A Very Brief History of Racism, Rape and Child Molestation + A Bill Cosby idea

By Angela E. Chamblee. Updated Feb.20, 2022.  3:29.  Updated:  Feb. 10,2022.  Originally published on January 30,2022

From the very beginnings of slavery, Black women have been repeatedly raped.The law said that White people could do anything they wanted to slaves that they owned.  That is how they got away with rape, and molestation.  In her famous speech “Ain’t I a Woman” Sojourner Truth speaks of how she gave birth to 13 children only to see most of them sold into slavery. When she was 18, she fell in love with a slave named Robert, but instead she was forced to marry another slave called Thomas.  They had 5 children together. “None, but Jesus” she said heard her cry. (Sojourner Truth, para 1).

The abolitionist John Brown was a very religious man. Because he had heard about sexual atrocities that happened during slavery, he believed that slavery was evil and would ultimately cause the destruction of the American people.  He thought that slavery should be outlawed in the United States. 

 In 1908,  Jack Johnson won the heavy-weight championship of the world.  He was the first Black heavy-weight champ.  During his reign as boxing’s heavyweight champ, a number of Black men were rounded up and lynched if there was even the suggestion that a Black man raped a White woman.  Nobody cared about a man’s right to be innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.   The allegation of rape became an excuse to round up as many innocent Black people to terrorize and practice genocide on them.

The Tulsa, Oklahoma Massacre

In Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1921, a Black teenager named Dick Rowland, had just gotten onto an elevator, when suddenly he heard the elevator operator scream.  He was frightened ,so he ran out of the elevator, out of the building, and disappeared  (History.com para. 5). The Tulsa Tribune newspaper front page carried a report that a Black teen had been arrested and charged with sexual assault ( Ibid.  para. 6).  A mob of 1,500 White people marched to the Black community, in Tulsa, and preceded to burn houses and Black businesses down.  Before rioting finished, 1,256 houses were estimated by the Red Cross to have been burned down, 215 other houses were looted, but not torched, 2 newspapers, a school, a library, a hospital, etc. . . .  an area of 35 blocks had been burned down(Ibid. para.  13). The White mob that had been initially 1,500, but it had grown to be thousands of people.  A few hours after the rioting had finished, police investigated and concluded that Dick Rowland had either stumbled on Sarah Page or accidentally stepped on her foot. Charges against Rowland were dropped and he was released from jail.  Rowland left Tulsa, and never came back again.  (Ibid. para. 16).  Approximately 100 - 300 Black people were killed( Ibid.  para 17).  Approximately, 8,000 people were left homeless (Ibid.  para. 24).

The Scottsboro Boys

The Scottsboro boys were ages 13-19 years-old, considered children in 193. Two White female teens, who were each 17- years-old were in the same box car, hoboing too. Then some White male teenagers got in the box car and they got into a fight with the Black teens.The Black teens beat back the White teens, and kicked them off the train.  Then the White male teens went and got the police. They made up a story and said that the Black teens had raped the White teenaged girls.  When the train arrived at its next destination, Paint Rock, Alabama, the police came and arrested the 9 Black teens.  The two White teenage girls said the Black teens had raped them.   They went ahead and agreed with what the White male teens said because they were afraid that they would be charged with vagrancy and having illicit sex.

The first trial ended in a hung jury. During the second trial one of the girls. Ruby Bates, said that she had lied, and retracted the story about the Scottsboro boys raping her.  Seven Scottsboro boys were found not guilty. One Scottsboro boy escaped prison, but was caught 30 years later.  Governor George Wallace pardoned him because new investigative reports had proven that the Scottsboro boys did not rape the two White teenaged girls.

Emmett Till

Emmett Till was a fourteen-year-old teenager from Chicago, Illinois. He was visiting his relatives in Money, Mississippi. Some of his friends or cousins dared him to whistle at a White woman, so he did.  The White woman told her husband. He got together with some of his friends, went over to the house where Till was staying, and kidnapped Till, brutally beat him to death and threw his body in a river.  It was days before someone took the police to where the men had thrown Emmett Till’s body.

At first, the police did not want to release the body, but when MamieTill, his mother, came to get his body, they released it.  When Mamie Till got her son’s body home, and looked at him, she said she wanted an open casket funeral ,so the whole world could see what racists murderers did to her son.  Pictures of Till’s body lying in the coffin, went all over America and the world. Till and the Scottsboro boys’ trials became the lynch pin that launched the Civil Right’s movement.  Black people said they had had enough of the level of violence used to attack their children, who were innocent.

The racism of slavery still happens today, only  the form has changed. Racism comes in the form of character assassination.  

 Adam Clayton Powell,Jr.

