should be called off, there is a simple way to avoid going to jail. Don't deal.

Hutchinson falsely asserts that "the U. S. Sentencing Commission pointed to the blatant inequality in the criminal justice system when it recommended that the harsh sentences handed out for drug possession to black offenders, and light sentences given to white offenders be modified 'or equalized.'" No, they didn't. They focused on the unequal punishments given to those busted for powder cocaine versus crack cocaine. The rationale behind the differences is simple: Reduce the violence attendant to the crack cocaine trade. Victims of this trade, by the way, are usually fellow black residents of the inner city. (But who cares about that.) You may quarrel with the reasoning, but it is most certainly not racist.

In fact, in 1986 Reverend Jesse Jackson and black New York Congressman Charles Rangel held a press conference urging the government to do something about the crack epidemic. Rangel himself voted to impose harsher sentences for crack offenders.

Besides, according to a Wall Street Journal article by Wayne Roques, a retired DEA agent, in 1995, the total number of federal prisoners behind bars for crack was 3,771, out of a total of 100,000 federal prisoners. Of the 6,015 federal prisoners for marijuana, how many were black? 442. (Obviously, racism against non-blacks.) Other crimes where white arrests vastly exceed blacks include busts for drunk driving, prostitution, and LSD. (Yet, more racism...)

Hutchinson said President Clinton agreed with the Commission to equalize sentences for crack and powder violations. No, Clinton didn't. On October 27, 1995, the "L. A. Times" carried a front-page article with the following heading: "Clinton to Sign Bill Preserving Stiff Crack Rules." (Guess Hutchinson's paper boy called in sick that day.)

Hutchinson tells us that 1/6 of California's black youth have records, diminishing their job prospects. Shocking! You mean, once somebody has a criminal record, employers are less likely to hire them? Horrors! What will those dastardly employers think of next!

As to Hutchinson's implied charge of "blatant inequality in the criminal justice system," "Investors Business Daily" reports that in all but two of the fourteen categories of crime, blacks are more likely to have their cases dismissed and more likely to be found not guilty than whites. (The two exceptions? Traffic offenses and miscellaneous felonies, which make up 1.4% of the sample.) Furthermore, careful analysis of the death penalty shows that whites are more likely to get it, and that whites outnumber blacks on death row, even though blacks account for nearly half of the nation's annual 30,000 homicides.

Hutchinson also trots out the catch-all liberal saw, that the media creates a "perception" that blacks are "inherently violent and prone to crime."

Hutchinson made this point repeatedly in his wrong and wrong-headed book, "The Assassination of the Black Male Image." In fact, the media leans over backwards to avoid the perception that it is racist, and studies show that blacks are more likely on television to be portrayed as doctors, lawyers, or managers than is the case in real life, and is less likely to be portrayed as common street thugs than is the case in reality.

An exhaustive series by the "L. A. Times" shows that this newspaper covers but a small fraction of urban crime compared to suburban crime. The newspaper, like most, under-reports black and urban crime.

Hutchinson remains in denial, but honest blacks are not. In their book, "Scar of Race," authors Paul Schneiderman and Thomas Piazza note that blacks are more likely than whites to say yes to the following statements: Blacks are aggressive or violent; blacks are boastful; blacks are complaining; blacks are lazy; and blacks are irresponsible. They write, "Plainly, large numbers of whites are perfectly willing to express frankly negative evaluations of blacks...but the national study adds a new element altogether. In every case, blacks are at least as likely as whites to hold a negative view of blacks."

Need more info, see Larry's web and search for the complete challenge.

Some African-Americans are indeed Muslims.  This again is controversial.  Wallace Fard Muhammad  founded the "Nation of Islam" in 1930, but it didn't really become popular with black Americans until the 1960s as introduced by Malcolm X.  Thus most African-American men named Mohammed are young to middle-aged.  But what does it matter?  Do you have to be Jewish in order to be named Joshua?  Come on.

The way Cosby was speaking did not sound like he considered the rest of black America "his race," but a race that had become alien to him.  The message didn't come across as, "All races have faults.  Blacks have faults.  I'm a black man, and I have faults."  It sounded more like, "I'm a shining paragon of success...and you suck."  I don't think Cosby intended his words to sound so arrogant, but when we speak out of anger, the results are hurtful.



1.  I think you will find that the practices of the Nation of Islam (official name, "The Lost-Found Nation of Islam in the West") are quite incompatible with "official" (Shiia or Sunni) Islam which is why nearly all mainstream Islamic bodies have rejected the NOI as outcasts.  The NOI started as a black independence movement that chose "Islam" as its religion because somehow Islam is supposed to be an African religion.  Cheif amongst their differences with other Islamic sects is that they believe that God came to earth in the person of Wallace Fard back in '30.  The NOI has, howevere, gotten alot of young black men off of drugs and that's to their credit.  But the rest of their teachings are openly and vociferously racist.

