Michael Jackson has had a most extraordinary life. A child superstar in music, recreated into the King of Pop with music that resonates across cultures, Jackson has not tasted success, but rather devoured it. Yet, his appearance on TV in interviews shows an unseemly side, not of Mr. Jackson, so much as of his fans.
The allegations of child molestation, the plastic surgery, the curious way his children appear in public (veiled and sometimes dangling out of windows) are common knowledge. And that raises the awful question, "Who cares?" We all have problems, quirks, difficulties, and it is a stain upon modern society that we need to go poking our noses into a man's private life the way we have done with Mr. Jackson (or Mr. Russell Crowe, or Miss Diana Ross, or Miss Ellen Degeneres).
Mr. Jackson is important because of his music, and his career is on the wane at present. The personal matters are, unless criminal, no one's affairs but his own. Yet, people who haven't listened to his latest work (judging by sales figures, a large number) argue over whether he is a good father. It is madness.
Regretably, musical knowledge takes time to develop, requires a certain inate talent, and well, it's just easier to focus on the gossip. How very pathetic. Mr. Mozart could have made marvellous copy for the tabloids, but really, is that what was important about him? The 18th Century saw the Age of Reason; could it be that the 21st will be the Age of the Trivial?