When Michael Jackson appeared in court to defend himself against allegations of child molestation, many in America and abroad immediately came to the defense of the music superstar. They refused to believe the “King of Pop” could ever be sexually involved with young boys. Scores of loyal fans appeared outside the courthouse holding signs proclaiming Jackson’s innocence, but there were also those who felt Jackson put himself in a position to warrant suspicion and tremendous criticism. While the prosecution, on two occasions, was unsuccessful in obtaining a conviction, the damage had already been done. Jackson’s album and concert ticket sales dropped dramatically, and exorbitant legal fees nearly bankrupted him. His devotees, as well as many within the music industry, were practically in a state of shock and disbelief, but The G-man may have been the only person in the world who knew Jackson was destined to fall from grace. How? It all started with a theory I came up with long before Jackson’s initial allegation.
Shortly after Jackson gave a videotaped account of what prosecutors forced him to do, which including stripping naked and having photos taken of his “private parts”, I called a very close friend of mine and said, “See? There is a connection! Didn’t I tell you?!” He immediately exclaimed, “Oh, my God! The songs!! You said something about his songs, and it looks like you were dead on!! What he was referring to was a conversation we had with several other friends months before Jackson’s child molestation allegations first surfaced. I think Jackson is trying to tell us something about himself based on his songs,” I said. “Have you ever looked closely at the titles, like ‘P.Y.T.’ – Pretty Young Thing, ‘Bad’, ‘Smooth Criminal’, ‘Speed Demon’, ‘In the Closet’ and ‘Man in the Mirror’, in particular?” My question was greeted with laughter and ridicule, but for some strange reason I felt these titles had an underlying meaning. Once the second child molestation case against Jackson flooded the airwaves, networks and publications, my friends stopped laughing and the theory seemed more than plausible.
If you listen to P.Y.T. now, the lyrics are as disturbing and frightening as Jackson’s refrain “Because I’m bad, I’m bad!” or “You’ve been hit by, you’ve been struck by…a smooth criminal!” Speed Demon is a song about someone who can’t be caught. In the Closet, and there’s no surprise here, is about someone with a deep, dark secret. I found one lyric in Man in the Mirror to be the most alarming, the one where he vows to change. Jackson sings, “I’m starting with that man in the mirror. I’m asking him to change his ways.” However, Jackson never reveals which aspect of himself he desperately wants to change. One could argue that there is no evidence to support this theory, but there are two indisputable facts regarding the Jackson allegations: he settled in the first case by forking over $20 million, and he admitted, while lovingly clasping the hand of a 14-year-old boy on national television, that there was nothing wrong with a 45 year-old man sharing his bed with young boys.
