Tonight you will be performing in the city where I live, London, Ontario. When your show was first announced, my intention was to purchase tickets as a Christmas gift for my mother. However, when the stories of your past involvement with sexually assaulting teenage girls surfaced, my heart sank. Sadly, I decided to look for another gift for my mother. The fall of another hero.
Mr. Cosby, I don't think you are a monster. No... to me you are simply a human being who has made some dark choices.
You are the same human being who reinforced good morals and values within me as a child and a developing teenager. I watched every episode of "Fat Albert and The Cosby Kids" growing up and can still recall your face appearing on the television screen just at the right time to point out the dilemma of the day and to emphasize the importance of the impending choices to be made. Mr. Cosby, as a child you reminded me to stop and think, to connect my actions with their impact, and most importantly, to do the right thing– something Fat Albert realized was always easier said than done.
Mr. Cosby, just when I began the tumultuous journey into adolescence, you cast a safety net around me with the launch of "The Cosby Show". As a young, racially-mixed girl growing up in the Canadian border town of Sarnia, your creation was the only positive reflection of African Americans playing over the media airwaves at that time. As I struggled with my racial identity, the Huxtables reminded me there was nothing to struggle with. I didn't have to accept what MTV and the 5 o'clock news was telling me about my skin colour and my destiny. No, the Huxtables held the torch of excellence and high standards for me. They brilliantly managed to transcend race altogether. ...And the Huxtable women! They were strong, intelligent, classy female characters that I aspired to emulate. They gave me another perspective on being a woman and also informed my personal story.
I've always kept my eye on you, Mr. Cosby, to observe all of the good you were doing for the world. Your standards followed you where ever you went, as you refused to speak nothing but proper English, without the vulgarity and crudeness of most stand-up comedians. As an educator, you made me feel proud of my role and the privilege I had to teach the inner city children of Detroit. I was behind you when received backlash from the black community about your unorthodox way of communicating higher standards for black children:
They’re standing on the corner and they can’t speak English.
I can’t even talk the way these people talk:
Why you ain’t,
Where you is,
What he drive,
Where he stay,
Where he work,
Who you be…
And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk.
And then I heard the father talk.
Everybody knows it’s important to speak English except these knuckleheads. You can’t be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth.
In fact you will never get any kind of job making a decent living.
People marched and were hit in the face with rocks to get an Education, and now we’ve got these knuckleheads walking around.
The lower economic people are not holding up their end in this deal.
These people are not parenting. They are buying things for kids.
$500 sneakers for what?
And they won’t spend $200 for Hooked on Phonics.
I am talking about these people who cry when their son is standing there in an orange suit.
Where were you when he was 2?
Where were you when he was 12?
Where were you when he was 18 and how come you didn’t know that he had a pistol?
And where is the father? Or who is his father?
People putting their clothes on backward:
Isn’t that a sign of something gone wrong?
People with their hats on backward, pants down around the crack, isn’t that a sign of something?
Isn’t it a sign of something when she has her dress all the way up and got all type of needles [piercing] going through her body?
What part of Africa did this come from??
We are not Africans. Those people are not Africans; they don’t know a thing about Africa …..
I say this all of the time. It would be like white people saying they are European-American. That is totally stupid.
I was born here, and so were my parents and grand parents and, very likely my great grandparents. I don’t have any connection to Africa, no more than white Americans have to Germany , Scotland , England , Ireland , or the Netherlands . The same applies to 99 percent of all the black Americans as regards to Africa . So stop, already! ! !
With names like Shaniqua, Taliqua and Mohammed and all of that crap ……… And all of them are in jail.
Brown or black versus the Board of Education is no longer the white person’s problem.
We have got to take the neighborhood back.
People used to be ashamed. Today a woman has eight children with eight different ‘husbands’ — or men or whatever you call them now.
We have millionaire football players who cannot read.
We have million-dollar basketball players who can’t write two paragraphs. We, as black folks have to do a better job.
Someone working at Wal-Mart with seven kids, you are hurting us.
We have to start holding each other to a higher standard..
