Thread by @frodofied

Be careful who you make your heroes. They will almost always let you down.

When Bill Cosby is sentenced today, for only one of the many crimes of which he stands accused, it will be a day of small justice for his victims and their families, and a day of regret for so many.

1/

Growing up in small town America, in a town so small,you almost certainly never heard of it, my very white, insular, and, in many ways typically racist family would gather around on Thursday evenings and do what almost every American family was doing, watch The Cosby Show.

2/

We laughed louder, harder, and longer together watching that show than any show before or since.

Though dated now, especially when considered next to a near contemporary like, say, The Golden Girls, at the time it, and its creator & namesake had their finger on our pulse.

3/

It is easy now, perhaps, to misjudge or underplay its impact, but there can be little doubt, given all we've experienced as a nation since Election Day, that shows like this, and very much this show in particular, helped forestall the emergence of our ugliest side.

4/

The Huxtables were a revelation to many white kids of my generation. And the ideas that the show injected into our lives were downright revolutionary at the time. In depicted, as sitcoms of tbe time mostly did, an idealized American middle class family, but they were black.

5/

This might sound mundane and naive now, but at the time it was a huge deal. For the first time in our collective history Americans were watching a show featuring a black family not only just like ours, but better than ours. Cliff and Claire were better parents.

6/

Everyone my age would look at the screen and then at their own parents and think, and maybe even say out loud, "Why can't you be more like them. "

White or black, rich or poor, the significance of moments like those cannot be exaggerated.

It meant something.

7/

Almost as important the Huxtable children were kids we could relate to, and knew. Denise was everyone's glamorous, snotty older sister, and Rudy everyone's cute, tattle tale little sister. The was a better controlled version of my brother Mike.

They got in trouble like us.

8/

BIll Cosby was America's dad, and the character of Cliff Huxtable, who he created and sent into the world for all of us to love and admire,seemed like a mere extension of himself, and so the reality of the man, in flesh, feels like a personal betrayal.

9/

Worse, he is the father of four grown daughters, some of whom are near the ages or older than some of his victims.

Bill Cosby the man knew what he was doing was terribly wrong. But Bill Cosby the father should have been enough to stop his worst instincts in their tracks.

10/

Cosby, like many icons before him, was a terrible steward of his own legacy. He had been, for many years, a bridge between black & white America, and is smart enough to have known that taking on that role brought w/ it responsibilities. He knew better, but didn't do better.

11/

Whatever happens to him today his legacy and name are forever tarnished.

There is no comeback from this nor should there be, but it doesn't make it any less painful to watch.

I had always rooted for Bill Cosby.

I backed the wrong player.

#Cosby #BillCosby