King maker — King of pop

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Michael Jackson the King of Pop passed away today at the age of 50. He was one of the greatest phenomena of the twentieth century. He was on the verge of making a major comeback in London next month.

From childhood Michael Jackson was a well known and popular performer as part of a family act “The Jackson Five”. In the 1980s he revolutionized pop culture with original dance moves during his performances such as the Moonwalk.
In addition to live concerts and recordings he made several hit videos and films.

Accusations of child molestation adversely affected his career and caused a great loss of popularity and consequently serious financial difficulties.
He was married twice, once to the daughter of Elvis Presley and once to his dermatologist’s nurse with whom he had a son and a daughter. His third child, a boy, was born from a surrogate mother who remained anonymous.

Although many considered him odd in his personal life with his unusual family and constant plastic surgeries that continually altered his appearance no one would argue his genius as an artist and performer. In addition to being wildly popular he was a pioneer in his field.

Michael Joseph Jackson (8, 29, 1958- 6, 25, 2009) was the world’s most famous African American entertainer there ever was. Michael, Child prodigy began his career at the age of 5 and quickly rose to be the world renowned “King of pop”. Michael Jackson was a heap of broken images. As the cartoon character Shrek characterized himself as being like an onion and made of layers, Jackson too is a tormented soul with masked layers.

Most great artists and geniuses of history have been mosaics of conflicting ideas, visions and fantasies. As for Michael Jackson, all kinds of derogatory names have been thrown at him for nearly two decades. He was the poster boy for the predatory tabloids, celebrity critics and grubby reviewers as well as omniscient media pundits masquerading as instant psychoanalysts, the jury and the judge.

However, the final verdict of “not guilty” at his trial earlier this year was a stunning blow to the sensational press as well as the mainstream editors, on-the-air pundits and oracular columnists, and the ultimate justice for the King of Pop. The irony of the end of the jury trial is the beginning of the speculative press, hatching new theories questioning the innocence of Jackson. The sensational media were stubbornly reluctant to “acquit” him as innocent. Let’s take a close look at the underlying crosscurrents of the Jackson controversy, raked by the media and relished by a large segment of Blacks who distance themselves from the smeared image of the singer.

Although the main charge against Jackson was child molesting by luring kids to his Neverland ranch, the media hounded him on other counts which were not tried in the court. The American media poisoned the pool of public opinion by caricaturing Jackson’s erratic behavior – the bleaching of his skin and the surgical alterations of his nose and face. The press and the pundits seldom mention that Jackson had for a long time been treated for vitiligo, a skin disease characterized by white patches on various parts of the body and caused by the loss of the natural pigmentation. The Jackson detractors invariably glossed over the angst over his speckled image on stage, on the beach or at home.

The result has been a retreat into changeability. Columnist Gary Young asserts that with his “raised cheekbones, thinned nose and lightened skin,” Jackson transformed himself into a “trans-racial experiment, a combination of features,” neither black or white, altering his face beyond all racial definition. Terry Eagleton, professor of cultural theory at Manchester University, depicts Michael as “a decaying infant” with an “over-chiseled nose” and “bleached skin.” He concludes that “The individual is now a self-fashioning creature, whose supreme achievement is to treat himself as a work of art.” But what is wrong with a “self-fashioning” artist, not a creature, treating himself as a work of art? Jackson is proving right Descartes, who said: “I think, therefore I am.” Another philosopher, Tagore, said that the ultimate goal of a true artist was when they eventually changed into a work of art themselves. In a narcissistic culture, who doesn’t want to embellish his image or get a “make-over” personality? (Especially if you are a global pop icon and target of the sensational media.)

“But if you’re thinking about my baby,
It don’t matter if you’re black or white.”

The unforgiving segment of the African-American community still chastises Michael for his tawdry attempts to erase any trace of his African-American features and heritage by the scalpel, bleach and through marrying white women and begetting lightskinned cherubs.

Jackson reminds me of another Michael, of the Renaissance. “I’m not well designed,” thought the 13-year-old Michelangelo, sitting before the mirror and sketching his own face. “My head is out of rule, with the forehead overweighing my mouth and chin. Someone should have used a plumb line.” Jackson is the same tormented spirit of our age, an artist trapped by self-doubt and a quest for the ultimate experience of truth and reality bordering fantasy. In his hit single Black or White, the singer writes:
Writer Fahizah Alim said that before the acquittal, “Jackson’s whitened skin, white wives and weird ways deleted much of his support in the African-American community years ago.” She even predicted that had there been a guilty verdict, much of the collective outrage would have come from Jackson’s European fans. Earl Ofari Hutchinson, author of Beyond OJ: Race, Sex and Class Lessons for America, says that Jackson’s bizarre behavior and the nature of the child molestation charges are “a big turnoff” in the African-American community. “There is no sympathy for that one in the Black community. It is the worst of the worst.” However, a lot of African Americans who understand the process of smearing, branding and exiling Black achievers, have begun to identify with Jackson’s plight and articulate their support for him. Levy Daugherty, founder and president of the King Maker Foundation, says that Michael’s childhood had been stolen by the greed of his parents, and that once he had become a star, the recording industry and the media destroyed his reputation.

