READER FEEDBACK
ON MICHAEL JACKSON

by Bernard Dubé

Perhaps an issue worth pursuing is how so many people are prepared to take Jackson’s side before hearing the evidence. What are we willing to overlook for the sake of our personal feelings and why are we prepared to throw morality and the truth out the window for the sake of those feelings?

Michael Jackson has launched a web site to publish and disseminate his side of the story as far as he can outside of a courtroom. So has the "dean of manners, " Martha Stewart, who is under investigation for illegal stock manipulation. Both sites are a hit.

There seems to be a large, public abandonment of the idea of shame for ones behavior. Now, even if the evidence is incontrovertible, the blatantly guilty create a side show of themselves, hire professional image managers and set out on a campaign to remake their image in the public eye. They act as if they are the ones who have been wronged and over time; they actually get away with it.

The idea that one aught to act with honor and dignity has been replaced with the idea that one aught to act any way they can as long as they can get away with it. Now, people evaluate their plans on the basis of whether they can get away with it instead of whether it is moral or not. And the young are learning the same attitude.

The media is just as shameless. That too does not escape the attention of the young. For the media it matters only if it will sell. And to sell, the media jazzes up everything, turning murder into entertainment for the masses.

That to me is the story of Michael Jackson.

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