In the 1960’s, There was a Black man who became the most successful Black Congressman to ever walk  on the floors of Congress.  He was a man, who wrote legislation that greatly helped Black people, but also helped poor people all over America.  His name was Reverend  Adam Clayton Powell, Jr.  He represented the Harlem Congressional district, #22, in New York City.  He got about 65 pieces of major legislation  passed, including Medicare, Medicaid, the Man Power Act, Upward Bound, and Head Start, to name a few.  (Haygood Time:  18:25 - 18:31) He also passed legislation that made lynching a man a federal crime.  Today what do children know about him?  They know that he was ”a rogue, never reached the heights he should have, and that his life was a waste (Haygood, Time: 4:34—4:50). Children need to study about how Powell was able to amass the power he had.  They need to learn how he was able to pass good legislation that helped so many Black people and poor people to be able to get a college education and raise themselves out of poverty.

Michael Jackson

Also,Michael Jackson got his character assassinated.  After he amassed enough money to buy the Beatle’s records and copyrights collection, stories started circulating that he was a pedophile.  Jackson had two trials, but never was convicted of child molestation. There is a difference between pedophiles, and child molesters. Child molestation is a heinous crime.  Still, Jackson’s character was assassinated.

One thing Michael Jackson did:  He gave Little Richard, “the King of Rock and Roll” all the copyrights to the songs Little Richard had written.  After Michael Jackson died, all the Beatle collections and the copyrights that were left were put up for sale, and Paul McCartney bought his copyrights back.

There are many people who will say that slavery happened a long time ago, and that the sexual atrocities of long ago don’t happen any more, but rape and child molestation are happening now more than ever because little 11-year-old boys have figured out how to hack into pornography websites at 1:00, 2:00 and 3:00 in the morning, and they are learning about sex through looking at pornography.

There are many people who think that slavery happened a long time ago, and does not happen now, but rape and child molestation still happen today.  Parents are notoriously uncomfortable about talking to their children about sex.  Not too long ago, people did not find out about sex until they got married. In the 1970’s, I took a sex education class in High School, but the class focused on how to prevent unwanted pregnancies.  It was devoid of religion or spirituality, and people need to be taught about spirituality in connection with sex, so they won’t become rapists and child molesters.  Little 11-year-old boys should not be learning about sex by hacking into pornography websites.

Parents need to be taught how to teach  their children, about sex.  Approximately how many little boys are hacking into pornography websites?  We may be rearing a whole generation of perverts for the future.  However,  some people have suggested that every child that looks at hardcore pornography does not necessarily have to grow up to become a pervert.  More research needs to be done.  “ Today it is reported that 90% of kids between the ages of 8 and 16 have watched pornography online at least once.”Not only have most tweens and teens seen porn, but boys ages 12 -17 are actually the largest consumers of online pornography” (Woda, para 1).

There are also people who suggest that public schools ought to sponsor small group discussions about the ethics of sex, for example questions like” is it right that teen boys ply teen girls with alchohol to get them to give them sex,“ or  “What does the Bible say about pornography?”  The person leading the discussion should be a counselor, a psychologist, or a psychiatrist.

Bill Cosby

Then, there is Bill Cosby.   He faced two rape trials and was convicted the second time, but won on appeal, after being locked up in jail for two years.  Women seeking justice  teamed up with the White patriarchal power structure to take the civil rights of a Black man away, and how many times has that happened in the history of the United States?  Thank you to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for recognizing that a travesty of justice had occurred.  In the 1960’s Black people had a lot of heroes who got assassinated, but then there were even more, who had their character assassinated.

What does character assassination mean?  Character assassination means that people are afraid to talk about important Black people, unless it is in negative words, and phases.  Character assassination means that black children don’t find out about how someone effectively fought racism, so they will know how to deal with it, in the future. It is a type of genocide being practiced on Black people since the  1950’s and 1960’s, with the COINTELPRO program.  The F.B.I. sponsored the Counter Intelligence Program. 

 What they did was to bug Martin Luther King Jr.’s  phone and Hotel room to try to dig up as much dirt  as they could on King. J. Edgar Hoover, who was in charge of the F.B.I. at the time,  thought that King was a Communist, but the F.B.I. never found any evidence that King was having any dealings with Communists, but they did supposedly find evidence that he had love affairs with women outside of his marriage.  This was the dirt they got on King.

But King is an anomaly.

 Bill Cosby‘s Ideas about fighting Racism, can work just  as well for fighting Rape, and Child Molestation. 

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1. First off,  if racism, rape ,and child molestation has been going on for 400+ years, and women, children, and people of Color still are not being treated right, then maybe it is time we tried and alternative strategy.  If we depend on the Criminal Justice system to be fair, we are going to get the same results we have always gotten for 400 + years. The Declaration of Independence states that a Black slave is only 3/5 of a human being.— not fully human.  That is how for so many years people turned a blind eye to the sexual atrocities of slavery.  Racism, rape, and child molestion go hand in hand. Bill Cosby ought to head up a T.V. Network whose main goal is to end Racism, Rape, and Child Molestation in the United States.  