Other supporters include civil rights activist Najee Ali, the director of Project Islamic Hope who organized a “We Are the World” motor caravan to demonstrate support for the pop singer in front of the courthouse. “I am not even a fan of Michael’s,” he told reporters. “I am a fan of social justice. Just because his behavior is eccentric doesn’t mean that he molested a child. We are rallying behind Michael because he represents or embraces his black heritage. We support him because he is being railroaded because he is black, whether he knows it or not.” Meanwhile, Jackson’s alliance with the Nation of Islam, former presidential candidate Rev. Al Sharpton, and Rev. Jesse Jackson of the Rainbow Coalition is interpreted as a “black celebrity marriage made in opportunism,” according to columnist Gary Younge. Conspiracy theorists believe that the incessant child abuse allegations against Jackson are motivated by the greed of those who are in the recording industry. They are adamant that these corporate thieves are bent on stealing Jackson’s 50 percent ownership in Sony/ATV Company. It is a veritable monopoly that owns a copious catalog of songs, including 251 popular Beatles tunes, and hit songs by Bob Dylan.

Some argue that hard-core racists hiding under the shield of law enforcement and the information industry are the true culprits fabricating lies about Jackson to push him off the pedestal of pop music. They do not want any competition to the other “king,” Elvis Presley, and his Graceland, the second-mostvisited tourist shrine of America, next to the White House. If they can smear and dethrone the King of Pop, there will be no Neverland. Rev. Douglas Moore, the second and last chairman of the United Black Front - founded by the late Stokely Carmichael, a.k.a Kwame Toure - adduces several reasons for the branding of Jackson as narcissist and puerile minstrel.

“First of all, Blacks who achieve significant political, economic, social or cultural power,” says Moore, “are targets for distortion, denigration and destruction.” There are countless Black leaders, artists and entrepreneurs, who have been systematically smeared, prosecuted , imprisoned or exiled: Congressman Adam Clayton Powell of New York; NAACP leader Medgar Evers; Malcolm X; Jackie Robinson; Paul Robeson; W.E.B. DuBois; Marcus Garvey; Muhammad Ali; historian Cornel West - so goes the endless list of persecuted Black leaders, victims of smear campaigns, according to Moore.

The plight of successful Black men has been captured in a 1970 bronze sculpture titled “Target” by Elizabeth Catlett, a famous African- American artist and sculptor. The bronze head of a Black man, focused in the telescopic eye of a gun, is displayed in the art gallery of Tulane University, New Orleans.

Many of these men have not only been targeted by racists. Rev. Douglas Moore also ridicules some of the kowtowing Black leaders who ironically join in the mudslinging at the racist targets themselves. For instance, the late Black journalist Carl T. Rowan made a brutal characterization of Malcolm X immediately after his assassination. Rowan, a protégé of President Kennedy, was head of the US Information Services when he spoke of Malcolm as “another pimp and dope peddler.”

One of the fatal mistakes that Michael Jackson committed, according to Moore, was his marriage to Elvis Presley’s daughter, Lisa Marie. “You don’t marry the queen. That’s against the social decorum and Southern etiquette, which unleashed the hidden fury of the dominant race against a larger-than-life target, the King of Pop.”

The trial, which started as a global media circus, ended like a backyard grill disaster. All the mendacious fabrications of the accuser son and his theatric mother, buttressed up by an overzealous DA, fell apart like a card castle under the cross-examination of defense attorney Thomas Messereau.

Jackson, however, lost the joy of winning the case. With the trial amplified by the media, there was a suspension of disbelief among the public. Once it was all over, sixty-two percent of polled whites still believed that Jackson was guilty of child molestation and a confirmed pedophile. A number of blacks also claimed that Jackson was guilty and displayed the traits of a pedophile, based on the random clips and cameos flashed on the TV screen.

Some of the media pundits portrayed the verdict as “celebrity justice” with some even evoking the fractured images of O.J. Simpson, who was famously acquitted of murdering his wife.

Jackson’s tangled images - a supreme artist with compulsive infantile expressions, an obsession with his body image, falsetto voice, and generous but unacceptable overtures to boys - have all contributed to his freakish public image.

No wonder Walter Scott of Parade Magazine said recently that even Benny Medina, the superstar manager responsible for Mariah Carey’s comeback, will be helpless in reclaiming Jackson’s image at this late stage of his career. “The King of Pop, 46, needs an illusionist like David Blaine to make all the negative images of him disappear from public consciousness,” Scott said.

That is a cynical prediction, if not an illicit generalization, about a proven genius with abundant talents of mythical proportions. His greatest albums and works are yet to come. Like Sammy Davis Jr. and Duke Ellington, Michael Jackson will work to trailblaze new entertainment formats in his late years. That is the only way to redeem his career, honor and trust with his fans and race.

Facts:

• 260 million The total number of worldwide album sales
• 60 million copies of Thriller have been sold worldwide - the best selling album of all time. “Dangerous” and BAD are second and third.
• 8 Grammys were won by Jackson in 1984 - the most ever won by an artist in one year
• “Billie Jean” was the first video to air on MTV by a black artist