2.  Cosby was not talking about "his race".  He was talking about those elements that show gross disregard of accounatbility and who celebrate bad english, irresponsibility, dropping out of school, and immorality as a "culture".  I do not think you would hear him apply his statement to, for example, Harry Belefonte, Shari Belefonte-Harper, Condi Rice, Malcolm Jamal-Warner, and countless other persons of color who worked hard and succeeded.  A RACIST would say that about all blacks.

1.  I think you will find that the practices of the Nation of Islam (official name, "The Lost-Found Nation of Islam in the West") are quite incompatible with "official" (Shiia or Sunni) Islam which is why nearly all mainstream Islamic bodies have rejected the NOI as outcasts.  The NOI started as a black independence movement that chose "Islam" as its religion because somehow Islam is supposed to be an African religion.  Cheif amongst their differences with other Islamic sects is that they believe that God came to earth in the person of Wallace Fard back in '30.  The NOI has, howevere, gotten alot of young black men off of drugs and that's to their credit.  But the rest of their teachings are openly and vociferously racist.


All of that about the Nation of Islam is true except you have to consider this- they make up a very small minority of African-American Muslims(as do the Five Percenters and other similar groups).  The vast majority of today's African-American Muslims are orthodox, Sunni Muslims.  Elijah Mohammed's son, Warith Deen Mohammed, is widely known for bringing the original Nation of Islam into the Sunni fold. Farrakhan's group split off later and re-formed the Nation with it's original beliefs.

Here's the link to his wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warith_Deen_Muhammad

Mr. Saver mentions Larry Elder and David Horowitz in his first paragraph.  There a few times when it is appropriate to dismiss a premise without considering the entire statement.  Larry Elder and David Horowitz?  It's like saying, "according Mein Kampf..."
Horowitz is Jewish, of course, but the far right Jewish Americans have joined forces with the white supremicists.  This goes hand-in-hand with LB's statment that Cosby was not talking about all blacks.

See, the racism in Nazi Germany and Apartheid South Africa was unalloyed.  The racism in contemporary America is weighted with classism.  In other words if you are Black, Latin, Jewish, Asian, and yes, even Arab, and you are rich and live like a white Republican, then you are just dandy.  Mr. Cosby was blurring both race and class is in his rant.

The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., talked about race in America for over a decade and managed to evade a lynching.  He talked about class in America for about two months, and got shot dead!  You're still not supposed to talk about class in our media unless it is in conjunction with either of these phrases: "middle class," or "class envy."

Yeah, I know some Muslims don't consider NOI Muslims real Muslims.  Some Muslims say anybody who has not read the Koran in Arabic cannot be a real Muslim.  There are all sorts of things to fight over.  The contention over who's a real Muslim is not confined to NOI.  It's worldwide and it's been going on for centuries.  It has caused war after war and millions of deaths.  There are a few kinks mankind has yet to work out with organized religion!
I don't like the racism of NOI, but I think I understand how it came to be!

SM...

I myself wrote that. I was cooped up taking like 20 pages of notes about the robber barons and their horrible abuses of labor and their theories of "vertical integration"/"horizontal integration" and the "Gospel of Wealth", and the way the late 19th century parrots the terrible changes that have been going on since the Reagan Administration. The belief that the wealthy will trickle down their wealth into the public, while only a few do (this was Andrew Carnegie's idea.) The way skilled industrial workers were turned into machines. The mistaken belief of the small businessman, choked in debt, that he too could succeed. Actually, Horatio Alger's books were re-edited after his death. He himself was conflicted about industrialization and poverty, and believed you needed luck and morality, other than hard work, in order to succeed. His books were meant to educate the middle-class about the poor. He was also a closeted gay man.

I'm not getting into a fight with you, SM, or hijacking this thread for a fight. The purpose of my post was, WE'RE ALL STUPID. WHY CAN'T WE ALL JUST GET ALONG? It was totally meant to be humorous...and a joke. It was tongue-in-cheek.

