This week will, confusingly, be remembered as the week that Michael Jackson died, at least physically. What is more bizarre than a life less ordinary such as his? Well his death of course. Every day we are bludgeoned by some form of breaking news about how he (might have) died. This top news somehow supercedes the President making strides in Russia, the insanity of the election in Iran, the countless heroes who have died this week protecting...whatever. For some reason the death of a reclusive singer who has not been popular for a good 15 years stemming mostly from him touching children (spiritually or physically). I'm not judging the man for his actions that were newsworthy so many years ago, and I have no hero worship of a man who sang songs that I liked. What I do find so disgusting about this fiasco is that his death is what has brought this crazed mob of frightening fans. For days after his death there were legions of people outside the UCLA medical center hoping for, what? What could have possibly driven anyone to spend more time in L.A.'s ridiculous traffic to stand outside of a hospital? Was there a singular thought that they were going to see him, his corpse? Was there a wave of thought that somehow believed seeing a body would make their lives better or give them closure? I am sickened by the weirdness that followed the death of a weird man, in fact I half expected Elton John to re-rewrite another "Candle in the Wind". I loved Michael Jackson's music, and I want to be clear about that, I own a lot of his music, danced the night away to it, didn't stop til I got enough, but that was music from another man in another time. His death was handled with the care of an underpaid dishwasher with a media so hard-pressed to put anything but what is going on in the world on television that it became necessary to bombard us 24/7 with the whodunit of his death. We should demand better.
