I know, I know. A redundancy of words and mixed metaphors, but how else to explain the antagonistic coverage of some sections of the media, like some of the British press, about Michael Jackson, both in life and in death. I cannot recall such determination to make a corpse a hated living figure.
Reading this particularly nasty story titled Jackals close in on Jackson Three I cannot help but wonder if my favourite Daily Mail is a cross between a jackal, a vulture and a hyena.
The moral superiority of that publication, in all its profit-mongering concern for Prince, Paris and Blanket Jackson is on display in the conclusion of the article, which must have had editorial concurrence or direction for it to be published. It ends:
Given the loss of their father and the stampede for cash led by their family, it’s hard not to feel truly sorry for The Jackson Three.
A slapdash mix of dispelled myths, easily refutable rumours, contorted truths, half-truths contradicted by other Jackson stories in the same publication, unfounded gossip, anonymous claims and legally defeated allegations, the piece attempts to project Michael Jackson’s supportive mother as a scheming, money-grabbing, insensitive sponger out to milk gold from MJ’s kids.
Truth is, the Daily Mail and its like-minded media ilk, are the ones into milking Michael Jackson for their bottom line, at any cost. Be they his biological children or not, now that he is dead, the kids are the nearest living things to Jackson’s pot of media gold; the unbroken thread that will keep the Michael Jackson story alive and relevant.
The print media relies on readership numbers to convince advertisers. Their online cousins keep check of the number of hits their websites generate, to lure advertisers. Subjects that generate the most clicks get recycled more, offered in interminable angles from unnamed ’sources” in order to drive up the web traffic. Both in life and death, it was evident that Michael Jackson’s worldwide following is immense.
Having brought the apparently rather malleable British mind evident falsehoods, like Micheal Jackson turning up only twice, and in a dysfunctional stupor, for rehearsals for his “This is It” London concerts, the editors of the Daily Mail, and many media pundits with ambitions nowhere nearly matched by ability, are not ready to accept their role in the wrecking of a man. So they are attempting their darnedest to have the kind of blame shifting they perfected with the death of Princess Diana.
Remember how public outrage was skillfully diverted from paparazzi and their media enablers to Buckingham palace? So far, the technique has not worked with whipping up a critical mass of public revulsion at Michael Jackson’s father, Joe Jackson, as the real and only culprit behind his son’s lonely life and miserable death. I am sure the unrelenting Daily Mail will soon have its way.
Our media almighty, who bring us the unlikeliest of scoops, by doing things like staking out and cornering former U.S. presidential candidate John Edwards as he paid a midnight visit to his mistress, surely could have verified the truth of Micheal Jackson’s claims to illness and his protestations of innocence in the face of miscellaneous allegations. In fact, the media very likely would have been in possession of the truth. But truth lacks titillation, at least the variety that lets a favourite money maker off the media hook. It is the Father of Lies who is the ruler of world.
To watch this interesting video, from non-other than ABC tv in America, was an exercise in disbelief. Suddenly, an expert was found to tell us that the umbrella, the mask and the glove, you know, Jackson’s ‘eccentric’ fashion accessories were hiding something more serious. Like illness.
On a related note, anyone who has wondered much why “liberals” appear to run roughshod over “conservatives” (especially white social and religious conservatives) in media, culture and the political process in the West, need only scrutinize the behaviours of the latter’s forefront groups and spokespersons. (In case any reader is thinking I am adversarial to those labelled “social conservatives,” I encourage browsing the archives of this blog).
- Deepak Chopra and Michael Jackson
I am looking at reporting of the Michael Jackson story, and comparing coverage of him in death on the ultra liberal Huffington Post versus that on the flagship social and religious conservative website, LifeSiteNews.com. We’re talking about a man who left a grieving family and children behind.
Whatever discomfort one may feel about his lifestyle, alleged improprieties and choice for artificially conceiving children and raising them solo, a human life was at the centre of this runaway story. The Huffington Post carries this peice by Deepak Chopra, which it may have commissioned, loaded with understanding for Michael Jackson’s human condition.
On the other hand, LifeSiteNews.com, which bills itself as “your life, family and culture outpost” and seldom covers celebrity foibles, could not find a droplet of sympathy for a “shattered” fellow human being, even in death. As at the time of writing this post, the only stories the editors of LifeSiteNews.com saw fit for their website, from their daily scouring of the length and breadth of the internet, were nasty pieces of work on Jackson. (Don’t you just love the elevation of Micheal Jackson to the level of wayward Catholic priests?) One dek on Lifesite insinuated the unproven allegation that Jackson was a pedophile, while even Jackson’s memorial was up for ridicule, with a prominent link given to this spewing of bile from a British near-gutter tabloid.
It may be the inadequacy of my internet searching skills, but I was not able to come up with a single reference on LifeSiteNews.com to Anna Nicole Smith’s death. If I can recall, that generated a fair amount of over the top coverage, in the U.S. at least. If we can only speak ill, selectively, of the dead, should we speak at all?
From good religious people, even the ones who mirror my social and religious values, this is hard to swallow.
