Thursday July 16, 2009
MJ was the voice of our conscience
IT will soon be three weeks to the day. How do I explain this feeling that a part of me has gone missing when I don’t even know Michael Jackson in person in the first place?
When I expressed this to a friend, she said that was exactly how she was feeling too. We are not Quincy Jones who had worked closely with him and yet, like Quincy Jones, we feel a part of us has come away.
Across the globe, the outpouring of grief is unprecedented. The same scenes of spontaneous and heartfelt street vigils and memorials were repeated in different continents – from south to north, east to west.
On Sunday just past, during a gathering of old school friends, one had brought along a compilation of his greatest hits. We played our favourites. As his voice filled the room, we grew silent. Each with our own thoughts.
So, we mourn. All over the world. Why did Michael Jackson’s death evoke such a groundswell of emotion?
For me, his songs have helped to define many things about life, about being a person and about being a citizen of our world. I have been shaped by these songs. What self-empowerment lies within the lyrics of Man In The Mirror!
I’ve heard Ben and many of MJ’s early hits during my childhood, but it was in varsity in the 1980s that I became more aware of him. I remember how his Beat It and Billie Jean videos were the rage and we used to crowd that one common room with a TV in Desa Permai to soak in his genius. As someone who has definitely been impacted by his music and his life, I would say that he went beyond mere entertainment.
For the past 30 years, in a world growing more and more askew, through his music and dance, his was the voice of our conscience. He touched chords deep in us and uplifted us in thought, action and spirit towards a rising consciousness and humanity. He was part of our soul.
I find it utterly profound that his very self became the embodiment of “It don’t matter if you’re black or white.” From black, he became white. Not because he aspired to be white but because vitiligo, a skin ailment, had caused deadening of pigment cells in his skin which in turn caused white splotches all over his body, and his dermatologist had embarked on killing off the remaining pigment cells as the treatment path.
So, Michael Jackson did not choose to be white. He became white out of medical necessity. In the end, he lived his very message of common humanity and racial acceptance.
SWEE BIN,
Kuala Lumpur.
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