Michael Jackson was a born professional, so
all his scandals were off-stage. It was the fans of Michael Jackson who sometimes
forgot how to behave. The worst case of this was a concert performance while
Jackson sang his Earth Song. Jackson was standing on a platform
being raised into the air.
And this guy runs up and holds on to Jackson
and the tiny platform, as it is raised about thirty meters or more into the
air. And Jackson just… holds on for dear life, never letting go of the crazed
fan, because to let go of him would mean the guy might very well fall to his
death on the stage below.
So Michael Jackson gave a performance for
several minutes, singing his ass off while holding on to a star-struck Korean
fellow with personal space issues and it was… weirdly inspirational. Like,
damn, talk about quick thinking — he could have stopped singing, called for
security to remove the guy, and go on with a thirty-second delay.
But there was no delay. The show went on, exactly as planned, to the very
second, just as Michael Jackson had planned it. And he casually saved a man
from tumbling to the stage and breaking his neck in between songs. Like a boss.
Another is:
He liked to grab his crotch as a part of his
dance routine. He did this, it is said, to scotch critics who called him
effeminate. Eventually, his costume people developed a glittery “chastity belt”
to call attention to his pubic area. I remember when he started doing this in
the 1980s, and it struck me as pathetic — just like the song in which he
proclaimed “I’m bad.” I’d be interested in hearing from any female fans who
were turned on by this stuff. It has always stricken me as the height of
hypocrisy when Michael’s people refused to promote the best song he ever wrote
with Paul McCartney —The Man from Pipes of Peace— because they were
afraid that Paul’s pot bust in Barbados, for possession of half an ounce of weed, might besmirch
Michael’s sterling reputation. Good thing for Paul that he got away from Jacko
before the latter’s reputation went irretrievably south.
