Apparently, Bill Cosby recently addressed the subject of the role of parents in raising educated, well-socialized children, or perhaps more accurately the failure of many parents in impoverished communities to do so. In describing Cosby's statements, Colbert King suggests that this is in large part a racial issue. However, my experience with similar populations of individuals of other ethnicities suggest to me that Cosby's comments, for the most part, can be widely applied to a subset of any given ethnic group.
Unfortunately, this is one of those problems which is easy to identify and very hard to solve. Particularly in a society that, although extraordinarily wealthy, is unwilling to make a significant investment in breaking that cycle.
In today's Post, Theodore Shaw of the NAACP reacts to Bill Cosby's comments, and makes some observations on the continued problem of racism in American society:
ReplyDeleteFollowing a recent conversation, Cosby and I agreed on this much: To the extent that he is frustrated and angry about the failure of people to be responsible parents, and about senseless crime and violence, I stand with him; to the extent that we continue to be challenged by the systemic issues of race and racism that the Legal Defense Fund has confronted since the days of my predecessor, Thurgood Marshall, Bill Cosby stands with me.