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.

This morning I went on Ace of Spades conservative blog and found the following video:

This blog by a black conservative sums up the problem pretty well:

First of all. while Michael Jackson has been accused by quite a few people of child molestation, he’s never been convicted of anything. Secondly, this is a reach as the media’s coverage of Michael Jackson has nothing to do with dissing our troops. And yeah, at a time when the GOP is struggling, barely getting mention on the national radar, dissing a cultural icon is just the kind of lift it needs. Any wonder too why Blacks stay away from the GOP?

Really, this is just making conservatives look bad. And I think it’s worse than just alienating blacks, it alienates most of the rational world. It reinforces the stereotype of conservatives as the uptight soulless whitebread guys that were outraged by Kevin Bacon dancing in Footloose. It’s getting to the point of self-parody now guys.

Maybe you don’t want Michael Jackson to be the most famous and admired human being born in the 20th century, but that doesn’t change the fact that he was. Hence they’ll cover him.

Also, check out this 1994 GQ article about his child molestation case that makes a pretty strong case that MJ was framed:

http://www.usnewslink.com/framedjackson.htm

Now I know what a lot of people think, sure they found no proof against him in criminal trials, but if he was innocent why did he pay off the family? Glad you asked.

Little known fun fact: not only was insufficient proof found against him in both cases, the $20 million paid as a settlement to the first accuser was not from Michael Jackson himself but negotiated and paid by his insurance carrier, over the loud protestations of Michael Jackson and his legal counsel.

You can Google it yourselves and find plenty of corroborating links about this fun fact, but if you don’t believe me here’s one corroborating link from Daily Mail to get you started:

When Jackson settled out of court with his first accuser, Jordan Chandler, for more than $15million in 1994, his career went into a rapid decline from which he never recovered.

Jackson had not wanted to settle the case. I have obtained legal documents proving that his insurance company forced the settlement on him against his will.

The documents state: ‘The [1994 Chandler] settlement agreement was for global claims of negligence and the lawsuit was defended by Mr Jackson’s insurance carrier. The insurance carrier negotiated and paid the settlement, over the protests of Mr Jackson and his personal legal counsel.’

A Youtube video covering most of the flaws in the accusation cases that aren’t widely known:

Slate also did the research and came to the same conclusion:
http://www.slate.com/id/2120889/

So then comes the other questions: if he was not a molester, why was his behavior so off and why did he have a compulsive need to spend time with young boys? That is covered in my last post on his psychology.

Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty? Whatever happened to Americans being proud of its icons? The state of conservatism is already in a fragile state, why would they bother with a losing, ugly stance like bashing Michael Jackson every chance they get right now? What do they gain from it besides showing insensitivity to his fans worldwide, showing themselves to fit the stereotype of insensitive, unhip and uptight white guys and providing cannon fodder for those who love stereotyping conservatives as racists?

It’s just really ugly behavior and horrible PR for us on the right. Obviously, whether or not Michael Jackson means anything to you or not, he means a lot to the rest of the world and is getting covered accordingly. There’s nothing to gain politically by bashing the coverage of a man hundreds of millions loved worldwide. A man who sold more copies of single album than anyone who ever lived, a record that is likely never to be topped again. Ever. I mean, I never got the big deal about Princess Diana, but I respect the right of the rest of the western world to go batshit insane over her death.

Anyway, one more Michael Jackson post coming up and I’m done with the topic, promise.

With Michael Jackson’s death last week, I wanted to do a tribute to him, but I didn’t want to just do fawning praise, and I wanted it to fit in with the theme of this blog, which is decontruction of social and sexual dynamics. I think celebrities are great test cases for learning to evaluate psychology because so much of their life is transparent and well-publicized, making them easy to study. Many short-sighted intellectuals disdain pop culture, but I love it, especially gossip magazines and celebrity biographies because they provide great practice for armchair psychologists like myself. And no celebrity is more psychologically fascinating or rich for analysis as Michael Jackson.

So I posted two videos that I thought gave great insights into his psychology with very little comment. I wanted to see if people who read this blog could see many of the themes I discussed being illustrated in the videos. Sometimes I don’t want to just spell things out for people, I want to challenge them to see read between the lines. It was how Iceberg Slim worked in his writing, and something I feel I don’t do enough of. The first video I posted from Michael Jackson this week was Stranger in Moscow.  I love this one for the message in the lyrics, particularly what they say about fame, wealth, culture, race and the different forms of isolation that can arise both because of and in spite of all those factors. But the lyrics to the song become especially poignant the more you understand his psychology and personal history.

Michael Jackson’s life story is a fascinating case study for psychology and human nature.