A great case in point would be my great-grandfather, Ernst M. He was born in Germany, and was a German patriot who, of course, hated the French and Russians and all other of Germany's enemies in WWI, and was injured at Verdun, which he was very proud of. Being a German Jew, he saw himself as superior to all other Jews, particularly the "Ostjuden" who form the majority of the Ashkenazi Jewish population, the people from E. Europe who spoke Yiddish or are descended from those who spoke Yiddish, today forming the majority of Jews worldwide. 3.3 million of 'em lived in Poland prior to WWII, 3 million of whom died (that's right, kiddies! Half of the 6 million were Poles.)  He was never himself much of a success-a piano store owner and social worker, with blonde hair and blue eyes that were his pride. His sense of German identity and German pride and superiority was destroyed in the 1930s, and he left the country for Portugal and then England in 1939, where my grandmother was a refugee. He became a masseur. And, he was disappointed when my grandmother married my grandfather, Robert L., a Jew of POLISH descent! More successful than he or anyone in his family had ever been, a lawyer with a Yale degree who was 2nd in the NY state Regents exams for 1936 and a Yale grad! He was disappointed, because, obviously, that his daughter was marrying an Ostjuden destroyed his last German Jewish superiority and bigotry! And a Holocaust survivor! Yep, that's right!

There is so much to answer to in this post.  My attention span and temper can't begin.  On some things I do agree and on others i don't.  What does bug me is the whole name thing.  There are so many parallels to the african-american experience and Irish experience that people tend to ignore.  When the Irish first came to the USA their names were considered abhorrent to "civilized" ears.  Many upon going to work who went to work found that their employers forced them to answer to to English names; Bridget to Mary, Umer to Jane, Assumpta to Alice, Padraig became Patrick, Sean became John, add infinatum.  I admit that I sometimes wonder at the names, but I see them in a bigger context and bristle when people believe the names should be brought into line.

There are more parallels that can be drawn in the Irish American and African American experience, including the question of crime(who gets arrested and goes to jail, and why) but y'know, I'm just a bit sick and tired of it. 

There is so much to answer to in this post.  My attention span and temper can't begin.  On some things I do agree and on others i don't.  What does bug me is the whole name thing.  There are so many parallels to the african-american experience and Irish experience that people tend to ignore.  When the Irish first came to the USA their names were considered abhorrent to "civilized" ears.  Many upon going to work who went to work found that their employers forced them to answer to to English names; Bridget to Mary, Umer to Jane, Assumpta to Alice, Padraig became Patrick, Sean became John, add infinatum.  I admit that I sometimes wonder at the names, but I see them in a bigger context and bristle when people believe the names should be brought into line.

There are more parallels that can be drawn in the Irish American and African American experience, including the question of crime(who gets arrested and goes to jail, and why) but y'know, I'm just a bit sick and tired of it. 


My book on "Ethnicity in America" said that the Irish filled the same sociological position in the mid-19th century through the 1880s as the blacks were forced to fill in the mid-20th century during the Great Migration. 

My book on "Ethnicity in America" said that the Irish filled the same sociological position in the mid-19th century through the 1880s as the blacks were forced to fill in the mid-20th century during the Great Migration. 


Try "How the Irish Became White" by Noel Ignatiev.  That is a good one.  There are many parallels in the treatment of Irish American and African American.  The reason police wagons were called "paddy wagons" was because "paddy" was rude slang for Irish, and the police wagons were always filled with Irish.  For quite a while the African Americans and Irish worked together, but there came a breach after the mass migration during the so-called "Irish famine"(which was not a famine at all) and post abolition fight for jobs.  It is a very interesting history.

because "paddy" was rude slang for Irish


This is a reason I hate when people refer to St. Patricks Day as Paddy's day or St. Paddy's Day.
It's a derogatory term that seems to very much acceptable in todays society. It is Okay to use
stereotypes, so long as the group being stereotyped is the Irish. In an episode of "The New
Adventures Of Old Christine"  Christine, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Was throwing an Irish themed party
for her son. When her son asked, "Can we pee in the sink?" Christine's answer," It's an Irish party,
what do you think." The network wouldn't dare use another ethnicity for their "toilet humor"
but because it's Irish, it's Okay. Neighborhood bars, Irish bars included, advertise St. Patricks Day
by saying "Come In And Get Your Irish On" are we to assume all Irish are drunks or to celebrate
the feast day of St. Patrick you must drink. See, The media, The networks and commercial establishments
its all right to dump on the Irish, they won't care.

It's something that many Irish perpetuate, though.  I'm not saying that makes it okay, but it's not as if the Irish are innocent of partaking in that which you described.  My dearest friend on this planet is Irish Catholic and every March 17th, she goes out with her friends, dresses in green from head to toe and proceeds to get sh*tfaced.  Is that was St. Patrick's Day is about?  Of course not.  However, much like other feast days/holidays, St. Patrick's Day has become more of a cultural thing in this country than a day with actual historical roots and values.  She went to Ireland a few years ago for St. Patrick's Day and what you see in NYC is what you see in Dublin.  Advertisements for all you can drink specials, "St. Paddy's Day" decorations, the whole nine. 

It's difficult to eliminate stereotypes when the people being stereotyped do nothing to stop it.