Opinion: What Killed Michael Jackson? We Did
by
reporter Brett Warner
As previously speculated, the planned Discovery Channel special
Michael Jackson’s Autopsy: What Really Killed Michael Jackson
has been “postponed indefinitely” following a barrage
of intense complaints from fans and members of Jackson’s
estate, as well as legal ramifications involving a court appearance
by Jackson’s on hand doctor, Conrad Murray, later this
week. The desperately perverse ratings trap— excuse me,
“hour long special”-- was purported to include a graphic
re-enactment of the King of Pop’s 2009 autopsy.
With the continuation of seemingly endless airtime devoted to
the late entertainer—not to mention the Frankenstein’s
monster cut & paste job calling itself Michael, in stores
now--, many casual observers and even Jackson’s most dedicated
fans seem to miss the tragic irony of what really lead to MJ’s
death in the first place: the media. Yes, before all the veils
and hats, before all the child molestation allegations and bizarre
rumors, before the pressure-induced drug habits and before Conrad
Murray, there was just Michael… and a couple billion of
us, staring at him. The more we bought into Michael Jackson,
the more private he became, secluding himself away from the
constant attention and intense scrutiny that we love to douse
over our celebrities. Like a lone waffle drowning in a plateful
of syrup, Michael Jackson had too much on him, too often, and
for too long. For all the media boo-hooing following his death,
nobody seems to remember a significant portion of the music
itself: “Scream”, “Leave Me Alone”, “Tabloid
Junkie”, “Stranger In Moscow”, even the awkwardly
produced “Breaking News” off the new CD— all
blatant tales of prosecution, loneliness, and forced martyrdom
written by a guy who paid dearly, mentally and physically, for
our insatiable interest in him.
Did Michael Jackson deserve all the endless coverage? Probably.
Was his untimely death a tragedy? Absolutely, of course. Yet
any culture capable of addressing life and death in terms of
profitability needs to take a giant Moonwalk step backwards
and look at what it’s become. How sick are we that we’ve
trained our television networks to literally cut up our icons
for our mild, semi-curious amusement? What I find infinitely
more offensive than the Discovery Channel’s pathetic attention-grabber
is the fact that a year and a half after his demise, we’re
still stabbing at Jackson’s corpse like a giant circle
of Roman senators, each taking their turn at twisting the blade.
I’ll tell you what killed Michael Jackson: being Michael
Jackson. Yes, living life as the King of Pop is fatal. Now we
know. I’ve long contented myself to the fact that Jackson
was an extremely talented singer, writer, performer, and all
around interesting public figure who captured the world’s
collective imagination--good and bad--for more than thirty years,
and perhaps his eventual decline was inevitable. Although he
famously once sang that “they don’t really care about
us”, the truth is, we cared way too much. The best way
to honor Michael Jackson’s memory, after all the harm we’ve
already done, is to just simply let him be. It was all he ever
really wanted in the first place.
