Friday, June 26, 2009
Some Thoughts on Michael Jackson
Does anybody else think the rapid deification of Michael Jackson is a little bit weird?
Granted, the guy DID just die. And there's no denying his achievements: the #1 selling music album in history... the moonwalk...
But let's not forget, he was also the trailblazing pioneer in the realm of washed-up celebrities prone to embarrassing meltdowns who seem to exist only for their next freak-show moment to be made public.
Seriously, y'all. Two days ago if I'd asked anybody what they thought of Michael Jackson, they'd have wrinkled their (normal-sized) noses and said, "Well, I like 'Thriller' but the man is a total perv who should have gone to jail for what he did with that kid from 'Home Alone'. Guilty, guilty, guilty."
But today, they've swept his baby-dangling episodes under the rug and all we're seeing are images of him at the height of his career in the bright and bouncy 80s. Nevermind the WEIRD goings-on at Neverland Ranch, his pet monkey Bubbles, his Frankenstein attempts at preserving his youth and beauty that resulted in his face melting off, and those curious rumors about the Elephant Man's skeleton hanging in his closet.
One friend said, "It really makes you think about your own mortality!"
I admit, even I was a teensy bit saddened by the news.
But now I understand why.
People aren't mourning Michael Jackson. They're mourning themselves. They're remembering those carefree childhood/adolescent days in the 80s when your Dad came home with individual copies of the BAD album for each of your siblings because you just COULD NOT SHARE something that rad. Michael Jackson's death really just reminds us that we're not children anymore. I'm not 8. I'm almost freakin' 30.
And that sort of thing makes everybody sad.
It's not like he was cut down in his prime, either. At least we'll always remember Marylin being eternally beautiful. No, with Michael we got to watch him decay into a pitiable sideshow attraction and are left with plenty of unpleasant memories of him.
It almost begs the question, if the Weekly World News online edition is to be believed, why he waited until NOW to fake his death instead of doing it YEARS ago.
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2 comments:
I've definitely been thinking the same: all the "memories" they've been showing of him, constantly, are him at his best. No freak show moments, or all the jokes I remember hearing about him on SNL and the like. One girl at work said she had her boyfriend and all his buddies at her house crying Thursday night over MJ's death. What? Did MJ bail them out of jail or save them from drowning once? I think it's not so much him they miss, but their own youth. Even MJ was doing all these crazy things you mentioned, in my opinion, to recapture an ideal childhood he didn't get to have. Kind of ironic that many are trying to kind of hold on to a 'childhood' they've noticed that they miss because of the death of MJ, but his own life was unraveling from trying to find that happy childhood experience he never even got to have.
Now THAT'S irony.
It's like, dude--it hasn't been the eighties for twenty years. Are you just now noticing you left your adolescence and can't go back and do it again? Did you really need Michael Jackson to die to remind you that nothing in this world is permanent?
And the thing is, when was the last time he had a smash hit? As far as I could tell, he was pretty much retired from the singing/dancing part of his life. Why didn't they cry then? Why didn't they cry when his skin went white and his nose started shrinking? When he stopped being the Michael Jackson who was so cool in 'Captain EO'?
But maybe it's an indication of something even more melancholy-- today, as we stand on the brink, on the verge of something very frightening, why-oh-why didn't we just LOVE every minute of that "simpler time" of big hair, bright colors, Ronald Reagan, writing letters on paper, and 'Thriller'.
But it's lost. We have smartphones and iPods now.
But mourning that you can't go back shouldn't be the end. After I read "Peter Pan" for the first time I thought, Wow. Yeah, leaving childhood behind and that steady march toward the grave is really sad--but what's the bright side that Barrie offers us? LIFE, LIVING will be an awfully big adventure.
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