We cannot blame the white people any longer.’
~Dr.. William Henry ‘Bill’ Cosby, Jr., Ed..D.
I can’t even talk the way these people talk:
Why you ain’t,
Where you is,
What he drive,
Where he stay,
Where he work,
Who you be…
And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk.
And then I heard the father talk.
Everybody knows it’s important to speak English except these knuckleheads. You can’t be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth.
In fact you will never get any kind of job making a decent living.
People marched and were hit in the face with rocks to get an Education, and now we’ve got these knuckleheads walking around.
The lower economic people are not holding up their end in this deal.
These people are not parenting. They are buying things for kids.
$500 sneakers for what?
And they won’t spend $200 for Hooked on Phonics.
I am talking about these people who cry when their son is standing there in an orange suit.
Where were you when he was 2?
Where were you when he was 12?
Where were you when he was 18 and how come you didn’t know that he had a pistol?
And where is the father? Or who is his father?
People putting their clothes on backward:
Isn’t that a sign of something gone wrong?
People with their hats on backward, pants down around the crack, isn’t that a sign of something?
Isn’t it a sign of something when she has her dress all the way up and got all type of needles [piercing] going through her body?
What part of Africa did this come from??
We are not Africans. Those people are not Africans; they don’t know a thing about Africa …..
I say this all of the time. It would be like white people saying they are European-American. That is totally stupid.
I was born here, and so were my parents and grand parents and, very likely my great grandparents. I don’t have any connection to Africa, no more than white Americans have to Germany , Scotland , England , Ireland , or the Netherlands . The same applies to 99 percent of all the black Americans as regards to Africa . So stop, already! ! !
With names like Shaniqua, Taliqua and Mohammed and all of that crap ……… And all of them are in jail.
Brown or black versus the Board of Education is no longer the white person’s problem.
We have got to take the neighborhood back.
People used to be ashamed. Today a woman has eight children with eight different ‘husbands’ — or men or whatever you call them now.
We have millionaire football players who cannot read.
We have million-dollar basketball players who can’t write two paragraphs. We, as black folks have to do a better job.
Someone working at Wal-Mart with seven kids, you are hurting us.
We have to start holding each other to a higher standard..
We cannot blame the white people any longer.’
~Dr.. William Henry ‘Bill’ Cosby, Jr., Ed..D.
Can I negate the positive influence you have been in my life? Absolutely not. Thank you for sharing your light, your wisdom and higher vision. But it appears, there is some darkness you must also address. By doing so, you will not undo the good that you have done or will continue to do. Good can come from this, too, Mr. Cosby.
No human being can escape the universal law of cause and effect. The visible effects may not return to the owner in this lifetime, but it doesn't mean the effects are not there. The fact that the effects of your actions have returned to you while you still are alive is a blessing in disguise. You have an opportunity to right a wrong. All actions are witnessed: your consciousness and the consciousness of the now-grown-girls who have spoken have all witnessed the truth. When truths emerge out of darkness to meet, the waves either merge or crash into each other. If the truths merge, a new cause will be created. There will be healing; not just for the girls, but for all victims of sexual assault who have been suffering in silence. There will be healing for you as well, for only one's own suffering can cause him to exploit and harm another human being for his own pleasure. The nature and truth of that suffering will be for you to discover if you wish to turn your circumstances around. Of course, there are consequences to face; a falling out and a disintegration of the Bill Cosby that stands before us today, but on the other side of this disaster is peace for the victims and the emergence of man who has reconciled his wrong doings.
Please Mr. Cosby, I ask that you do the right thing, despite the difficulties that lie ahead in doing so. Speak the truth. Own it. Walk the fire of consequences and take the journey of a true hero, you can only become a better human being in doing so. Your story is not just about you and these girls. It's about the human race and the multitude of ways we abuse and hurt each other. You have been given a great opportunity to make the biggest impact you will ever make on this earth. Seize it with sincerity and humility. Truth is the only way.
I wish you all the courage in the world.
Much Peace,
Chantelle Diachina
