Media stoops to honor Wacko Jacko

Posted Jul 3rd 2009 3:03PM by John Scott Lewinski
Filed under: News, Industry, OpEd, Celebrities, Obituaries

Audiences hope to remember Michael Jackson for Thriller and not everything he's done since.If anyone in the press should ever ask you, "What were you doing when you heard the great Michael Jackson was dead?", be sure to answer with: "Reading one of your stories on what a lowlife you thought he was just prior to his death."

There are times when I'm ashamed to be a part of the media. The 48 hours after Michael Jackson's death was just such an epoch. I chose that last word carefully because the endless, maudlin, self-congratulatory coverage the major news networks wallowed in following Jackson's death was as long-winded as it was embarrassingly dramatic.

While that coverage is sure to continue throughout the memorial services, unavoidable custody and estate battles and forthcoming autopsy reports, none of that will compare in sickly sweet sensation to what CNN, Fox News and the others lowered themselves to just following the singer's death.

This is not a commentary on Jackson himself. The guy was covered so relentlessly by the press that his successes and sins (be they confirmed or alleged) are well known on all fronts. There's a reason why no one (even in the media) should speak ill of the dead and, in this case, that reason is three children mourning the loss of a father.

Besides, Jackson had ceased to be a compelling story before his passing. At best, he was a legendary and famously talented singer and dancer who had fallen tragically into a world of deluded isolation, failed plastic surgery and prescription drug abuse -- an artist whose success rendered him unable to deal with reality. At worst, he was an alleged serial abuser of children and a sexually underdeveloped man-child.

In time, as they did with Elvis Presley, fans will probably put Jackson's tragic and disastrous descent aside and remember his music. But that doesn't mean the media should do the same. As the news networks toiled to out-schmaltz each other, they lost all sense of perspective and objectivity in favor of celebrity worship.

The major media outlets considered Jackson a tragic freak for years. From Bubbles the Chimp, to his nose falling in, to dangling babies off balconies, to showing up in court in pajamas and a mask, the press frolicked in painting Jackson into the corner of his own three-ring circus. In fairness to that coverage, Jackson gave the press (tabloid or otherwise) plenty of ammunition. And reporters kept up the head-shaking disdain -- right up to the moment that the story broke of his trip to UCLA Medical Center.

Then, you could hear the media's engine shift with all the speed and efficiency of a Ferrari Enzo's gearbox. Jackson was dead. It was a shocking news story that should keep people riveted to their screens for hours (even days) if it could be sold as a national tragedy. But it's not a national tragedy when "a tragic freak" dies, so reporters needed to push all of that angst behind the nearest curtain and paint Jackson as a misunderstood Mother Theresa who could hit the high-C.

The damaged circus performer of the previous day was replaced by the legendary entertainer post-mortem. Just ask any of the non-stop "experts" Fox News and CNN trotted out to discuss the loss. After the networks ran out of the Diana Ross and Quincy Jones types, they resorted to less and less relevant interviews until they were grilling a woman in Topeka who once wore only one oven mitt for three minutes and an elderly gentlemen in Green Bay who said his grandson once watched the Carl Weathers flick Action Jackson on one of the off-brand Cinemax networks.

Now that the love fest is dying down in face of the hard realities left by Jackson's death (with child custody and debt issues abounding), you can feel the media's snakes turning on the story again. When the glitter blows over after all of this, we're left with the sad reality that the news media is so sensationalized now that there's nowhere to go for just the facts when something like this happens.

Sadly, even when dealing with death, you have to sift through the hype.

Tags: cnn, cnn headline news, CnnHeadlineNews, fox news, fox news channel, FoxNews, FoxNewsChannel, michael jackson, MichaelJackson

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