In what has to go down as the Least Surprising ConclusionTo An Entertainer’s Biographytm of all time, TMZ is reporting that Michael Jackson has taken the Big Moon Walk at the tender age of 50.
(LA Times confirms)
* And don’t waste your time or mine piling on. You know what I’m talking about.
Update: Prize for the best backhanded obituary of the day goes to Associated Press…
He was perhaps the most exciting performer of his generation, known for his backward-gliding moonwalk, his feverish, crotch-grabbing dance moves and his high-pitched singing, punctuated with squeals and titters.
h/t Ed S.
Update 2: – Racist!
One last comment:
A “tragic childhood” is a 4 year old in Bangladesh with retinoblastoma. A “tragic life” is a Russian teenager sold into the sex trade.
Michael Jackson did not have a tragic childhood, nor did he have a tragic life.
He had the life he chose.
To excuse his behavior as though it was simply a pre-programmed result of his years as a child performer is not just intellectually lazy, it’s an insult to every individual who has overcome true childhood hardship, deprivation and/or abuse to emerge as a functioning member of society.
Michael Jackson was no bobbing cork on the sea of circumstance – he was a multi-millionaire with the means to choose any lifestyle he wanted. “Functional adult” was one of the options. He chose otherwise.
Celebrate the music if you like, but for decency’s sake, don’t celebrate the man.
Ben, he unquestionally was a freak. The whole world has been aware of that for many years now. So exactly how would mentioning that qualify as angry, insensitive, and arrogant? Or is it just your opinion that anyone not weeping and anguished over his death fits that description?
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As for Jackson, I didn’t like any of his music (except the song he sang for the movie “Willard” titled “Ben”). I thought it was rather pathetic that he thought he had to grab his crotch repeatedly in his performances.
That being said, I did recognize considerable talent, both as a singer and dancer. He could have produced much better quality.
Kate wins that hand…
Why is it that ‘celebrity’ trumps all, speaking of card games.
If you (bleeding hearts)found out that one of your neighbors had been diddling your prepubescent son or daughter I’m guessing that the Crown Prosecutor would be looking at filing Murder two charges against you.
Who is this Michael Jackson you are speaking of…?
TJ @8:41 – “Jackson and Mike Tyson have some things in common…” and both had/have freakishly high, squeaky, childlike voices. Both were/are into facial self-mutilation. Huh.
Me, I’d have locked the kid in the toolshed before letting Michael Jackson babysit, just to be on the safe side, but I don’t think he was a child molester, just a trauma victim so isolated from reality by stardom that he never realized how creepy and awful it was for a chronological adult to try to live out some fantasy of a pain-free existance by pretending to be a child and trying to make “friends” with children.
On the other hand, “Bad” is one of the two earliest songs recorded in my mental hard-drive. And when he was good (and I sure don’t mean “Bad”), he was so d*mn good. I’ll really miss him. Poor M.J.
Yes, once Jackson got out from under his father’s influence, his problems were self-inflicted. Neither his father nor his family made him choose to sculpt his face into something resembling a police sketch of a suspected felon.
Well, yes, freak show he was or became. He started out as this amazing little kid — that’s who I remember. While all the other little girls my age were nuts over Donny Osmond, I liked Michael. I also liked the Jackson Five cartoon.
I couldn’t stand to look at him in later years — too freaky. And his death shouldn’t come as much of a surprise; he’s looked sickly for a long time.
But some of the sickest people are the parents who let their little ones have “sleep-overs” with him. Money meant that much to them?
I am really hoping, though, that this whole thing doesn’t turn into another Princess Di – yuck!
Hilarious clicking around the news this morning… old white guys like Mike Barnacle on MSNBC talking about how Michael touched their souls. Nothing funnier than someone pretending the mandatory schtick is from the heart.
Can you imagine the Happy Dance that SC Governor Mark Sanford is doing this morning? That guy was set to be THE news cycle for the next week. He was going to be drawn, quartered, filleted, buttered and served up all day and through the weekend. And now… yesterday’s news.
In terms of celebrity poker, a dead diddler trumps an adulterous politician… even a Republican one.
