Bill Cosby betrayed all the black people like me who grieve for what they thought he was

Bill Cosby – once an inspiration and encapsulation of the American dream – betrayed a lot of people. He betrayed the women he sexually abused. He betrayed his family and friends, many of whom stood by him because they didn’t want to believe he was capable of the things that he did. And he betrayed members of the black community, people like me who grew up watching him on TV in the Eighties.

He offered us hope. His apparent charm, wit and entrepreneurial success paved the way for a generation of black comedians and entertainers. It’s painful to know that a lot of that was a lie.

There’s no denying, despite his horrific crimes, that Cosby was one of the greatest entertainers of his time. In Britain there were not many black faces on TV at the time. Watching The Cosby Show on Channel 4 allowed me to learn more about my roots, culture and background. It provided a world in which people like me would grow up to be successful, respected, beloved.

The fictional character Dr Huxtable, played so expertly by Cosby, depicted what every black person wanted to achieve: a life where stereotypes and prejudices were shrugged off, where they hadn’t affected the character’s life in any discernible way. The Huxtable family lived in a big house; they were black; and they were prosperous and well-regarded. Their example set the foundation for what many black Americans aspired towards. Cosby and his fellow actors in The Cosby Show opened doors to allow mainstream America and the world to understand what it was like at the time to be middle class, black and ambitious.

Now his criminal conviction has shattered those memories. It is hard to accept he is a criminal, and was a criminal all the time that we looked up to him – but we must be brave enough to accept what he did. It happened, and it’s important to make sure that it doesn’t happen again under any circumstance by anyone in a similar position. Plainly this was nothing to do with race, but with gender and with Hollywood. We can’t be blinded by our previous admiration to him to the point where we defend someone who let us all down.

This betrayal has not only affected African Americans but a wider generation of Americans who regarded him as Bill Cosby the elder statesman; the uncle; the father figure who was a laughable, kind and sincere person. Cosby was a respected and ambitious creative, and merely through his appearance on TV, he did much to further integration and diversity in western culture.

So what went wrong? What led him to be deceitful? We may never know or be told, but one thing is for certain: his work will now have to be dismissed in light of what we know about him. Cosby should have admitted fault from the outset but he resisted and, in doing so, mocked everything he said he had stood for in his previous life: fairness, equality and respect. He added his name on to the American wall of shame.

This is a painful moment for every African American who adored him for what we thought he stood for and the way in which his work increased visibility – positive visibility – of black people in the US. I understand why many may not want to accept the verdict. Some will say that it was the system against him, the status quo trying to bring another black man down. Denial in our pain is expected. This man meant everything to us.

But we need to remember that Bill Cosby made this happen. There was nothing we could have done to stop it. He did not represent the black community when he carried out disgusting sexual assaults. We once looked up to him; now we must, with heavy hearts, look down on him.

Now we have the verdict, we need to ask why we ignored the cries for help from women who had been harmed by him. Did we want to protect Cosby due to his heritage and powerful connections? Undoubtedly. We allowed Cosby to take advantage of us and mislead us.

What Cosby built sadly has diminished. I sincerely hope he regrets what he did – most of all to the people he directly harmed, and secondly to the black children who wanted to be him when they grew up and now are left with nothing more than a sick feeling in the pits of their stomachs.