… or rather, the real tragedies are:
1/ we will be subjected to renewed assaults from his “musical legacy” for the foreseeable future
2/ the musical taste of whole new generations will be despoiled; his stuff is like #3 or something on the charts right now
3/ worst of all, there’s an endless supply of more of his “music” in the Jackson vaults ! This stuff is going to dribble out for the rest of our miserable lives like pus from an untreated wound. Lock up your radios.
Even if you don’t like his stuff, is it any worse than what is currently topping the Billboard charts?
… it wasn’t a very painful, slow and horrible demise brought on by multiple STDs contracted in prison from very brutal, nasty, viscious men over a long period of time.
What? Too soon?
C’mon, people! He was a Pedophile! His fame/money allowed him to “buy his way” out of conviction.
And your supporting evidence is… ?
Evidence of what? That he was a pedophile? Are you whooshing?
I thought I quoted the relevant section. Do I need to read it aloud to you? He makes a pretty bold claim - implying he was guilty of the charges brought against him and the only reason he wasn’t convicted was because of his fame. Evidence supporting that claim would be incredibly valuable, so I am forced to assume Gatopescado is privy to this information that the rest of us are not and is merely holding it back to sell to NBC for the big exposé. If it were otherwise he would just be talking out of his ass and basing his statements of fact on his personal perceptions and prejudices. But that wouldn’t be very SDMB-like, would it?
That he wasn’t convicted.
This just in: O.J. *still *hasn’t found real killer! Vince Neil drives to local 7-11 for Big-Gulp!
Well, sure it would! Oh, didn’t you hear? We don’t haffa pay no mo’ to post! My behind can spout all it wanna!
Rig, I liked your contributions to this board…
Goodness. I don’t keep track of the law too much but it apparently became incredibly complex last night whilst I slept. The proof of someone’s guilt is now that they weren’t proved guilty. Sheesh, that’s a helluva burden to overcome.
I suppose, using similar logic, I can show that he wasn’t a pedophile by showing you the thousands of video clips of him with children while he, so it would seem from the videos over the years, wasn’t then molesting any of them. I love negative proof.
I like to set the bar high. No slack for slackers!
Don’t think Mikey liked the Little Fellas? They have a bus for you, with a tight turning radius. Think he did, and give him a pass? Get under that bus.
Such buses do indeed exist outside of the States. Just because we don’t make smart buses because we don’t have to because of how spacious our country is doesn’t mean other countries don’t.
Incidentally, it’s worth noting that your entire line of discussion is on “belief”, but is noticeably devoid of any evidence. One might argue this is why he was acquitted, which doesn’t imply innocence, only that there’s an insufficient amount of evidence to prove the assertion.
For you, in this thread, assertion is sufficient. So is a negative assertion: he was found not guilty; therefore, he’s guilty!
The truth is: I don’t know. I don’t know what happened behind closed doors at his ranch, and neither you nor I will ever know. The only ones who do know for certain are the alleged victims. And of course Michael, who is dead. All I know is that the evidence wasn’t there to convict him. You seem to think that money and fame are an automatic get-out-of-jail-free pass, but I do not find that to be a correct assessment (I really don’t want to rehash OJ here though).
I find it unfortunate that all it takes is an accusation to brand someone forever as a criminal in the public eye, regardless of the findings of a court operating with due process. I also find it unfortunate that I have disappointed you with my latest contribution, as I believe I acted in the spirit of rationality.
Wait a minute!
Are you from Florida!?!
This is the Crux of My Buiscuit.
Eh, I still think you are Okay! Its just that ratiionality has nothing to do with pedophiles and beer-drinkers! (I’m the beer-drinker)
No, but I did lecture there one summer. Never again, never again.
If we can keep hearing songs like “Beat It,” “Thriller,” “Billy Jean,” and, to a lesser extent, “Black or White” then I think we’re doing pretty good. So far as pop music goes Jackson was pretty damned good.
There’s nothing wrong with liking Michael Jackson’s music. He was extremely talented even if Thriller was the height. Most musical acts couldn’t even hope to approach Jackson’s “mediocre” work like HIStory.
Odesio
His stuff’s seminal. It’s statistically highly improbable to not like some of what he did. Or at least, something that was influenced by him… surely? 
If so, it’s hardly any great loss. What would you rather: hackneyed rehashes of his stuff and the like at higher BPM -or- the versions that actually have some relevance beyond an excuse to drop an MDMA devoid Ecstasy tablet? <_<
This we do see eye to eye on. I mean, if his more recent caterwauling is anything to go by, I’d much rather the ‘vault’ stay firmly shut! :rolleyes:
Count me and Askance as apparently among the statistical outliers (Okay, Off the Wall has a trace of funk in it, so it’s not THAT bad.)
To answer the OP, IMHO the real tragedy seems to be that not enough folks are questioning why MJ seemed to try so hard to flee from the (perfectly beautiful) face he was given. The silence is especially deafening from those who see MJ as representing the black community from which, through his elective surgeries, he fled.
Michael Jackson is the 38th most acclaimed artist of all time, according to music critics. (cite: acclaimedmusic.net)
And I suppose it is compared to (not in the top 2500) Lady Gaga, or whatever they normally play on the radio.
What baffles me are these astronomical sales figures. These recordings were available before he died, people! What makes it more urgent to get them now? What makes them more valuable now? It’s not like anyone’s taking them off the market.
Seriously, I’m stumped.
back to the tragedy talk - I think what he did to his face is a tragedy. I think not coming to terms with being gay is a tragedy. I think grown men sleeping with little boys is criminal.