Note to self: If I ever get caught running around… pray for the untimely death of a famous freak.
Check out Kate’s Update 2:- Racist! and learn some sensitivity from the lefties. Isn’t Zorpheous at 7:11 the same person that cruises by SDA occasionally? And how about that balbulican?
“To excuse his behavior as though it was simply a pre-programmed result of his years as a child performer is not just intellectually lazy, it’s an insult to every individual who has overcome true childhood hardship, deprivation and/or abuse to emerge as a functioning member of society. ”
Thank you muchly for this statement. It applies in so many other circumstances – the experiences of Aboriginal people comes ot mind.
There are many of us who had childhoods filled all sorts of deprivations and dysfunction. I remember making the choice at age 10 that once able to choose my own path I would choose differently. That was in 1991. I’m not sure whether there are enough glimmers of principles such as meritocracy, individualism and hard work filtering into public schools to allow kids to believe in their power to make that type of choice any more.
“He had the life he chose.
To excuse his behavior as though it was simply a pre-programmed result of his years as a child performer is not just intellectually lazy, it’s an insult to every individual who has overcome true childhood hardship, deprivation and/or abuse to emerge as a functioning member of society.
Michael Jackson was no bobbing cork on the sea of circumstance – he was a multi-millionaire with the means to choose any lifestyle he wanted. “Functional adult” was one of the options. He chose otherwise.”
Thanks for that Kate – The Truth, laid bare.
This provides a nice destraction for the masses this week, time to ram some legislation down thier throats,the global warming bill comes to mind. Almost like they had it planned this way.
MJ’s death couldn’t happen soon enough for Gov. Sanford. Wow – what a lynchmob frenzie by the left-leaning MSM!
Now MJ can be reunited with his nose.
Re Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough: At least he still had a face, and a handsome one. And, what’s with all the debris in the background? What kind of outerspace was Jackson in?
‘Just a precursor to his future life?
This is the first time in Two Years that Obama has been out of the “news cycle”, wasn’t it pleasant!
Oh, but I’m sure Him and Ralm will be able to use this distraction to their benefit somehow. (like ram through cap an’ trade)
Walking around out and about today, I don’t see any black arm bands. No flags at half staff. No silent parades of mourners.
What I see is people going about their daily usual, ignoring a conflagration of wall to wall Michael Jackson Everything on all the media. Web included, here we are talking about it.
Earlier I made a joke about Farrah Fawcet. According to my core beliefs, she’s laughing at it right now. She lived well, and died well and now goes onward to her just rewards. Ave atque vale, Farrah Fawcett. And to everyone else who died well yesterday but didn’t get on TV.
Either a human being has the power of free choice or they don’t. Normal people in our culture assume they do. the media assumes they don’t. Hence the feeding frenzy over Michael Jackson’s self inflicted departure.
It only seems harsh if you think people are robots. So if I’m harsh, if Kate seems harsh, you might want to think about that a little bit. Or you can just curse me and move on, I’m good with it either way frankly.
He was a super talent, there’s no denying it.
Here’s my favorite video by MJ.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Hg-IRZk4D0
Is Dirty Diana, demerol?
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/michaeljackson/dirtydiana.html
A super talent that turned into a drugged degenerate child rapist.
A Princess Diana maudilin faux grief twisters a comin…
Everyone to the cellar!
Come on…’the quality of mercy’ still exists in all of us.
I have to admit I can’t comment on MJ’s music; I never heard it (that I know of)..same with the Beatles, Presley and all the other pop culture. For some odd reason, it and I slipped past each other even though we shared the same planet during the same years. It can happen, after all.
I agree that Jackson’s neurotic obsession with transforming his body and face into what it wasn’t is neurotic. His attempt to return to a pre-adolescent childhood ..by having ‘sleep-overs’ with young boys..(and I think Jackson was asexual and that nothing happened)..well, it’s all weird.
And yes, we are able to and even required to make choices that are constructive rather than self-destructive. He consistently and relentlessly made the latter.
I still think that, as we are all human and might, possibly, be weak and unable to be constructive in some areas in our own lives…that we owe him the courtesy of mercy.
