two women renew Bill Cosby sexual abuse allegations in Newsweek interviews

and it's worth recognizing that an otherwise saintly person can have terrible traits and v-v

― mookieproof, Monday, November 17, 2014 2:27 AM (16 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

which is part of why broke people get arrested for spitting on the sidewalk and the rich can practically murder someone before anyone cares. wealth and social success are seen as moral successes, or at least moral karma

― jenny holzer, ilxor (mh), Monday, November 17, 2014 2:32 AM (16 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

these are so otm and i feel like a key reason it feels like an uphill struggle in specific cases like this, or even in a wider "take sexual assault victims seriously when the perpetrator had more power and higher status than them", is because of how deeply entrenched these huge myths are

While we've obviously entered a whole different realm, it's been quite a while since Cosby's public persona was "saintly," I think? Eddie Murphy was telling him to STFU in the mid '80s and as in that Philly mag article above, Michael Eric Dyson and many others grew sick of his self-appointed moral arbiter status.

ime liberal whites eat the moral arbiter stuff up.

liberal whites are the ones pointing and screaming "it's the culture"?

well no obviously it's conservatives' entire thing. i meant that in addition to those guys i've talked to some people who'd steer clear of, say, charles murray, but will say that cosby is tough-loving.

Cosby, Belafonte -- hard to knock those guys for speaking as leaders. I mean, easy to knock Cosby now for it, but still.

POTUS has made similar arguments

welp
http://www.mediaite.com/online/listen-to-bill-cosbys-1969-stand-up-bit-about-drugging-womens-drinks/

I totally remember that bit, because it was the first time I heard about spanish fly and as an elementary school kid I was like wtf

...yeah, it did cross my mind that, despite the 'kid-friendly' side of his career in his 30s, he was also did Playboy After Dark etc.

The anecdotes told in the routine are likely not fully based on reality and instead used to serve the comedic scenario, but in light of the fact that drugs are believed to have been used in the alleged assaults, the bit takes on disturbing meaning all these years later.

Publishing "Isn't it weird/funny that this sounds like rape" is pretty much just telling a rape joke via hypertext

no it isn't.

"pretty much"

"disturbing" != "weird/funny"

Yes, da croupier, this Death + Taxes post really does have the somber tone of a writer who was disturbed to his very marrow and post this heartbreaking comedy routine with nothing but sincerest empathy for women

Props to self-proclaimed “crap archivist” Alan Scherstuhl for digging this one up:

On the album, forebodingly titled “It’s True! It’s True!,”

Listen to the clip and tell me if you think the Cos is regretting this one about now

sorry i thought you were responding to the link you quoted

Well the link i quoted has this

The anecdotes told in the routine are likely not fully based on reality and instead used to serve the comedic scenario, but in light of the fact that drugs are believed to have been used in the alleged assaults, the bit takes on disturbing meaning all these years later.

which is basically "We admit this comedy bit is probably fictional and not actually about raping women, but bear with us while we make you think it is"

i merely noted that "disturbing" != "weird/funny",

calm down

^ two most inflammatory words in english language

thank you, NBC Nightly News, for interviewing for your two-minute segment a "viral media" expert younger than my neighbor's teen and letting him say that this story will probably die soon because that's how we roll in 2014.

wtffffff

guessing there's wasn't any full disclosure there

Soda otm!

Heard all those incidents were "misunderstandings".

The Playboy After Dark... reminds me that I still really want that DVD set.

That gif is fucking with me now

"We admit this comedy bit is probably fictional and not actually about raping women, but bear with us while we make you think it is"

― Whiney G. Weingarten, Monday, November 17, 2014 6:41 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

something can be fictional AND about raping women

and yes a piece about a drug that makes women have sex with you that don't want to have sex with you is 100% about raping women

sorry to be dim but these accounts pretty much all suggest that the cos was slipping drugs into girls' drinks, then raping them WHILE THEY WERE PASSED OUT?? i mean all rape is equally intolerable but fucking an unconscious person is seriously mental-patient behavior, it's like one step away from.. i dunno, necrophilia!

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/sep/02/cee-lo-green-it-isnt-if-the-victim-is-unconscious

http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/more-on-bill-cosbys-history-of-mentioning-spanish-fly/

COSBY: There’s a thing about Spanish Fly. Do you know anything about Spanish Fly?

KING: When we were kids we used to-

COSBY: There you go. There you go. That’s all. I just wanted the recognition.

KING: Yes.

COSBY: Spanish Fly.

KING: We knew what it was.

COSBY: Spanish Fly was the thing that all boys from age 11 on up to death — We will still be searching for Spanish Fly.

KING: (laughs) That’s right.

COSBY: And what was the old- The old story was, if you took a little drop — It was on the head of a-

KING: Pin.

COSBY: -pin! And you put it in a drink-

KING: That’s right. Drop it in her Coca-cola — It don’t matter.

