OK Kids, He’s Dead. You Can Come Out Now.

There’s an old Yiddish saying-"alleh maisim tzadikim"-which, loosely translated, means "all the dead are righteous", or more specifically, one should never speak ill of the dead, at least not the recently departed. Thankfully, not all Yiddishisms, no matter how salient, have the force of a commandment. Even if it had in this case, I would have gladly—and publicly—broken it. As I will do now.

Sometimes, pop culture gets it right. One of those cases was OJ Simpson. Once it became obvious that he was the most likely culprit in the murders of his ex-wife and Ron Goldman, the entire country knew, no matter what the outcome of the trial, that his celebrity was radioactive; never again would he be able to cash in on his status as a pop culture icon, now forever tarnished. In fact, the oft-made observations made at the time regarding the Black/White divide in reaction to the verdict, while salient, overlooked the fact that the Black “cheering” for him had less to do with OJ than the perception that a historical pattern of racial bias in the American justice system had played out in reverse for once. OJ remained as much a cultural pariah after the acquittal, even in the Black community.

Like OJ, Michael Jackson escaped legal retribution for his misbehavior. Unlike OJ somehow he was able to maintain his privileged position in the pop culture pantheon, to the point his recent comeback shows in London sold out in a ridiculously short amount of time, this despite committing the “original sin” of “just don’t get caught with a dead girl…or live boy.” Not only did he get away with it [at least] twice, but he even practically bragged about it on national television in Martin Bashir’s 2003 ABC documentary. While much of the eulogies offered regarding Jackson praised his ostensible bridging of Black and White culture, this much is certain: his supporters during his legal difficulties cut across all ethnic and racial lines. In that sense, Al Sharpton was correct.

What is even more baffling in the case of Jackson is that America—if not the world—seemed willing to forgive him the one crime that usually garners more social opprobrium than murder: homosexual pedophilia. [It’s amazing that, in all of the garment-rending on TV that almost rivaled Obama’s groveling in Cairo, the only pundit that didn’t completely sacrifice his credibility was Geraldo Rivera, who had the audacity to suggest that Jackson somehow brought this all on himself.]

In trying to explain how this could happen, one might begin with the argument that Michael Jackson’s contributions to pop culture at large far outweighed those of, say, OJ Simpson. While this is true, I would say Jackson's status is highly overrated. One should remember, his self-coronation as "King Of Pop" occurred around 1991, when his slide into musical irrelevancy became more slippery and, concomitantly, his more bizarre behavioral tendencies became more pronounced. Take away his work as a child star [certainly, overwhelmingly the product of others’ imaginations and talents, though one should not overlook the price Jackson himself paid], and his total musical irrelevance after 1991 [his Greatest Hits album sold poorly, and his only post-1991 album of all-new material—2001’s “Invincible”—was DOA], and you’re left with four salient albums. No one can take much away from Off The Wall and Thriller—except when one considers that the real “genius” behind those albums was Quincy Jones and his production skills. Even those couldn’t save “Bad” [certainly an appropriate title for an album with only one good song, "Smooth Criminal"], and “Dangerous” had the misfortune to come out at the time when the Seattle scene began to overtake the music business, rendering it irrelevant almost immediately upon release.

More sacrilegious from a pop culture point of view were the comparisons to Elvis and the Beatles. Uh, no. Everything Michael Jackson succeeded in—recording, dancing, video media—was equaled or surpassed by Presley and the Fab Four, who certainly made more than four relevant albums, and actually played instruments; not to mention none of them had the 15-year headstart in the business that Jackson did. Jackson came along at the right time; Elvis and the Beatles created the zeitgeists that defined their times. [I’d even argue that Jimi Hendrix’ and Prince’ musical contributions are way more important, if one uses a crossover criterion.]

Nevertheless, that fact may provide the first explanation as to why Jackson kept getting free passes: as we were continually reminded, we “grew up with him”. I suppose one can’t underestimate the power of nostalgia, but also that people bizarrely considered him almost as a “family member”. It becomes difficult to re-examine such a childhood icon with a more jaundiced eye, even when the behavior of said icon becomes increasingly inexplicable. In fact, the media's treatment of him as a freak, while accurate, may have eventually led everyone to simply shrug their shoulders even as his behavior advanced from the grotesque to the reprehensible [viz., dangling his "son" over a hotel balcony]. Consider also that Jackson’s celebrity colleagues almost to a person categorically denied the possibility that Jackson could ever hurt a child, add the almost divine currency attributed to celebrity pronouncements to the penchant for nostalgia, and Jackson’s shield became almost impenetrable. It even served to exaggerate his cultural importance, which circuitously reinforced said shield.

A second explanation, a two-fold observation regarding child psychology and general attitudes toward others’ children, may be the most disturbing. By all accounts, during Jackson’s 2005 molestation trial, defense attorney Thomas Mesereau brilliantly dissected the accuser’s and his mother’s testimony, enough to elicit the eventual acquittal. At the time, I had a theory that, if the situation became dire, Jackson’s defense team had a “nuclear” option: to claim that Jackson was emotionally no more mature than his alleged victims and therefore, as an emotional [if not sexual] 12-year-old, could not form the requisite criminal intent. It never came to that, even if the spectacle of Neverland Ranch ensured that it would not take a trained psychologist to come to the same conclusion. The fact that people were willing to air this “excuse” for Jackson at the expense of his victims indicated that, in line with all the reason delineated above, there was always something more important to consider than the welfare of someone else’s children. [I always thought this was one of the fatal flaws in public education: the notion that someone would willingly cover someone else’s kid’s tuition. But that’s for another time.]

To provide a perfect summing-up: one item in Jackson’s oeuvre repeatedly touted as one of his greatest achievements was the “Thriller” video where Jackson turns into a monster onscreen. One wonders whether Jackson was trying to tell us something. Apparently, no one was really paying attention.

No one wanted to.