As the fallout from Bill Cosby’s recently-emergent confession to purchasing Quaaludes to give to women for sex continues, several more former supporters and allies have publicly admitted to believing that Cosby is guilty of drugging and raping many women.
Actor and Christian conservative commentator Joseph C. Phillips, who starred on "The Cosby Show" as Denise Huxtable’s husband, appeared on CNN this morning to address his change of heart after speaking to a friend of his who Cosby allegedly assaulted. The controversial Phillips did his appearance after a lengthy (if fairly misogynistic) post on his personal website made waves on social media. In the post, he talks about that conversation in depth, saying that was the tipping point for him to see Cosby’s guilt:
We spent the next two hours sitting on a bench talking. Through tears, she told me her story. She cursed him for violating both her trust and her body. She cursed herself for not being smarter, and for degrading herself in pursuit of success. I listened patiently. As she began to run out of steam, she turned to me. "Do you believe me?"
“Yes.” I said. “I believe you.”
“Why?” she asked.
“Because I don’t believe that you are crazy and only a crazy person would sit with me all this time and share a fantasy.”
Like Phillips, Whoopi Goldberg was not convinced of Cosby’s guilt, and she said as much on "The View." But after a major backlash (including a hilarious video of John Oliver breaking down other problematic personalities she’s defended), she brought ABC News legal analyst Dan Abrams on the show to explain what would happen if Cosby were arrested and tried. After Abrams addressed how statue of limitations works in rape trials, Goldberg publically reversed her position:
What we’ve learned is there’s no recourse for these women except what they’re doing. If this is to be tried in the court of public opinion, I gotta say, all of the information that’s out there kinda points to "guilt."
In addition, the City of Philadelphia’s murals program is dropping Cosby. According to a statement to the Philadelphia Inquirer from the Mural Arts Program, a 2008 painting depicting Cosby alongside Martin Luther King Jr. and Nelson Mandela will be removed from its wall. The program had already planned to decomission the mural due to structural problems of the wall. But in light of the information from the 2005 deposition, in which Cosby said that he had given Quaaludes to a woman with the purpose of having sex with her, the city and program have sped up their plans.
(H/t CNN, Washington Post, Philadelphia Inquirer)