When I was a reporter for a major broadcast news organization in the late 1990’s I did a series of stories about the financial choices celebrities make. I remember how excited we all were when Bill Cosby was coming into the studio.
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As expected, Mr. Cosby was charming and funny in the interview. We really hit it off. When it was over, he asked that I escort him out of the building, and we joked as we rode down the elevator.
When I walked him to the door and it was time to say good-bye, he took my wrist and said, “You’re not going back to work, you’re coming to have breakfast with me at my place.â€Â I laughed. He repeated it several times while he held onto my wrist. We were in a busy lobby, the interaction even caught the attention of the security guard. We all laughed it off and he left.
I didn’t ‘think’ much about this and assumed my gut feeling, which was telling me “that was off†was mistaken. After, all this was Bill Cosby.
As I’ve watched and wondered like the rest of the world as his ‘truth’ has been revealed, I, and all of us have to ask why this man got the benefit of the doubt from so many, when we all know instinctively that where there is that much smoke, there must be fire – more than 25 women have alleged that Cosby assaulted them over the past 40 years.
I share this now because this is a ‘teachable’ moment in which we must evolve and stop allowing our human fascination with celebrity to make us forget our intelligence and instincts. We owe this to the victims in this case and to our children.
BlackEnterprise.com discussed this with Terrie Williams, award-winning mental health advocate, and author of Black Pain:Â It Just Looks Like We’re Not Hurting.
Continue reading on the next page…
BlackEnterprise.com: When you think about the experience many celebrities have had  — special treatment, unlimited access, and very few if any people saying ‘no’ to them from the time they showed a unique talent – are we being unrealistic to think that they would develop into the role models we demand them to be in their personal lives? That would be challenging for anyone who has been isolated in that way.
Williams: We should let them off the hook when it comes to the expectation that they must be role models in their personal life. You just never know what a person’s journey has been, how they have been affected, and how they have lived their lives, and you have to be mindful of that. Everybody has scars and a story. In addition, many people who are rich and famous understand the power they have over people and they know how to get what they want, because of who they are in the world, because of their branding.
There is a part of us that is completely enamored with celebrity, it’s part of human nature. How do we live with that instead of getting lost in it?
We’re a culture that is very celebrity driven. We’ll do anything to rub elbows with a celebrity. We literally loose our minds. The brand a person sells does not have to have anything to do with who they are. It’s business. We project that onto people and have to do a gut check about that. Especially parents. Some are so short-sighted and they don’t convey to their children that this person is great on the court, and leave it at that. We simply don’t know anymore about who they are than they know about us. Even though there is a tendency to idolize, there is no one we should idolize, they are human.
What is the lesson we can take from this?
We can look at ourselves and pay attention when things like a lack of confidence or self-esteem is causing us to stop listening to our gut. This is a hard thing for many of us to do. When we hear a story like Cosby’s, and hear from the victims, so often, the thought crosses our mind that something is wrong, but we are trapped by the celebrity thing. Good sense values go out the window. We buy into the hype, and tell ourselves, “that can’t be what I heard, felt†we don’t want to go there. But everybody is wounded and scarred in some way. We need to remember that and remember that all of us have a ‘game face’ and a mask that we wear. Celebrities aren’t any different.
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