Joe Jackson was a steel mill operator and failed musician. He worked full-time at a steel mill factory, and in the 50s formed a music group with his brother Luther called The Falcons, where he played guitar. They failed to get a record deal and Joe was forced to go back to working at the steel mill.

While he went to work, the three older brothers would sneak into his belongings and play with his guitar. This is something that would never happen today as kids are rarely left unstimulated long enough to get bored enough to experiment with something like a guitar. Today those three older brothers would be watching BET and sneaking peeks at Internet porn while their dad was at work. The only time they’d probably come close to playing a guitar would be the controller of a Guitar Hero game. But I digress…

Anyway, Tito would play with Joe’s guitar behind his back, while his brothers Jackie and Jermaine sang and danced. One day Tito broke a string, which caused Joe to discover they were playing with his stuff. Being Joe Jackson, he promptly threatened to beat Tito (or actually did beat his ass, depending on who you ass), then changed his mind and asked him to play the guitar for him to see what he could do. As Tito played and the other brothers sang and danced, Joe realized they were actually pretty good and decided to channel his aspirations to be a musician into his children. That’s right, Tito, the butt of endless jokes, was actually the talent in the Jacksons responsible for launching the pop dynasty.

The three brothers formed The Jackson Brothers with some hometown friends, and eventually two younger brothers joined, Marlon and Michael. Michael around the age of 6 or 7 had displayed an uncanny singing and dancing ability and ended up replacing Jermaine, a talented soul singer in his own right, as the lead singer. How uncanny? See for yourself:

An important thing to realize was the type of music and performing the group was doing before joining Motown. Motown’s big innovation was taking a gritty, dirty, sexy and lowdown sound like black soul rhythm and blues (the rhythm and blues that was the precursor of rock and roll, not the genre of music we call rhythm and blues today) and sanitizing and whitewashing it to make it palatable to mainstream America. When you see the clip above, one thing that strikes you is that it’s not the type of music and dancing you normally picture when you picture the Jackson Five. It’s funkier and sassier. Sexier. Less bubblegum and kid-friendly. Very adult. Michael Jackson’s dancing in the vein of Jackie Wilson and James Brown, in a very adult, freewheeling swaggering and strutting sexual fashion. And keep in mind he’s 6 or 7 years old in this clip. And watch him dance again. This is very sexy and adult dancing, especially for the 60s. It’s actually very inappropriate for his age, but the problem was that he was so damned talented you’re willing to overlook it. If you have to choose between being denied seeing such talent and doing what’s right for the kid, most people selfishly choose seeing the talent. And that would be a recurring theme for the boy in his life ahead.

Now keep in mind, this boy is 6 or 7 years old and can dance with an incredible sexual swagger. This is the kind of dancing that could make a grown woman moist to watch. Yet another often overlooked aspect of the Jackson family is that they were very devout Jehovah’s Witnesses, especially the mother, and Michael grew up very much a true believer. This created a very profound conflict in him, as he was incredibly sexualized from a tender young age, and encouraged to increasingly play up his sexuality in his suggestive dancing and singing, yet on the other hand he was very indoctrinated with a belief system of repressive religious social attitudes. He was so deeply involved in the Witnesses that he was going door to door professing the faith as a youth. Yes, he was one of those door-to-door Jehovah’s Witnesses.

Many psychologists theorize that this is where many of Michael’s dysfunctions arose from: the mental and emotional conflict from trying to resolve the freewheeling and inherently sexual lifestyle that he was exposed to and encouraged to chase with the intensely repressive and morally rigorous Jehovah’s Witness religious belief system he was indoctrinated into from birth.

But it gets worse. The boys got their start performing gigs in the circuit of strip clubs, burlesque houses and adult black dance clubs called the chitlin circuit. At one point they even had a residency in a strip club, where they performed in between stripteases and during down time. Anyone with a kid knows their minds are like sponges, and you can only imagine the type of vulgarity he was exposed to and forced to process. Yet while he wasn’t being immersed in that life, he was being immersed in his mother’s devout faith. At the same time, it’s probably very likely that much of the sexualized titillation he saw in the performances highly influenced his own showmanship as well.

When he wasn’t performing and being involved in religious activities, he was forced to practice, practice, practice at a feverish pace. If he wasn’t performing or involved with religion, he was in practice being overseen by his dad. His father was like a drill sergeant and Michael never had a childhood. The act of interacting with other kids in a peer group is very important to properly socializing a human being. Socialization through peer groups is something we often take for granted, so we never realize the severity of damage it can do to one’s psyche and social skills to be deprived of it:

Developmental psychologists Vygotsky, Piaget, and Sullivan have all argued that peer relationships provide a unique context for cognitive, social, and emotional development, with equality, reciprocity, cooperation, and intimacy maturing and enhancing children’s reasoning abilities and concern for others. Modern research echoes these sentiments, showing that social and emotional gains are indeed provided by peer interaction.

