A symbol of our culture

James N. writes:

I’m too old to be a Michael Jackson fan, and so many readers have provided so much erudite commentary on the music that I won’t even try.

I DO find it remarkable, though, that the death of another skeletal drug addict is such, SUCH a big event in Europe. Everything MJ, all the time. It still dominates the front pages of all the papers, there are public demonstrations of grief, the London dailies are publishing every minute detail of his disgusting and perverted life for readers to pore over. What accounts for this extraordinary Euro-attention?

I think MJ was on the path that they would have the West take—asexual, aracial, nonreligious, nonreproducing, noningesting (food), all the way down to death—while at the same time steeped in hedonism of the most perverse kind.

A man for his times.

- end of initial entry -

Anthony Damato writes:

I see you are writing a lot on Michael Jackson. I’m a bit surprised, but it is interesting to learn just how totally wrecked his life had been, for many years before he died.

Just thinking of how much in hock he was is telling. He was music royalty, yet his debts amounted to many tens of millions. I read his former nanny say that he had no money at times and she had to use her own credit card to shop for his children. I don’t know how true this is, but his debts were so large, that the amount of money agreed for his “This is it” tour, would have not resolved them by far.

In fact, according to news reports, he was advanced money by the entertainment group financing and organizing his tour to pay for his useless doctor to accompany him to London, to the objection of Jackson handlers, who were concerned about the additional expense for travel and hotel accommodations. Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG), was the real power behind the Jackson comeback tour. They had the cash, and Jackson was the financially strapped product they sought to capitalize on. It didn’t even matter that the autopsy revealed he couldn’t even sing anymore. The O2 arena in London is equipped to be the most advanced lip synching venue in the world. Image, hype, illusion and denial is the reality the throngs of Jackson fans embraced.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at June 30, 2009 10:35 AM | Send