If  Mr.  Cosby does not  want to work on the project or can’t, then someone as good as Bill Cosby, if not better, ought to head up the  television network.  Then too, he could be a consultant and give good advice.  The network should be headed up by a Black American, at least initially. Why?  Because of slavery, Black people have been treated worse than  any other people of Color. They might be more sympathetic to all peoples of Color, and people probably won’t find any other person better qualified than Bill Cosby, right now Cosby has started something innovative:  hiring a Black Harvard University Professor, Dr. Alvin Poussaint, who is a psychiatrist who, read scripts for The Bill Cosby show, which co-starred Felicia Rashad, and he censored anything said that might damage the self esteem of Black children.  There should be all kinds of psychologists, and counselors, who also would have a say in censorship issues.  Parents as well, although they may not have degrees, they should sit on an advisory board and will have a vote to decide on censorship issues. 

Cosby believes “television and film are primary battlefields of the enduring war against racial prejudice and discrimination in the United States.”( “Why Bill Cosby, 1 - 15))He felt the only way to reverse cultural genocide in the media was to own a major network channel ( Ibid. 2.28-2.35).

He set his sights on NBC, which was in financial difficulty at the time.  Cosby’s net worth was 500 million dollars.  He raised 2 billion dollars,but General Electric, who owned NBC, asked for 6 billion dollars, and Cosby could not raise the money. Wall Street said NBC was only worth 2.5 billion (Ibid.  3.25 - 4.30).  Cosby knew it was important that not just  Blacks,but all America be educated about Black history as a way of fighting racism, and this is something true for all people of color,  all people who suffer from discrimination.

Also, early in Cosby’s career he decided that he would not curse in his comedy routines.  He has had a longstanding commitment to doing funny, but clean humor.

Cosby’s work has been not only a critical success, but also a commercial success. His television art has helped millions of children grow up to become decent human beings.  He has had the courage to step forth to give us the gift of healing laughter. He is arguably the greatest African-American  comedian ever.  His television art is needed now, more than ever.  It should not be banned from television. It should not be locked up and never seen again.  It should not be destroyed.  

“Shame on the nation that has no military heroes, but much more shame on the nation that has heroes and does not honor them.”— Pericles, Greek Statesmanand General, 450 BC

2.  Do not allow comics, who come on the new network, to use curse words in their comedy routines.     This may be considered to be unconstitutional, and an attack on free speech, but we should not stand around and do nothing, while the Internet runs rampant, degrading the moral fiber of our children.  Pornography should be banned from the internet, as well because right now the internet projects free hard pornography to children at a time when they are very impressionable and formulating ethics,religion, and spirituality into their concienceness.  Also, by getting them addicted to porn, early in their lives the Porn industry can make a lot of money off of children, when they become adults.

3.  The U. S.  government should fund this new television network,headed by Black Americans, Asian Americans,Native Americans, Latin X - Americans, Women, Disabled-Americans,  elderly-Americans, L.G. B. T.Q. + Americans, White-Americans, Jews, Muslims, Christians, Wicca, and Rastafarians. There should be programs about the history of such people and their contributions to American culture, as well as the world.  Air time for television programs should be equably distributed among  the 12 peoples’ first named in the list found above. There should be space left for the Wicca , Rastafarians, and any new religions of the future, that have yet to be created or recreated.

4.   There should be programs that teach parents how to talk to their children about sex.  Different priests, ministers, holy men, rabbis, imams, preachers, and evangelists who are excellent speakers should make videos that give sermons about the spirituality of sex or If parents don’t see a video that chimes with their ideas about religion and spirituality, then they should e-mail the television network their suggestions, for sermons that should be posted.

5.  People should have free and open access to look at the new television network.

6.  Finally, a critical mass of people living in America,(roughly that would be 31 million people, in America should be asked to pray for an end to Racism, Rape and Child molestation at an appointed time, on an appointed day,once a year, in America. They should not March on Capital Hill because 31 million people might not fit on Capital Hill,but people should stay at home or go to various churches, synogoques, temples, mosques,etc., and they might go out to be with nature too, when they pray.

People should also take a pledge to be better parents to their children;  (This idea is a variation on something done at the 1995 Million Man March, on Washington,  D.C. and was led by the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan of The Nation of Islam).

Work Cited Page

Haygood, Wil. “King of the Cats:  The Life and Times of Adam Clayton Powell,Jr.”

     C-SPAN. “Book T.V.”  Feb.21, 2006.  Accessed Feb. 7, 2022.

History.com editors.  “Tulsa Race Massacre.”  A. & E. Television Network.

     Updated Mar. 8, 2018.  Accessed on Jan. 23,2022.

“Sojourner Truth:  Ain’t I a Woman.”  Women’s Rights National Historical Park.

    Accessed Feb. 4, 2022.  NPR.gov./Article/Sojourner Truth.htm

“The Scottsboro Boys” The Smithsonian National Museum of  African 

     American History and Culture.  Mar. 15, 2017.  Accessed Feb.  7, 2022.

     nmaahc.si.edu.

“Why Bill Cosby Tried to Buy NBC—Here’s Why?”  Comedy Hype. Feb.12,2021.  

     Accessed Feb.  4, 2022.

Woda, Steve.”Is My Child Looking at Pornography Online.”  “Uknowkids.com”

     Updated June12, 2019.  Accessed Feb.18, 2022.

      https:// resources.uknowkids.com