The Limits of Victimhood

Newsweek has decided to offer its take on Bill Cosby and his call for personal responsibility among poorer blacks: Does Cosby Help?

"It is not all right for your 15-year-old daughter to have a child," he told 2,400 fans in a high school in Milwaukee. He lambasted young men in Baltimore for knocking up "five, six girls." He tongue-lashed single mothers in Atlanta for having sex within their children's hearing "and then four days later, you bring another man into the house." "The audience gasped," reported The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

People have been gasping since May, when Cosby blasted "lower-economic people" for "not holding up their end," for buying kids $500 sneakers instead of "Hooked on Phonics." His words (and tone) set off a raging discussion over whether Cosby's comments make sense and whether they can do any good, over whether the problem resides in the poor people he criticized, or in forces largely beyond their control. No group has a larger stake in that debate than the poor urbanites Cosby presumably is trying to save. Yet they don't exactly seem to be rushing to Cosby's church.

Time to trot out Newsweek's "expert" opinion.

Kenny, 17, a onetime stick-up man, puts it plainly. "Cosby is ... talking about me holding up my end of the bargain. Listen ... I robbed 'cause I was hungry. If he's going to put food on my table, if he's going to give me time to pursue education vigorously, then fine. But if he's not, then I'm going to hold up my end of the bargain and make sure I get something to eat."

Newsweek accepts at face value that this "onetime stick-up man's" choice was between crime and starvation. One wonders what kind of store the teen attempted to rob. My bet is it wasn't a supermarket.

"Times are different" than in Cosby's heyday, said Sonia, 20. "Back then even if [men] worked at a factory they'd get up every day and go to a job in a suit. Nowadays ... most black males don't have good enough jobs."

Once again Newsweek expects readers to view this statement as some sort of refutation of Cosby, and not the example of shocking ignorance it actually is.

The aim seems to be to inoculate poor blacks in America from having any standard of personal responsibility placed upon them.

Telling people born into such circumstances to shape up is not much of a plan. Combating "a history of inequality and disadvantage" requires "systematic solutions," argues Stephanie Bell-Rose, president of the Goldman Sachs Foundation, which funds programs targeting achievers in poor communities. She believes Cosby has an obligation to be "more thoughtful."

I'll agree with the writers in one sense. Cosby's call for personal responsibility is not a "plan" at all. Cosby is not claiming that personal responsibility is "necessary and sufficient" to change lives for the better. He is claiming that it is necessary. It won't matter how many "systematic solutions" you try to implement if you still have an epidemic of poor teen mothers, and it is ridiculous to claim that 18 year old men have "no control" over whether they impregnate the 14 year old girl down the street or not. What Cosby is railing against is the belief that, if you are poor and black, there is no behavior you could engage in for which you could be faulted.

The reason Cosby has been so effective in raising these issues and starting this debate is precisely because he isn't being "more thoughtful," which seems to be synonymous with being politically correct. Here is to hoping that Cosby will remain less thoughtful for a long time to come.