“How much of his success was due to his own talent, and how much to the talent of Quincy Jones?
I’m just askin’.” Posted by: Imethisguy at June 25, 2009 8:41 PM
That was the most relevant comment in the string regarding Michael Jacksons great success. Without Quincy producing and arranging Thriller and others, Jackson’s music may have been lost in the stupidity of the 80s music.
It’s a shame, perhaps inexcusablethat MJ turned into what he was with all his resources…BTW did anyone ever notice any little girls in his presence over the years? Hmmmmm……
ET: Thank you for bringing some sanity back to this thread. Regardless of what anyone things personally, MJ leaves behind three children that are morning the lose of their father right now. There nightmare is just beginning. I couldn’t have said it better than what you eloquently wrote in your last line. Mercy and Peace.
At least Gov. Sanford was having heterosexual sex with an adult.
Jackson was just another profligate, sexually perverted freak. This world is better off without him.
Yes, those would be the children he’d hide under blankets and dangle off balconies.
(Oh, and the same children whose father converted a $19m yearly income into a massive debt. Now, that’s responsible parenting!)
Celebrate the music if you like, but for decency’s sake, don’t celebrate the man
Thank you, some one had to say it. He dead, everyone get over move on. There’s far more important things in the world than MJ.
I’m 99.99% sure an angry parent got him
Micheal Jackson lost his credibility when he paid off the little kids family. he made his bed and had to lie in it. I echo Bob’s comment at 9:38 this couldn’t have come at a worse time to distract from Cap and trade. Cap and trade will break the western way of life. The MSN wants that.
Oh Kate, stick a sock in it and show some class for once in your life. The interpretation you have of him is at least partially attributable to an obsessed tabloid media sensationalizing every movement the guy made. He may or may not have been a great father, he may have looked weird, he may have done horrible things (for which he was aquitted of..later it emerged that the family charging him had a history of trying to extort money). My point what do you really know about him vs the depiction you have received from an over obsessed media and in any regard show some mercy. If you’re a Christian act the part, his judgement is in god’s hands now so give it a rest.
He chose otherwise.
Kate, That would make for a great new category to go along with Y2Kyoto, Tony Blair’s Britain, Not Waiting for the Asteroid, etc.
Being the same age as MJ, I have had the almost life-long displeasure of hearing his horrible singing, crappy lyrics and seeing his hilarious image. Even back in grade 6 in 1970 I cringed at the sound of his voice. (The Jackson Five were a joke to most kids I knew back then.) I suppose now we’ll be hearing even more of it as the world mourns the loss of this “talented entertainer”.
Just realized how different a reality I inhabit when I don’t recall any of MJ’s music aside from “Eat it” which my wife informed me yesterday was a Weird Al Yankovich song. Most likely I heard MJ’s music at some point during the 1980’s but it was not something that made any impression unlike The Cars or Dire Straights which were the memorable bands of that era. No-one I used to associate with back then listened to MJ (or at least admitted to it).
Just realized how different a reality I inhabit when I don’t recall any of MJ’s music aside from “Eat it” which my wife informed me yesterday was a Weird Al Yankovich song.
I was really young when Michale Jackson’s career was at its peak (in my opinion). “Thriller” came out a few months before I was even born.
I remember watching “Bad” for the first time, confusing it with Weird Al’s “Fat” video, and being very disappointed when Michael Jackson failed to balloon up.
Always room for an unkind word here (especially when talking about blacks/Indians/gays/Muslims).
This creep is one big reason why so much talentless junk made it big. Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake to name just two. It’s not about the music anymore. It’s about the dancing, choerography, costumes, sex exhibitionism, videos and merchandise.
None can play an instrument including their own vocal chords.
BTW, the narcissist in chief is probably twitching that he his not the top news story right now…Watch for a teleprompter sermon or a bogus, pre scripted press conference any minute now…Probably to sob about poor Jackson, the white cream on top, Orio boy.
Mary:
We don’t care about anyone’s opinion when their knee jerk reaction to everything is a cry of “racism”. You do a disservice to true racism in this world.
