Siftings
A Nobel Prize for MJ, or the Black Boy who would be White?
It’s been some weeks now since the talk about a Nobel Prize for Michael Jackson, the King of Pop who invented and reinvented himself so much so many times that in the end nothing remained of the cute, lovable lead singer of the Jackson 5 who poured out his heart and soul in the song “Ben”, later to capture the imaginations and affections of a worldwide audience, and much later yet, earning the scorn and derision of a world gone cynical and indifferent to his antics. Yes, antics, gimmicks, etc. How else was one to take and accept his countless facial reconstructions, nose lifts, skin bleaches and hair straightenings? Vetilaygo or no, why did MJ have to turn himself white, in the process becoming the reincarnation of his persona in his greatest video and album, “Thriller?”
Only MJ himself could have answered that. Not his family, not his friends who are loyal to him. True to the spirit of showbiz, MJ’s facial improvements were not confined to him alone. His mother, father and siblings must have undergone nose jobs at one time or another. Witness how their noses have become pointy, contrary to the rounded noses of the Black race. The Jacksons were a pleasant-looking Black family, but somehow they weren’t satisfied with that kind of look the way other blacks are. And Michael just had to be White. What is this need that pushed MJ to change his appearance completely? How, where and when did it all start?
This is mere conjecture, but I have a theory. Back in the late 80’s, when I first visited the US, there was a rumor circulating that MJ had undergone surgery to keep his voice from growing mature as he grew up, thus, keeping it perennially high-pitched, piping clear, innocent-sounding. This was a surgery that was supposed to involve his sex organs. I remember being horrified at the time: Wouldn’t that mean some kind of castration, the way ancient cultures castrated men who were designated to guard the harems of sultans? All this, for the sake of keeping MJ’s audiences happy and faithful to him? But what about his life, wouldn’t that be affected by this operation? Or was he already effeminate, the reason his own father, whom MJ hated until the day he died – the father was excluded from his will – abused him, perhaps with beatings to make him more masculine? If this was so, MJ’s operation was just an affirmation of his natural sexuality. There is the added insight that MJ as a young boy was a loner; while his brothers tussled with each other and ran about the house in rambunctious play, young Michael would steal out by himself and sit in a swing, watching the world go by. Which is probably why, deprived of a normal carefree boyhood, he opted later to take up the cause of children, inviting them to Neverland to enjoy his rides and menagerie, even his bed. That’s how he earned for himself the tainted name of “pedophile” which attached itself to him after the celebrated sexual abuse case which he settled out of court. Despite the case being dropped by the court. Of course this is all conjecture born out of a long-forgotten rumor.
MJ is a mystery and will probably remain so for a long time, the sad haunted look in the eyes of the adorable black boy morphed into the guarded look of the white-faced, pink-cheeked, red-lipped singing icon with his signature long, curly but not kinky raven-black hair, all decked out in the garish regimentals of his concert costumes:a guarded look that did not give anything away, least of all the loneliness of the boy who sang “Ben” to his best friend, a rat. But one remembers that Michael in his heyday, made efforts to unite the world through his music–:Heal the World” and “We are the World” (co-written with Lionel Richie) are just obvious efforts towards this, on top of the world tours he undertook in which all races he came in contact with seemed united in the enjoyment of his music.
For my part, MJ was a genius who gave great performances: both singer and dancer whose performance can take one’s breath away even just by watching his videos. He gave his all in every concert: his perfect spins, moonwalks and sidewinders; his voice the clear cloudless falsetto of his youth heralding the completion of his act; the chords of his finales crashing with such precision that one can only gape in wonder!
But in death, Michael has become the embodiment of The Great Black American Tragedy. Being Black, he strove to be White. His voice, high and childish, does not proclaim his Blackness but accentuates an androgeneity: it is neither tinkly female nor deeply male. Without that operation, MJ’s voice could have proclaimed his blackness. His adoration of the two idols of his lifetime also point to another ambivalence: Diana Ross, Black Goddess Supreme; and Elizabeth Taylor, White Beauty once proclaimed the Most Beautiful Actress in the World. In this he was telling the world that he preferred to be both black and white. And his fans, both black and white, adored him for that. The whites, because he wanted to be like them; the blacks, because he epitomized their desire to be white. Underneath the triumph and glory of blacks, including the presidency of the greatest power on earth, there is probably a deeply hidden yearning to be white, to belong, completely, absolutely belong, to a land that is White in the universal consciousness.
In the end, it all falls into place to look at MJ as some kind of universal symbol: neither black nor white, he was both; neither man nor woman, he was both; neither grown man nor child, Peter Pan-like, he was both. Androgynous genius, Man-child, the white overlay hiding the black skin of his race.
So now we say, Peace be with you, Jacko. May we, in the fullness of Time, accept you and your strangeness as ours, human and flawed but striving for glory.