Michael Jackson and

Things of Importance

Things of great importance may have happened Thursday, but few will have been noticed, let alone remembered because Michael Jackson died at 50.

The pop culture creation’s death goaded mainstream media to grab public attention by the throat like a dog killing a squirrel, driving attention away from just about anything else.

Shortly before midnight on Thursday the New York Times website was running nine Jackson stories, slide shows or other links. For MSNBC, the count was seven. The splash page for The Associated Press at hosted.ap.org limited itself to two Michael Jackson stories, but over at CNN.com, there were ten links, as at The Drudge Report. The Washington Post web page also sported ten links. I stopped counting there.

This wasn’t the death of a Gandhi or Churchill or Mother Theresa. Lynn Elber of the AP had the context right: “Jackson's death brought a tragic end to a long, bizarre, sometimes farcical decline from his peak in the 1980s, when he was popular music's premier all-around performer, a uniter of black and white music who shattered the race barrier on MTV, dominated the charts and dazzled even more on stage.”

So about a quarter-century ago, this guy was very, very hot. And then he had some troubles, including allegations of molesting boys and financial woes, but he was hoping for a comeback run starting July 13 in London.

So what makes his death from a suspected cardiac arrest at 50 worth all the hyper-attention?

The answer seems pretty clear. The media is in mourning for one of its creations. Jackson had talent, but it was the media following first his every success and then his every bizarre twist and decline that both made Jackson what he became and revealed the mainstream media for what it has become.

For both, good beginnings. For Jackson, a premature end.

For the mainstream media, one more demonstration that its self-congratulatory and studied devotion to news in the public interest can be vanquished at a moment’s notice by news in the service of pandering for profits.

A sad day all around.

There will be others.

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