Only in America can a poor Black boy grow up to be a rich White woman
- Anonymous
A sad figure passed from the American stage today, and a little reflection should serve to remind us of the sick racism that remains deeply embedded in our culture. This was a man who, from childhood wealthy and famous, could still not shake his self-loathing hatred of his own skin. He built himself a fantasy world in which he could be androgenously prepubescent forever in a baroque microcosm of pre-Boom White culture, a world that only began to collapse in the few years before his death.
Michael Jackson inhabited many fault-lines in our culture, masculine/feminine, straight/gay, black/white. He tried so hard to pretend that he was a normal heterosexual black man comfortable in his own skin when the contrary evidence rolled in waves over the public image of this sad, troubled man. This conflict helped produce some of the most bizarre public behavior and perverse private flaws of any major American celebrity.
Although most of us are more comfortable in our own skins than Mr. Jackson, let him serve as a warning that if we want a healthier culture, we need to be on better terms with the truth about ourselves and each other.
