Wait..that’s all?
As the long, live, “Saturday Night Live” 4oth anniversary show was being aired on NBC, twitter and various websites gave moment by moment accounts of what was occurring. Everyone was puzzled by the much-ballyhooed appearance of Eddie Murphy, who had a returning hero’s introduction, and was on screen for about a minute, never to return. Why didn’t Eddie do anything funny? Later we found out, though backstage revelations by SNL mediocrity Norm McDonald.
At the tail end of the “Celebrity Jeopardy” sketch – which reintroduced Darrell Hammond as Sean Connery, Will Ferrell as Alex Trebek and Macdonald as Burt Reynolds/Turd Ferguson – a Video Daily Double appeared in the Potent Potables category. Current SNL cast member Kenan Thompson played Bill Cosby revealing his cocktail recipe, a nod to the sweeping allegations against the comedian.
As Macdonald revealed on Twitter, that cameo was originally written for Murphy, who – after a few days of being pursued by Macdonald, Michaels and even director Brett Ratner (the latter serving as an intermediary for the comic) – decided not to appear in the sketch.
“Murphy knew the laughs would bring the house down. Eddie Murphy knows what will work on SNL better than anyone. Eddie decides the laughs are not worth it. He will not kick a man when he is down,” Macdonald wrote.
Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz is…
Is Eddie Murphy an Ethics Hero?
Cosby released a brief statement thanking Murphy.
Murphy, a major star in need of a late career boost, had a chance to get a viral YouTube moment mocking Cosby, who certainly deserves mockery (and more.) Should unrepentant serial rapists who continue to avoid accountability while ignoring, attacking and refusing to apologize to their victims be accorded special dispensation by a show that mercilessly satirizes everyone from Presidents to reality stars? That’s easy: no.
Eddie Murphy, however, has had his own embarrassments over the years, though nothing within light years of Cosby’s reputation melt-down. He chose to be kind and compassionate to a performer who was a role model and inspiration to Murray in his career, sacrificing what both he and Cosby live for: laughs. (Okay, laughs and drugged women, in Bill’s case.) This was a pure Golden Rule move by Eddie Murphy, and I cannot find fault with it.
I think he’s an Ethics Hero.
Ethics Alarms 
I agree. A class act, that will be remembered for far longer than the most hilarious (and well-deserved) parody he could have pulled off. Which he could have.
Isn’t this odd, though, Charles? I agree with you, but we’re taking about aiding and abetting an effort to slide past the consequences of a series of horrendous crimes. Would Cosby’s victims agree that this was noble, or take it as siding with the victimizer against the victims? And shouldn’t we share their sensibilities rather than Cosby? What is a Golden Rule act toward Cosby rejects the Golden Rule from the 34 women’s perspective. Are we biased as men?
I don’t see how this is even a question. Had he done the bit, would that have been unethical? I think not. Deciding what laughs he wants to get and what jokes he wants to tell should be completely within his discretion. He owes nothing to the victims or to Cosby. He had joked about Cosby before, so we know that he is not inherently off-limits in his mind. But, his decision not to kick him when he is down is gracious. And, if the victims are upset, he could pull out the feminist line that he does not think rape jokes are funny.
-Jut
I think it comes down to what we believe. It almost staggers belief at this point that someone doesn’t believe that Cosby is guilty of at least something. I personally am not sure I believe all the women, but if even one of them is telling the truth, and I think the majority are, it’s indefensible.
There are holdouts, people who don’t believe that Cosby did any of it. They’re waiting for a trial, or a confession, or a smoking gun that’s irrefutable, and until that information comes out, he’s their guy. I’m stuck on Murphy being one of them. I think from his perspective, he sees a man in a hard spot, wrongly maligned by the media, in need of a little compassion. Because the alternative is that he sees a man he knows is a rapist and refuses to treat that person the same way he has treated countless other people who’ve done wrong.
This is a ruling that depends on Murphy’s frame of mind, if he believes Cosby is innocent, he’s a hero. If he believes Cosby is guilty, he’s a dunce.
