Alexander Tamargo/Getty ImagesJay Leno understands the allegations of abuse against Bill Cosby are no laughing matter.
What he doesn't understand, however, is why there's doubt about the veracity of these troubling claims. During a Q&A session Wednesday at the NAPTE conference in Miami, Leno spoke about the Cosby controversy with Tom Papa, saying, per Variety, "I don't know why it's so hard to believe women."
"You go to Saudi Arabia and you need two women to testify against a man," he added. "Here you need 25."
The former Tonight Show host noted that allegations against Cosby were thrust back into the spotlight when comedian Hannibal Burress "made a flat-out statement that reverberated around the world" during one of his standup performances (which later made its way online in the form of a viral video).
"On any other media that would have been edited," said Leno. "People are getting news unfiltered now"—something Leno believes to be a good thing.
However, one of the women who claims to have been sexually assaulted by Cosby, Barbara Bowman, was bothered by the fact that Burress' comments picked up steam whereas hers over the past 10 years had not. In a piece for the Washington Post, she wrote, "While I am grateful for the new attention to Cosby's crimes, I must ask my own questions: Why wasn't I believed? Why didn't I get the same reaction of shock and revulsion when I originally reported it? Why was I, a victim of sexual assault, further wronged by victim blaming when I came forward? The women victimized by Bill Cosby have been talking about his crimes for more than a decade. Why didn't our stories go viral?"
Cosby and his attorney have consistently denied Bowman's claims as well as all other allegations of sexual abuse made against him. Additionally, the Cosby Show patriarch has never been criminally charged with any wrongdoing.