My post should read:
You do a disservice to identifying true racism in this world.
Because of people like you Mary,the word racism and the eye roll come hand in hand.
Chairman, you and your friends are providing fine service to racism.
Now Mary can judge friends of people she never met while shouting racism from the rooftops.
I’m talking about his ilk here.
Mary Sunshine,
the notorious and scandalous Michael Jackson just died, Farah Fawcett just passed away from cancer, and David Carradine died practicing some kind of auto-erotic sex act.
And out of all of this the only thing that you can come up with is an unwarranted attack on a Saskatchewan blogger.
This is really a new low in originality.
mary sunshine – don’t be stupid.
Stupid behaviour has nothing to do with one’s ‘race’, ethnicity or religion. If someone makes bad life choices, and it can’t be disputed that Jackson made some very bad decisions, these decisions that he made had nothing to do with his ‘race’, ethnicity, religion etc.
Are you seriously suggesting that IF someone is ‘black/native/gay/Muslim’ that they are incapable of making bad life decisions? Or that their decisions are directly caused by their being ‘black/native/gay/Muslim’? That’s nonsense.
Kate: “Grown men who sleep with little boys behind a phalanx of security cameras should not be celebrated in life, or in death”.
Mary Sunshine: “Racist!”
You really take idiot to a whole new level, Mark.
I partially agree with Right Honorable Terry Tory about the decline in pure musical and vocal abilities over the years; listening to a CD without the videos is testiment to that.
I disagree with him about Obama not being the top story today….it’s better for him that the Cap-and-Trade legislation will be voted on without full knowledge by the public or even by Congress.
As a parent I find it morally reprehensible to financially contribute to a person who I believe guilty of abusing children. He made the initial $20 million dollar payoff that we know of, then was charged with molesting another boy.
When you buy his music, listen on the radio, watch a tv show or movie that uses his music, he received payment.
Yeah, he was never convicted. And OJ was innocent as found by a court of law.
jay – since I wasn’t there, I don’t know if Jackson was guilty of abusing children.
Such a correlation that you’ve made is as valid/invalid as your suggestion that because OJ was found not guilty and presumably was guilty, that therefore Jackson’s innocence was equally invalid.
My own ignorant view is that Jackson was, all his life, not a grown man but a pre-adolescent and asexual individual. Sleeping in the same bed with young children would have been, to him, akin to him being the same age as they were.
Whatever – since we really don’t know and can’t know, I think it’s best to view the situation from a distance and with ..mercy.
Mark Steyn’s obit, Ave atque vale:
http://www.steynonline.com/content/view/2196/28/
The profound statement by Kate bears repeating:
“Michael Jackson was no bobbing cork on the sea of circumstance – he was a multi-millionaire with the means to choose any lifestyle he wanted. “Functional adult” was one of the options. He chose otherwise.
Celebrate the music if you like, but for decency’s sake, don’t celebrate the man.”
Posted by Kate at June 25, 2009 6:14 PM
And race bloody well doesn’t enter into it!
Truth is, whether it’s Barry Bonds or MJ, wealthy black men are probationary whites until they f..k up. Then all of sudden, you hear hoopin’ and hollerin’ about “celebrating his achievements but not the man” b.s…
Face it, only wealthy white men can be “eccentric”; black men, of course, are the embodiment of deviance. OJ screwed it up for everyone.
BTW, where is Klaus von Bulow and that Heinz ketchup guy who used to drive an army tank through the streets and had a thing for Olympic wrestlers, so much so that he killed one?
Funny how white folks forget about that shyte. It is also obvious that there is still frustration in modern society that these boys can’t just get hung from the nearest tree like in “the good ole’ days.”
When are multi-millionaire celebrities going to realize….whether you are a gazillionaire or make minimum wage, you must take responsibility/ownership for your own life. I’m once again appalled by the general idea that everyone around MJ, his ‘handlers’ let him down. GIMME A BREAK, an individual must be responsible for their own affairs.
Lori,
I hear ya – but I think the Eagles “Hotel California” deserves more attentive listening.
Mike checked in but he could never leave…