COSBY: It doesn’t make any difference. And the girl would drink it and-

KING: And she’s yours.

COSBY: -’Hello, America!’ And there’s a story in there about Spanish Fly. So I think that everybody — any guy picking it up will just have a ball reading about that.

Search Results
Childhood

books.google.com/books?isbn=1560549343
Bill Cosby - 1991 - ‎No preview - ‎More editions
In a collection of humorous childhood stories, comedian Bill Cosby discusses such matters as his tenure as a school crossing guard and his quest for the elusive Spanish Fly

There are a lot of problematic things going on beyond consent, in that the routine is about an aphrodisiac and not something that presumably causes a loss of consciousness or memory loss. You still have the element of lack of consent in that it's not a self-administered party drug, it's something you drug someone with, and the routine paints that as funny. I think that social boundary has become a lot more well-defined over time, but the fact many people don't question it leads to the second bit:
objectifying others and using them as a means to an end.

That's the opposite of Cosby's family-friendly message and his perceived social advocacy. If people want to have sex on the basis of physical attraction alone and that's the end of it, fine. But that's the same shit he's decrying to others.

I guess maybe you can claim you have a level of social responsibility if you have a crisis management team to mitigate being a total shithead. I don't buy it.

Spanish fly is mostly an urban legend and his comedy bit is mostly about horny teenagers' fascination with it and how kids buy into a stupid legend. To drag up a 45-year-old comedy routine as evidence of ANYTHING in the wake of like 12 serious allegations is the stupidest fucking thing in the world.

Can you believe Tone Loc wrote a TOP 10 POP HIT hit about DRUGGING AND RAPING WOMEN?!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OP5EnaaYjQ

Man, the Beastie Boys talked about putting "spanish fly" in a girl's Brass Monkey, better recall all those MCA tributes

You're missing the point. As far as any of us know, Tone Loc has never been accused of actually slipping a mickey in anyone's drink. On the other hand, Cosby has been over a dozen times.

Yes, and to take those serious charges and be like "Hey, if you listen to this 45-year-old comedy routine about a mostly fictional aphrodesiac and the dumb minds of teenagers in the early 50s .. isn't that WEIRD/PROBLEMATIC/[Clickworthy]"?

It's really insincere, imho

As it applies to these cases, it doesn't even meet the minimum qualifications for circumstantial evidence, yeah. BUT it is worth noting that relistening to Cosby's old bits with a fresh perspective sometimes reveals some o_O moments that were relatively easy to gloss over in the past.

Like that time he strangled that child to death with a piece of chocolate cake

I think the whole Spanish Fly attitude is problematic and of its time, and had he not been really into that routine and also accused of similar behavior, it wouldn't be a thing. But this wasn't some one-time routine, it's basically "old man who joked about slipping aphrodisiacs in drinks in his youth actually put roofies in drinks as a middle-aged man"

then there's the entire beastie boys being apologetic thing and disavowing some of their bad behavior, to the point of attempting to atone for it?

45-year old comedy bit newly offensive for all sorts of reasons, news at 11.

although a hat tip to whiney for bringing up the single most popular spanish fly reference of his lifetime

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDsa4uDM3zU

there just isn't a connection between putting this stuff in your art and committing crimes like this. i mean, there is, but it's not causal. the big confounding variable is, it's ingrained in the culture. putting out someone's artistic history as evidence of guilt is an attractive kind of a sidestep from "the problem is in the culture" toward, like, the kind of villainization that serves to absolve ourselves, the subject. it takes a specific person / collection of experiences / traumas etc. to enact this absolution and these people always end up being the sacrificial lamb so we can keep on moving forward as is without questioning or at least being more aware of these deep beliefs around us.

and of course these discussions about x y z who did something similar are always splitting hairs because these are prevalent, mainstream attitudes and it's a matter of defining when and where it is acceptable/unacceptable every time.

Remember when rock stars, actors and other celebrities used to boast of their vast sexual conquests, and then more or less stopped?

there can be a connection, I just agree with Whiney that there's not really one here and that Cosby's leaning on that sketch back in the day really does make him look like a relic in 2014 xp

Like, with Magic Johnson? xp

The content of bits performed by some well-regarded comedy figures of the '60s and '70s sounds pretty gross these days, but that was "pre-liberation" culture, hmmm? (There's a bit on the first 2000 Year-Old Man album, I think, where Mel Brooks plays an Italian auteur whose new film is titled Rape... albeit there's more of a distanced, satirical bent to it; oh those licentious Europeans.)

I think part of his earlier stuff circulating now is the group consciousness trying to wash the idea that he's Dr. Cliff Huxtable out of their head.

It definitely helps.

definitely glad that sort of commonplace sleazy grey area seems to be less of a trade secret now. xp

Value of Coogi sweaters is cratering

lol i wondered if whiney was getting upset because late '80s hip-hop was in the line of fire