Phylicia Rashad Defends Bill Cosby and the Celebrity World comes for her head!

I say kudos to Claire Huxtable in her attempt to defend Heathcliff.  There have not been many people hopping to Bill Cosby’s defense these days.  The reason being, they don’t know what they don’t know.  However Phylicia Rashad went out on a limb and spoke up against the Cosby accusers and now she, herself is being attacked.

At a luncheon for the movie “Selma”, Showbiz 411’s Roger Freidman was able to interview  Phylicia Rashad.   At first she declined to comment on the entire issue.  She did not want to take part in the media circus.  When asked about the scandal, her first comments were,

I don’t want to become part of the public debate.

She should have left it there.  The entire thing was starting to die down and people were moving on to other, more exciting topics.  However….Phylicia could not let it go and had to express what I’m sure are strong opinions she had been holding in for months,

Forget these women.  What you’re seeing is the destruction of a legacy. And I think it’s orchestrated. I don’t know why or who’s doing it, but it’s the legacy. And it’s a legacy that is so important to the culture.

When asked about Beverly Johnson and Janice Dickinson, Rashad had a very Claire Huxtable-esque response,

Oh, please,  Someone is determined to keep Bill Cosby off TV

She is 100% right about that.  NBC dropped the new comedy he had in the works, his live shows have been cancelled, Netflix pulled the plug on his special and TV land pulled all of “The Cosby Show” reruns.

It didn’t stop there.

Phylicia Rashad is well respected and her defense has reinvigorated the debate.  People were feeling a certain way about her comments and they have not been holding back:

Sarita Butterfield one of the accusers said,

What if something like this happened to her daughter? Shame on her and shame on Bill.

Another accuser Angela Leslie responded:

I looked at her as a woman with morals, and it’s sad that she’s speaking like this,

This story then made news on The Wrap which sparked a twitter war which included Tom Arnold, Judd Apatow and Norm MacDonald,

@JuddApatow @TomArnold @TheWrap My opinion is he is guilty.But I worry about the next guy.I believe social media could destroy an innocent.

— Norm Macdonald (@normmacdonald) January 7, 2015

.@sharonwaxman @TheWrap “forget these women.” She is worried about her SAG residuals disappearing if they are heard in court. Shameful.

— Judd Apatow (@JuddApatow) January 7, 2015

LASTLY WE HAVE ‘THE VIEW’

Of course we have The View where this has been a hot button for Rosie O’Donnell.  She took Whoopi’s absence as an opportunity to go in on Bill when Nicole made comments regarding  Rashad’s defense.

Nicole Wallace said,

We have to be careful not to dismiss Phylicia Rashad. This is her truth.   There is certainly a possibility that this is the truth.

Then Rossie, with no Whoopi to check her, went to town….

It’s a slim possibility. I think people like mothers in incestuous families, where they’re aware the father or boyfriend is sexually abusing their children, chooses denial because it’s a safe place for the brain to land.  Because they can’t hold two thoughts in their head at once: ‘The man that I’m married to is also sexually abusing my children.’

When the hell are they going to get that beast off the show!  I mean really.

In the end we will never know for certain.  Millions of people thought the earth was flat but that doesn’t make it flat.  It doesn’t matter if 200 women come forward it doesn’t make him guilty.  All it takes is one woman with evidence.  That’ would make him guilty.

Yeah…he certainly could have done it, but you don’t know what you don’t know.

Watch the women (and Mario Cantone….insert joke here) fight it out.
(The Cosby discussion starts at the 10min 25sec mark)