The Rawness

Okay, this is the last Michael Jackson related post.

As crazy and social maladjusted Michael Jackson was in his personal life, he was peerless in one area, and that was creating a larger than life showbiz persona. And the second video I posted from him, “Liberian Girl,” demonstrates this perfectly and I think has a lot of human principles to teach.

First thing to notice about the video is the use of social proof. Social Proof is a concept popularized by Robert Cialdini, author of “Influence.” It basically says that if something is endorsed by a bunch of people, it automatically rises in value to onlookers. For example if I walk into a venue and don’t say hello to anyone and no one says hello to me I will make one impression. If I walk into a venue and a bunch of people mob me and I seem to know and say hello to everyone, I have social proof. Even if I’m dressed and looking exactly the same in both examples, in the example where I have social proof my value will rise sharply. People who look on will automatically assign value to me without knowing anything about me. The quality of the people also determines the level of social proof. Anyone who has been out with an incredibly hot woman knows this to be true. Men and women both treat you differently and assign you value automatically without knowing anything about you. If you walk in someplace with a model-caliber companion or a famous person like Diddy or Donald Trump with you, the social proof will be significantly more powerful from that one person than if you walked in with a mob of 30 nobodies.

Another good example of this is rapper team-up songs and videos. The format is the same. A rapper who is popular has another rapper who is as popular or up and coming and puts him in the video. He’s endorsing his social circle and gaining social proof. He’s telling people who are watching, “This is my friend. This is the caliber of rapper I hang with. If you think he’s credible, than I am credibly too by association.” Usually the two rappers are of equal or near equal status, and use each other’s presence to mutually give each other social proof. Then as icing on the cake they surround themselves with a bevy of fine women, fancy cars and material possessions. Crude but effective.

There is a current rapper coming up named Drake who is using social proof to an incredible degree to make himself incredibly popular and viral. He’s made himself a household name among rap fans within less than a year just by hanging out, working with and appearig in public with today’s top rappers. This gave him social proofing among hip-hop’s male fans. Plus he was publicly spotted dating female celebrities like Rihanna, which gained him a lot of press and gave him social proofing among females who follow black celebrity gossip.

He used social proofing so well that his album hit #3 on Billboard and he has yet to complete an album! More incredibly, he didn’t even have a record label yet! He has since ignited one of the biggest ever bidding wars for a new artist in history:

Toronto MC Drake, arguably the most talked about up-and-coming artist since Kanye West and 50 Cent, is involved in a serious bidding war between at least three major labels according to Billboard.

As XXLMag.com reported last month, Drake is close to signing a deal, but has yet to sign on the dotted line. Billboard has learned that Drizzy will most likely go to Universal, due to the label’s relationship with his crew Young Money. At the same time, this has not deterred other labels from baiting the So Far Gone rapper, whose mixtape single “Best I Ever Had” is receiving serious radio airplay. In fact sources tell Billboard that three majors are in possibly “one of the biggest bidding wars ever.” It is rumored that an undisclosed company has offered Drizzy $2 million to join their ranks.

In addition, Warner Music Group CEO Lyor Cohen and Chief Operating Officer Julie Greenwald made a notable appearance at Drake’s New York City concert last week, showing Atlantic’s interest in the former Degrassi actor.

An astounding accomplishment for a relative unknown in an incredibly short time, accomplished primarily through social proof. In one of Drake’s mixtape songs I heard, he shouts out Robert Greene’s 48 Laws of Power as his personal bible. I’m not surprised.

However when it comes to social proof in show business, Michael Jackson was great at this, and he knew how to do it better than anyone else. It’s a lesson he learned from Berry Gordy, who used his existing stable of Motown stars to add social proof to the Jackson 5, such as when he created the legend that Diana Ross was responsible for discovering the Jackson 5, which is why their first album was named “Diana Ross presents The Jackson 5.” She had absolutely nothing to do with their discovery, but Berry Gordy created the legend that she did, and had her present them to the crowds at all their early performances and on their debut album, which even contained a written story describing this discovery that never actually occurred in real life. It’s a lesson that stayed with him throughout his life.

The “Liberian Girl” video is a prime example of this:

The video for the song came out in 1989, and it features the prime celebrities of the era: Paula Abdul, Rosanna Arquette, Dan Aykroyd, Mayim Bialik, Bubbles, Jackie Collins, David Copperfield, Emily Dreyfuss, Richard Dreyfuss, Corey Feldman, Lou Ferrigno, Debbie Gibson, Danny Glover, Steve Guttenberg, Jasmine Guy, Whoopi Goldberg, Sherman Hemsley, Olivia Hussey, Amy Irving, Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Beverly Johnson, Quincy Jones, Don King, Virginia Madsen, Cheech Marin, Olivia Newton-John, Brigitte Nielsen, Lou Diamond Phillips, Ricky Schroder, Steven Spielberg, Suzanne Somers, John Travolta, Blair Underwood, Carl Weathers, Billy Dee Williams, “Weird Al” Yankovic. Many of these stars may have faded into B or C-list obscurity since then, but at the time they were all huge names.

But putting celebrities in a video isn’t novel or exceptional as far as social proof goes. But what made this video notable wasn’t just the quantity or quality of the celebrities but the context in which they were used. What Jackson was always good at, and it started back in the Jackson 5 era with Diana Ross, is that he’s always been able to present himself as a celebrity to celebrities, or a god to other gods. This is his social proof masterstroke. He makes sure to remind you that he is the idol to your idols. He creates the impression that he’s doing them a favor by letting him appear in his video rather than giving the impression he’s using them for social proof. He has Steven Spielberg waiting anxiously in a chair for him for Pete’s sake.