When Michael was 10 years old, they got a recording contract with Steeltown records. He had been singing and performing for over 3 years at this point:

Journalist, J. Randy Taraborrelli said of the groups two singles released through Steeltown Records, “Both were mediocre numbers that don’t really hint at Michael Jackson’s potential as a vocalist, but the boys were thrilled with them just the same. After all, these were their first records”. The Jackson family gathered around a radio to hear the song broadcast for the first time. Michael Jackson—who was 10 years old at the time—said of the period, “[the family] all laughed and hugged one another. We felt we had arrived”. “Big Boy” did not appear on any Billboard charts of the period but sold in excess of 10,000 copies…

The Jackson 5 would release a second and final single through Steeltown Records—”We Don’t Have To Be Over 21 (to Fall in Love)”. The two singles were to be supported by an eleven track studio album but it was never released. On July 26, 1968, the group signed a new contract with Motown Records. However, as the groups Steeltown contract had not yet expired, the new contract could not be fully executed until March 11, 1969. Motown Records tried to get the group out of their Steeltown contract, ultimately with a financial settlement.

By the time he was ready for the national stage at Motown, he was now 11 years old and a seasoned performer.

In his autobiography, Moonwalk, Michael Jackson has described his childhood as “mostly work.” The Jackson brothers were rehearsed and managed by their overly-strict father, whose insistence on perfect performances … in school work as well as in rehearsals and talent shows … frequently ended in physical and/or verbal violence. Michael was eleven-years-old when the group signed with Motown in 1969 (although the Motown press corps published his age as nine, explaining that he would be much cuter and more appealing to the public if he were two years younger. They called it “public relations.”)

Apparently Michael was very disturbed at this lie. We’re used to adult performers lying about their age all the time, but it’s important to remember that he was 11 years old and very devout in his faith, meaning he took much of it literally, including the ban on lying. Yet he was being asked to lie about his age in interviews and press conferences. To get him to do this, the adults around him explained to him the lying was okay so long as you’re doing it to further his career. Young Michael accepted this answer as satisfactory and went along with it. But that message, that the truth is flexible and lying is acceptable when done to further your career is said to have stuck with him throughout his life. Now his sense of right and wrong and his relationship to honesty were warped.

As grueling as his work schedule and the demands of his father were before the big time, they only got worse after fame:

He gives a rare glimpse of his youth in his statement that in the summer of 1970, the Jackson 5 performed in 45 cities, with 50 more cities being added later in the year. Forty-five cities within a ninety-day period meant that he and his brothers were performing concerts [on average] every second day during that summer. Travel to and from the concerts accounted for a portion of the non-performing day. And this does NOT account for recording sessions, picture sessions, interviews, or the interminable rehearsals Joseph Jackson insisted upon. It also does not account for the fact that, unlike many lead singers of the time, Michael was present at EACH of these recording sessions. He recorded with his brothers and his is the beautiful, clear treble in the backgrounds of all of the Jackson 5 early hits. Later, he would return to the recording studio while his brothers played basketball or tinkered with cars to lay in the lead tracks and round off the recordings.

Michael Jackson describes his relationship with his father, Joseph, as “turbulent”, understating rather than sensationalizing that relationship. But, much later, during a televised interview, he replied to his interrogator’s questions regarding this relationship with the words, [I was] “frightened … very frightened. There were times when he would come to see me, I would get sick. I would start to regurgitate.” When asked if such occasions occurred “as a child … or as an adult,” he responded with one word … “both.” He was 35 years old at the time of the interview.

Then it got even worse than that. On the road, they had a lot of groupies. The older boys were better socialized than Michael because they had more of a life before fame, including more years of formal schooling and peer group socialization. They had a healthier relationship to sex and girls than Michael did, especially the older brothers, who were approaching 18 at the time and had the raging hormones that come with that age. Since the brothers shared a room, they would have sex with the groupies in the same room as Michael. Michael would hide underneath the sheets and pretend to be asleep as the brothers banged out their groupies. This apparently traumatized him greatly. To make matters worse, Joe Jackson didn’t want to be left out of the sexual rewards. Joe would present himself as a “gatekeeper” to the boys, and groupies would often have to provide him sexual favors before they were able to get a crack at the boys.

