Media all over the world mourned the death of rock star Michael Jackson, Jacko as they fondly called him. It was on expected lines, given the fact that MJ had fan-following across continents. He has traveled through lengths and breaths of all continents popularising his brand of music and dance. It was also but natural that media celebrated the unique talent of MJ, hailing him as a born genius. No doubt, he was a born singer and musician and dancer. In fact, he is considered the creator of what is now known as the break dance.What is perhaps missing in all the eulogising across media is MJ’s compulsions to metamorphose himself into a white. Was he not proud to be a black? Was he ashamed of his race? Or was he not sure of his success with his colour?
We are not sure. But he was one of his kinds among blacks to be so gifted in several arts – music, singing and dancing. Perhaps, he felt it was impossible to survive as black singer in racist country. Or may be he was apprehensive as to how people would accept him as a black rock star. Be that as it may, media’s portrayal of him as a youth icon, somehow, does not seem to go well with those who would think that some of his eccentricities would more be a challenge to youth spirit than to enthuse it.
Attaining fame and name seems much easier than living up to their demands. We have seen this in the case of many celebrities, including Murline Munroe and Elvis Presley. What brought end to MJ was his own fame. He took it very seriously and thought that the glory he had attained was a licence to live a horrendous life, courting women and finding comfort in drugs and narcotics. His changing of religious faith into Islam does not seem to have done any good to him. In fact, one wonders whether religion was important to him at all.
Coming back to Media, some newspapers and news channels carried the news of his death and tried doing a post-mortem of the possible causes of his death. However, what is surprising is that media went amuck describing him as a model which every youth must follow. Sorry! MJ is a good musician, singer, dancer. His hard-earned achievements are definitely worthy of emulation. But not so his un-inspiring life. It is a irony that a person who lived among crowds died a loner. One is naturally distraught at the sheer cruelty of the turn of events. However, in the case of MJ, at least, it seems he cared less about life and more about his glory, which is not one of the subjects any youth must emulate.
