Cosby, ritual of rape denial virtually written in stone in much of public opinion, Huffington post

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

9. Hi DesertFlower! And thank you so much for your response. Forgive me for coming off as generalizing.

I didn't mean to do that.

I think I've been writing more out of frustration than anything else.

But you see, my frustration has not only been with many white people, it has been directed at the black community, too, as a black woman in particular. We both have written of the racism that we've witnessed in the last few years and issues that we thought were resolved as a nation decades ago only to confront them again.

However, there's another dirty little secret in the black community that is often overlooked, and that is the rampant misogyny. With so much focus on black men and their trials, black women are expected--it's an unspoken demand--that we stand by our men through thick and thin. We must be on the front lines! Fighting for black men--even risking our lives for them if necessary. All of these battles--Trayvon Martin, Jordan Davis, Eric Gardner, Mike Brown...all of them--had the so-called "strong black woman" standing on the front lines, leading the fight. You saw us out there holding up signs in support of our men.

And yet, type in "black women" in the search bar on "YouTube". Go ahead. I dare you. The results you'll get are tens of thousands of YouTube channels devoted to the ridicule, the derision, outright hatred of black women. Despite the fact that black women are excelling in every aspect of social, economic and political life at rates never before seen; despite all of our successes, improvements in areas where we were once deficient; despite the fact that for many decades black women have been forced to hold down the black community--for a myriad of reasons far too difficult to fully explain--were are hated, blamed for all that is wrong in the black community; told that we are the ugliest, most undesirable, unfeminine, you name it. And the name-calling. Oh the horrible, unimaginable names we are called...

Anyway, what has me so upset is the fact that so many of us are falling over ourselves, once again, in defense of this black man Bill Cosby, who is another example of a black man who has disrespected his black woman; who has defiled her; offended her; mistreated her. And yet when awful things happen to us or our children, particularly when the alleged perpetrator is a black man, not only are the men dismissive of our claims, other black women are very quick to blame us first.

There's a much longer rant to this, but I don't want to get into it here.

What I'm trying to say that the irony of calling out the racism and the oppression on behalf of white society is there, but as I also stated in my concluding sentence, the fact that I am siding with the majority of the white women and not Cosby puts me at odds with a good number of blacks. The conflict that many black women grapple with but are afraid to speak out lest they become at odds with the black community is there and is real.

I guess the purpose of my initial post was to point out the duality; first, the real and very valid reasons for why blacks feel the way we do about why Cosby could be innocent, AND second, why I am personally conflicted because I feel that he is likely guilty for equally valid reasons.