Excerpts from Bill Cosby's speech, as quoted in the Washington Post:

"Ladies and gentlemen, the lower economic people are not holding up their end in this deal," he declared. "These people are not parenting. They are buying things for kids -- $500 sneakers for what? And won't spend $200 for 'Hooked on Phonics.' . . .

"They're standing on the corner and they can't speak English," he exclaimed. "I can't even talk the way these people talk: 'Why you ain't,' 'Where you is' . . . And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. And then I heard the father talk. . . . Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads. . . . You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth!"

The Post's Hamil Harris reports that Cosby also turned his wrath to "the incarcerated," saying: "These are not political criminals. These are people going around stealing Coca-Cola. People getting shot in the back of the head over a piece of pound cake and then we run out and we are outraged, [saying] 'The cops shouldn't have shot him.' What the hell was he doing with the pound cake in his hand?"

There is not a single thing that Bill Cosby said in his remarks that couldn't be applied to some of the white kids I meet every week of my life. Yesterday, for instance: Groups of bored, semiliterate kids hanging out in the library, which is OK, until they get loud and crude, and then we start the tag routine, chasing them from floor to floor, giving them their warnings, calling each other on the phone for updates, until they are expelled out of the air conditioning. (Yesterday, in electronic pursuit of a particularly obnoxious group of boys who I had admonished about shoes on the upholstery, sticking body parts in the copier, and standing on the windowsills, I called downstairs to alert the circ desk to their movements. "Incoming," I said. A patron browsing the video racks next to youth reference started to laugh.) I'm not sure who urinated in the tall trash can in the family restroom, but my list of suspects is short. It includes no one who understands the rules of polite behavior. And I can tell you, from the actual witness of my eyes, the only people of African descent on the floor all day were a fellow employee and her family. Mr. Cosby put it right where it belongs: not a matter of race, not a matter of culture, but a matter of class, in the sense of class as manners.

And it's just as he said: I blame the kids until I hear the parents. The kids hang out until it gets too dark to be on the streets, and go home to parents who haven't bothered to keep track of them, and who tell them to get themselves something to eat and be quiet. It doesn't matter what they're doing while they're being quiet.

Multicultural? Mr. Cosby, in these brief quotes from what were longer remarks, made no mention of non-English speakers, but of speakers who mangle their first language. He made no mention of people wearing turbans or head coverings, but of people who spend money on superfluous apparel that would be better spent on other things. He made no mention of people who give to ethnic or religious charities, but of people who take things that don't belong to them.

He criticized black citizens for these behaviors, because he is black. I criticize everyone who comes into my library who displays these behaviors, because I am a librarian. We all share a responsibility for enforcing civilized behavior, all in our own spheres of influence. Differing cultures have nothing to do with it.

If anyone is concerned that he would be called a racist for pointing out these behaviors among black people, he can rejoice: there are plenty of white people who need similar correction. Go forth and civilize! We can only improve the world.