Just because the situation is there to make fun of or joke about doesn’t mean you have to nor is it every public personality’s job to comment on it. That would make it news which would then be up to Brian Williams to report it then as he ‘remembers’ it. Hey maybe he had one of Cosby’s cocktails before the flight . . .
I say good for him, no reason to pile on and as you mentioned Eddie Murphy has had his own share of self-inflicted woe, perhaps that’s even why he used the Golden Rule.
I don’t feel slighted as a women that Eddie Murphy didn’t make jokes at Cosby’s expense and I think if a woman does take exception to it counseling wouldn’t be out of the question. Eddie Murphy hasn’t/didn’t condone any behavior he just didn’t jump into the fray. Nothing wrong with that.
“Are we biased as men?”
No, I don’t believe you are biased at all. There is nothing wrong with pointing out that someone has chosen not to kick a man while he is down and saying that this was a gracious thing to do. You are making a judgement about Murphy’s behavior not Cosby’s behavior. It’s a big leap to suggest that commenting on one person’s actions in isolation automatically puts you at odds with Cosby’s victims.
Yep. Which is why I don’t see the Golden Rule as being applicable as Murphy relates to the victims…
I don’t think Murphy deserves Ethics Hero status for what he did. I think he deserves praise for a kind gesture – but nothing more.
Murphy is not obligated to use his talents to make more publicity about Cosby, whether that publicity be favorable or adverse.
Has Murphy made a statement regarding this? I would like to know his motivations from his own mouth.
The one thing that really rubs me the wrong way is Cosby’s public thank you to Eddie Murphy. Obviously, Murphy isn’t in control of public statements made by Cosby but Cosby’s statement taken with his past statements gives the illusion of thanking Murphy for believing him and not the “innuendos”. Cosby is a manipulator and whatever graciousness or kindness Murphy may have shown, Cosby used that to further his own agenda and in a way tainted Murphy’s decision. Whatever Murphy’s motivations were, he would have been much better off without a public thank you from a serial rapist.
I agree. It looks to me like Murphy decided, “I am not going to use you (Bill Cosby),” and the thanks he got was Cosby using him.
From the perspective of a black man breaking through to the top levels in the entertainment industry, a trail blazer making it possible for Murphy and many others to follow, is Murphy allowed special consideration based on Cosby’s achievement for the black community?
Yes, I think so.
So this is firmly in ethical dilemma territory? Honor his significant professional accomplishments condemn his personal actions? So how does the historical entry read?
Ethics conflict, I think: competing ethics values. In this corner: kindness, gratitude, loyalty, compassion, the Golden Rule. In the other: fairness (anyone else would be mocked), respect (for the victims), responsibility (to the culture, integrity (of his profession). The ethics dilemma would be the Golden Rule vs. the non-ethical benefits to Murphy of making a national TV splash.
Was it ethical not to hurl rocks or dead cats at a man in the stocks? To make eye contact with Hester Prynne? As a very public peer of Cosby’s, the blow would have landed most solidly. Had he taken the shot – deserved as it may be – he would have been no villain. I like to think restraint, kindness, and mercy are still valuable ethical considerations, even if they are grossly misused in many ways today. Hero.
Question: is there a website somewhere that is cataloging corroborative evidence in the Cosby case? There must have been an investigative reporter by now checking people’s whereabouts on specific dates, checking out MD’s who are known to enable Hollywood drug users, checking out limo drivers/hotel employees and such. Has anyone* gone to print on subjects like these yet?
Given all the true believers at moveon.org and elsewhere throughout the left who still believe “I did not have sex with that woman, Monica Lewinsky” even after Clinton gave up his law license to settle the case against him, how is Cosby so effortlessly presumed guilty until proven … anything at all? Does a sufficient number of accusers and allegations overcome the supposedly sacrosanct presumption of innocence in American jurisprudence? The Cosby pitchfork campaign just strikes me as dissonant. Would he get a pass if he stopped doing things like expressing concern about black pathologies? (Am I playing a race card here?)