That’s another notable social dominance aspect of the video. Making people wait for you and getting away with it is a display of social power, a way to remind others of dominance. It’s also a way to build anticipation and anxiety. The whole video is the era’s A-list celebrities waiting for him with bated breath with nothing to do. He sends no apologies, doesn’t send any explanations to them for where he is, they’re left in the dark and even more importantly, no one threatens to leave or get upset. They patiently put up with it. They ask where he is often, but not out of anger but anticipation.

This is also an illustration of Law 16 of Robert Greene’s 48 Laws of Power:

Law 16 Use Absence to Increase Respect and Honor

The best element is the final one, his actual arrival. Not only is it a nice subtle bit of spectacle, but for those who know classic theatre it’s highly symbolic. First, the direction he comes from. He descends from above like a god. More specifically, he descends like a “deus ex machina,” which translates to a “god from the machine”:

the ‘god from a machine’ who was lowered on to the stage by mechanical contrivance in some ancient Greek plays (notably those of Euripides) to solve the problems of the plot at a stroke.

And what does the god do once he descends from his machine to their cheers and adulation? He simply dismisses them with one sentence. He got what he needs from them without their knowing and is done with them. And they’re happy with that, so long as they get a glimpse of him. It’s incredibly arrogant, but he is able to get away with it by doing it with childlike charm and an innocent smile. The whole video is bragging without bragging, or displaying high value without explicitly having to verbally toot your own horn.

So the lessons you can learn from this video? First, use social proofing whenever you can. Even if you arrive somewhere by yourself you can use social proofing. Within seconds of walking in, walk up to a stranger, ask them some question, smile, pat them on the back, shake their hand and move on. Do this once or twice more and to onlookers you seem to casually know people. Introduce yourself to people, make small talk, exchange names, and remember them. They’ll come in handy later. When you find a person you actually want to keep talking to and engage in a longer conversation, whenever you see the other people you exchanged names with earlier, you can introduce each other. Anything to casually remind people that you know other people who like and endorse you. No one has to know that you just met these people, although even if it comes out no one really cares by that point anyway.

Also keep in mind the quality of social proofing. People of low social value, such as nerds or unattractive women or boorish, loud low-class people, if you surround yourself with them, actually provide negative social value. You’re better off being alone at that point. Also, avoid that type of friend whose preferred method of breaking ice to strangers is to crack jokes and excessively bust on his or her friends. These people are annoying and not only hurt you but themselves. People see you getting busted on and think “wow, what a loser, his own friend doesn’t respect him,” then they look at your friend and think “wow, what a loser, he doesn’t respect his own friend,” and both of you lose value. If you keep quiet you look bad, if you bust back, then you look just as much like a douche as your friend. And it elevates the stranger’s value, because he or she now has two friends taking turns bashing each other for his entertainment, even though they know each other longer and are supposed to be friends. Just like Michael Jackson used flattering words from celebrities to build up his reputation and image, you should be around friends who do the same for you. In fact, this is more important than any other part of social proof. Say for example you are someplace with a hot girl or a powerful man, which would normally give you social proof whether you are a man or a woman, and they spend the whole time berating and belittling you and cracking jokes at your expense? At that point the high quality of your companions does nothing for you.

Second, act humble but avoid self-deprecation. Michael Jackson was great at acting humble while actually having a larger than life ego and self-regard. This is the man who crowned himself “King of Pop,” much like the Stones were the first to name themselves the “World’s Greatest Rock Band.” And in the case of both MJ and the Stones, the names eventually stuck and everyone forgot who originated them. But notice that the biggest celebrities, the ones that even other celebrities look up to, almost never engage in self-deprecation. I can’t think of a time MJ, despite his soft-spoken and shy act, ever was self-deprecating. There’s only one exception to the self-deprecating rule. If you have extremely high-status, you can put yourself down and instead it comes off as endearing. In that case, the ability to still put yourself down despite your obvious high status actually improves your image. If you don’t have blatantly high status, the only acceptable self-deprecation is blatantly insincere self-deprecation. For example if you are in a bar and know everyone there, you can joke “Yeah, I’m a pretty lonely guy with no friends. Look, I couldn’t get anyone to come out tonight!” If you are a musclebound tall guy, you can say “Yeah, it sucks to be a 95 pound weakling.” Ironically, people will be impressed at how humble you are for not taking yourself too seriously in such a scenario, but if you actually were friendless or a 98 lb weakling and said the exact same thing, it would get an opposite reaction!

Third, understand that extreme lateness is a power play that elevates the status of the one being waited for and lowers the status of the one waiting. However I wouldn’t recommend people to be habitually late because it’s not only a tacky power play but often a transparent one as well. It says “I’m so important that I can show up whenever I want, and I consider your time is so unimportant that I expect you to just wait around for me.” Instead what I would tell people is, if you are being kept waiting for too long without an acceptable excuse, just leave and announce that you’ll reschedule at a better time. Don’t act angry about it and indicate annoyance, just do it matter-of-factly and without malice. Display that your time is valuable too and shouldn’t be taken for granted.

Fourth, don’t be afraid to be the most prominent person in your social circle, but don’t be an openly opportunistic dick about it. People love ambition, but hate when it appears to be too naked and aggressive a power grab. Michael Jackson didn’t want to just be a celebrity, he always aimed to be THE celebrity, even to other celebrities. But he didn’t do it by bullying and throwing his weight around. He did it by offering value to his social circle. By bringing them joy and making them value and love his presence and the other things he brought to the table, they were more than willing to give him the highest status in their circle. By not trying to be overly bullying and transparently nasty in his play to present, he reached top dog status without building up resentment and negative backlash in his peers. He framed it in a way where people felt they were being done a favor by being allowed to defer to him. A good fictional example of the opposite is the main character from “All About Eve,” who made it to the top but lost all her friends and companions at the end of the day.

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