Why We Really Miss Michael Jackson (Archived Blog - 1 Month Old)

Over the last week, there has been a gentle riff that the general public has been playing that strikes me as odd; Michael Jackson, the ultra-talented, deformed multi-millionaire who literally built an amusement park for himself, has gone from media leper to golden icon. The man who was once a condemned pervert and accused burn-out is now considered a golden memory, a legend born of time and tears. Even the moniker that everyone adopted after his death, 'Prince won', seems inaccurate: Prince LOST, as Michael is now more famous than ever and Prince has no chance of lighting up headlines this boldly with anything he is going to do, dying included. The reason for this is simple; people love dead people.


Let's do some grim reaper math here:

JFK + Bay of pigs = humiliation

JFK + Getting his head shot off of his shoulders = instant hero status


Now, I know I'm not the first person to point this out, I'm aware that everybody has an erection for the dead. It's just human nature. We regret, we feel pain for not having valued life the way we feel we should or should have, and eventually these feelings bleed (or maybe mutate) into projected feelings of warmth and appraisal for the deceased. Michael Jackson is simply the latest, albeit one of the biggest, that has rolled down the pike.


I think Michael Jackson did great things with his career, especially considering his childhood. It's a wonder he didn't become a drug addict or a paralyzed invalid at 26 (which is actually two years AFTER he released 'Thriller'), and in fact, looking back on everything that happened to him, he managed his pressures very well. Nobody could make a similar claim to having been the icon Michael undoubtedly was; Prince was amazingly popular, but never transcendently so, and during the early 90's, he began to lose his appeal and his edge and was subsequently ignored; Michael was in the news, no matter what, and whether it was celebrating Free Willy's escape in 93' or undergoing numerous (perhaps false) child abuse charges in on-and-off court battles.


MJ was a consistent presence in the 00's, long after the world had come to see him as a potential chart-topper, and LONG after he could make the kind of money from a record that would fund his ridiculously expensive personal life (and record-setting music videos). Everybody still knew him, although the nicknames given to him had changed to things that were considerably more insulting than, like 'Jack-o', or, my old stand-by, 'Skeletor'. His single 'You Rocked My World' sunk without a trace and initiated a creative undertow which sapped Michael of his resources (both monetary and health-wise) as he began re-grouping for a comeback that would never happen. Finally, on June 25th, Michael Jackson went into cardiac arrest, and died, at the age of 50. The very minute TMZ made reports that Michael was indeed dead (CNN, among others, were still hesitant), Facebook was flooded with Newsfeed updates such as 'R.I.P. MIchael' or, flatly, 'Michael's Dead'. The first time I saw these, I was admittedly in disbelief. Only recently have I realized the kernel of that reaction; I had, as the rest of the world had, as endless people had, as people no longer seem able to - thought of Michael Jackson as a given, a media fixture who would signal the passing decades of my life. The more he changed, the lower he sank, the greater Michael from the 80's became, the more perfect and surreal he was, the more timeless and wholesome. In a way, his great early success is his 'Rosebud' - a time of great joy that was quickly buried by disappointment, and in terms of his disfigurement, undiluted horror.


I originally wrote this note, yesterday, to ask people why they missed a man they had never met, or why they decided to jump on Michael's bandwagon literally hours after he could no longer thank them for it. I'm no closer to an answer than anyone could reasonably be, but I understand to some degree. I think it's shameful, weak, and opportunistic - more often than not - but it is the fate that all of us accepted early on in our lives when we heard his music as children and burned his image into our minds. It is the fate that he ultimately was destined for, a fate that, one way or the other, is the dream of all people; to be loved, unconditionally, for whatever length of time, by everyone. And if it took him 26 years of hell to achieve this, then what is our excuse to miss work, to sleep in, to moan about our daily hardships? My answer is a definite "I don't know".


What I do know:


I refuse to martyr him.
I will not be able to forget him.
We will hold his memory as a public into our dying days, and when prompted, we will have known where we were when we got the news. We were the spectators, and he was the sun, effortlessly compelling our interest, until we lost sight of our dreams and became a part of his.





Michael won.