Then young, extremely religious Michael would have to go home to his devout, beloved mother and lie to her face about everything that happened. Lie about the sex that his brothers had as well as the sex his dad had. The pressure and guilt of such secrets and the burden of having to lie to his mother, who he adored, combined with the grueling schedule and the psychological terrorism waged by his father wore greatly on Michael’s psyche and is the reason many mental health experts theorize his psyche fractured and became frozen at that age, 11 years old.

The seeds for all his adult problems were sown in his youth, and you can see it in what I’ve described: His issues with sexuality, both being obsessed with it from constant exposure and sexualization, but not being able to get a healthy relationship with it due to his extreme youth, his repressive religious values and his lack of peer group socialization. Not to mention that sex was something he was trained to be secretive and dishonest about. Adult sexuality became something that terrified him for all the reasons described.

As for his obsession with being around children, it was never proven that he molested those boys, so as far as I’m concerned they will remain allegations and not facts. But his obsession with children I think comes from two factors. First, he never got that peer group socialization that he so desperately needed, and since his psyche was frozen at age 11, he chose a peer group of that age. Second, his whole life consisted of being used, abused and let down by adults. Second, adults were either selfishly using him for short term benefits without any thoughts of the long term detriments, like his father, Berry Gordy or the Motown publicity machine, or they were letting him down like his mother, who failed to protect him from his father’s abuse and stayed with him, implicitly cosigning his behavior. So he probably was very distrustful of adults and wary of them. “I haven’t been betrayed or deceived by children,” Jackson once said. “Adults have let me down.” And because he was so horribly tyrannized and abused by his own dad, this caused him to be excessively gentle and nurturing to children when he became an adult.

I think it was Bill Murray who said (I paraphrase) that with fame, it’s not about whether you get screwed up or become an asshole, but how much of a screwed-up asshole you become. His point was that when fame hits you, nothing can prepare you from it and at some point you get screwed up. If fame does that to healthy adults, imagine what international superstardom did to an 11-year old with the dysfunctional background I just described?

When Michael Jackson was acquitted of molestation charges in 2005, a great piece appeared in Slate celebrating his acquittal and explaining the reasons it was likely he didn’t do it, and I suggest if you guys click one link in this whole piece you make it this one. I’d also suggest watching VH-1 to see if they ever air a special called “Michael Jackson’s Secret Childhood” again. Both touch on a lot of what I mentioned here and more.

Many say that the child abuse trials were the final emotional blow to him, something he perceived as his last and greatest betrayal, and that he sank into a depression that he never fully recovered from, because now not only were his relationships to adults ruined, he now had to be distrustful of kids. He was never safe from feeling used and isolated. Which is why I posted the song “Stranger in Moscow,” as it’s incredibly exposing of his personal psychology:

“Stranger in Moscow” is the fifth and final single from Michael Jackson’s album HIStory. The song was released worldwide in November 1996 but was not released in the US until August 1997. The track was written by Jackson in 1993, at the height of the highly publicized child abuse accusations made against him, while on tour in Moscow. In the ballad, Jackson sings of a fall from grace that has left him lonely, isolated, paranoid and on the verge of insanity.

See if the meaning and emotional impact you derive from the song has changed at all after reading this piece. Below is a version of the video with the lyrics printed on the screen for you to read as you listen:

UPDATE: GQ released an article in 1994 titled was “Michael Jackson Framed?” that made a pretty strong case that the first accuser was severely lacking in credibility. The article can be found at this link here.

Not only was insufficient evidence found in all criminal matters against Michael Jackson, but there was a matter of a $20 Million settlement paid to the accuser that Jackson’s detractors use as proof that he was actually guilty. After all, he was innocent why pay the money, right? Well I’m glad you asked.

A recent article by Daily Mail reveals the reason:

When Jackson settled out of court with his first accuser, Jordan Chandler, for more than $15million in 1994, his career went into a rapid decline from which he never recovered.

Jackson had not wanted to settle the case. I have obtained legal documents proving that his insurance company forced the settlement on him against his will.

The documents state: ‘The [1994 Chandler] settlement agreement was for global claims of negligence and the lawsuit was defended by Mr Jackson’s insurance carrier. The insurance carrier negotiated and paid the settlement, over the protests of Mr Jackson and his personal legal counsel.’

Jackson was said to have almost collapsed as the settlement was forced upon him. His aides insist this marked the beginning of his mental and physical breakdown.

That last sentence also adds more context to the lyrics and theme of the “Stranger in Moscow” video.

Also, this video covers just about ever flaw in the molestation charges:

Next: Dissection of MJ’s “Liberian Girl” video.