Although the story about Eddie Murphy not doing the skit for one reason or another may or may not be true, it’s kind of nice to at least think someone in Hollywood would even consider doing something kind, never mind without having his PR people issue a press release detailing and praising his actions for the waiting media beforehand.
Again, you’re innocent until proven guilty in the eyes of the LAW, not common sense, justice or fairness. Nobody’s putting Cosby is jail. That doesn’t mean that when a guy settles one case with a settlement and a confidentiality agreement and now over 30 unrelated women from different eras, to their detriment tell essentially the same story without Cos making an effort to substantively rebut any of them—“She says this happens when? I was in Bankok!“—as well as his refusal to deal with them directly or discuss them, is damning. I’d say the chances that he isn’t guilty are more than 1 in a billion. He’s never even uttered a Clintonian lie directly.
Why in the world would an unrepentant rapist who poses as a fatherly saint ever get or deserve a pass?
None of the thirty women went to the police? That’s like batting a thousand for an entire MLB career. How did that happen? Only one of them found their way to a plaintiff’s lawyer? Or vice versa? Shouldn’t suing Cosby have been an industry larger than the GDP of most second world countries? He has been active purportedly, what, three times longer than Michael Jackson was? Isn’t the fact he’s never been charged some sort of indictment of the U.S. legal system? Has the statute run on all of these allegations? Don’t some states’ statutes only begin to run from the time of reporting to the police? The Brits are prosecuting guys for incidents that occurred in the ’60s and ’70s (as long as they’re not Pakistanis from Rotherham). But you are right that the court of public opinion has different rules.
Oh, please. Read my posts on this. They were all in show business, and correctly concluded that they would be neither believed nor respected, given whom they would be accusing. They would be chewed up and destroyed by the PR machine and the press. None of the women who were molested by Bill Clinton or Bob Packwood went to the police either. Juanita Broderick didn’t report what she now says was rape. Have you been watching Biden harass women on camera???? Has one of them complained at all?
You’re not being rational or logical. Why a conspiracy from women ranging from 40-60, black and white, to smear “America’s Dad”?
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-31550251
Is it unethical for U.S. statutes of limitation to let off alleged rapists? I think rape and child molestation should have no statute of limitation, like murder. I’m not sure how the statutes work in the UK, but shouldn’t the US system be able to go after someone like Cosby? The Brits seem comfortable ignoring all the stale evidence and dead witnesses counter arguments.
No, I think it’s unethical NOT to have a SOL. The evidence in rape dissipates, and eye-witness testimony becomes more unreliable the farther it is from the event—absent a film or a confession, there would be inherent reasonable doubt. With murder, there’s a body, a weapon, DNA, material and tangible evidence. For the most part, and I’ve written about this, I think a really old rape accusation is unethical and inherently unfair. Remember, Bill opened the floodgates after decades himself, by attacking one victim and prompting others to come out in support, as well as by pushing the virtuous dad image ad nauseum, which was twisting the knife in his victims.
I think a really old rape accusation is unethical and inherently unfair.
That’s very interesting. I also wonder about the ethics of the victims who did nothing “because they were in show business.” What would your Dad have said upon hearing of that as an excuse for not going to the cops? Likely a sharp “So WHAT?” To have something that terrible happen to yourself or your child or a client and do nothing about it? That’s inexcusable behavior, much worse than a partner at Arthur Anderson just taking his check and hoping for the best.
Doing nothing because nobody will believe you and the man you’re accusing has the power to destroy you is a reasonable, if not a courageous, decision. Hollywood and politics are full of such serial molesters—Hitchcock comes to mind. Do you blame the altar boys who didn’t accuse their buggering, sainted priests? I don’t.
I’d probably blame any abused altar boys who kept their mouths shut because they wanted to get in on the priestly child molestation industry some day themselves. A more apt analogy?