Somewhat sad news. Chess champion Bobby Fischer is dead. The story of his life is one of great triumph followed by great tragedy:

Fisher went on to become a bizarre, shadowy figure (hence the irony of the title of the 1993 movie about a child chess prodigy, Searching for Bobby Fischer). Over the years, his eccentricity seemed to blossom into full-blown madness as he railed against the United States, went on anti-Semitic tirades (although his mother was Jewish) and was essentially in exile from the U.S. after breaking sanctions by playing a match in Yugoslavia.

Too often, in the world of competitions, a person reaches the pinnacle of his or her life at a very young age. And nothing after that can ever match what they did at age 30 or 25 or even 18. That’s tough. But if they handle the reality with grace and intelligence, what they did in their youth can be a springboard. In the case of Fischer, who was on top of the world at age 29, it didn’t have to work out the way it did. Chess isn’t that kind of game. You can be superb for years. In fact, Fischer was. But there were other things going on — invisible demons is the best way to put it, I guess — that contributed to making him a victim of his own early phenomenal success.

Long, long before the end, Bobby Fischer had lost himself, never to be found again.

I find the contrast between Fischer and a later American chess champion Josh Waitzkin to be fascinating. Josh Waitzkin was the subject of the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer and also had his problems with early chess celebrity. But unlike Fischer, Waitzkin is very well-adjusted and a lot less eccentric. He has given up chess, but is now a world champion martial artist and author.

This story reminded me of this piece, where I talked about how loving something motivates you to master it, but mastering it too well, or solving the mystery, causes you to stop loving it. I called it the mystery/mastery paradox. You have to mentally reframe the challenge in order to stay engaged. Like once you figure out a game inside out, you change your focus to beating other masters of the game to stay engaged. Once you beat the other masters of the game, you may focus on spreading your fame or writing books about the game. It’s still about the original game, but only tangentially. I think this is what led Michael Jordan to try baseball for a while.

I don’t know much about Bobby Fischer’s life, but maybe he didn’t cultivate anything besides chess. From what I know, it was an all-consuming passion for him from a very young age. Maybe when he fell into his own mystery/mastery paradox and it stopped being fun for him, he had no other outlet to switch to, because being so consumed with chess from so young never allowed him to figure out his identity outside of chess.

At some point, however, it seems Josh Waitzkin did figure out his identity outside of chess. He explains it in this NY1 profile he did:

About ten years ago, to escape the phenomenon of, “Hey, you’re the ?Searching for Bobby Fischer? guy!” he spent a year living in Slovenia and traveling around Europe.

And he came to a realization.

“Transitional moments were affecting me in chess and in life. And when I took them on in one, it helped me with the other,? said Waitzkin. ?And so that became my manner of studying of chess, which was to look at my psychological being was manifesting itself over the board. So that kind of led to this way of thinking about chess, life, tai chi, the martial arts, in a manner which was basically looking for thematic interconnections, as opposed to looking at one art at a time.?…

“I didn’t grow up learning chess or competing in a protected environment,? says Waitzkin. ?I grew up kind of in a raw environment and that’s been kind of central to my life in all these things, because life as a competitor is brutal.”….

“It caught up to me, and I started to become externalized through the chess, which was very sad, very sad,? says Waitzkin. “When you?re defined by something from the age of six on, the idea of letting that go and redefining yourself completely, it?s naked and raw and terrifying.?

But the transition was eased when the Columbia University graduate discovered tai chi, and his new passion resulted in an international championship in 2004.

Now his goal is to use these two parts of his life to create a multi-disciplinary learning center for kids.

So he went from competitive chess to martial arts champion. And note how, as he masters martial arts, he already sets up his next challenge, his plan for a multi-disciplinary learning center for kids. I think this technique he has of setting up his next challenge ahead of time shows how he’s able to avoid the mystery/mastery paradox. He realizes when he’s falling out of love with something and as he masters it, he sets up the next challenge for himself.

I also think that’s why celebrities like Michael Jackson, and Bobby Fischer go insane once they achieve their goals. They only focus on mastering one thing, and once they achieve it and naturally start to fall out of love with it and it just becomes a grinding job or crushing responsibility, they have nothing else to channel their energy into. They hate what their doing, but they also love the security blanket of knowing they have an area they have mastered and are afraid to leave it behind despite how unfulfilling it has now become.

Not being prepared to channel your energies into something else is also what I think contributes to the alcoholism of the guy in this story who turned his hobby into a job, along with other people who turned to substance abuse after they turned their passion into a career and hit the top. The problem wasn’t turning their passion or hobby into a career, it was not being prepared for what the void that would come up once they mastered that hobby (doing something for a living is the ultimate form of mastery I think). They became victims of the mystery/mastery paradox.