The documentary Leaving Neverland, which details the alleged abuse of James Safechuck and Wade Robson at the hands of Michael Jackson, has hit a cultural nerve.
There is a sense, in my mind at least, that while Jackson was inviting young boys into his bedroom in the early hours of the morning, we were all sitting in the room next door. Perhaps listening to Bad on repeat.
We cannot say this time that we didn’t know, because we did.
Perhaps the most famous pop star of all time stood on the world stage and told us that he slept in beds with children and we collectively shrugged our shoulders.
We bought into a logic that, in retrospect, didn’t make sense.
If the allegations are true, then James Safechuck and Wade Robson were groomed. Their mothers were groomed.
And so were we.
“When I was a kid,” Jackson told us, “I was denied not only a childhood, but I was denied love.”
And who denied that to him?
Well, we did.
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Jackson was six when he joined the Jackson Brothers, a band that one year later would become The Jackson 5.
We were greedy. We bought albums that we would later learn were the product of child labour. We laughed and applauded and demanded more as an 11-year-old Jackson sung ‘I Want You Back’ – a song he couldn’t possibly have understood. Behind it all was abuse and exploitation, and we funded it.
When we began to raise an eyebrow about Jackson’s behaviour at his Neverland Valley Ranch in California, he told us, “I wanted a place that I could create everything that I never had as a child. I was always on tour, traveling. You know?
“We have busloads of kids, who don’t get to see those things… they enjoy it in a pure, loving, fun way. It’s people with the dirty mind that think like that.”
The gut feeling we had that something wasn’t right, Jackson told us, was our own fault. We were sexualising the platonic. What an awful thing to do to an innocent man – to let our ‘dirty’ minds get in the way of philanthropy.
And so, we sat in our room next door, and turned up Bad a little louder.
But the noises didn’t go away. The accusations kept coming.
Then we saw it, with our own eyes, during an interview with British journalist Martin Bashir in 2003.
“Michael, you’re a 44-year-old man now,” Bashir asked. “What do you get out of this?”
Jackson sat across from his interviewer, holding tightly the hand of 12-year-old Gavin Arvizo.
"Why can’t you share your bed? That’s the most loving thing to do, to share your bed with someone," he replied, as Arvizo rested his head on Jackson's shoulder.
There were hints of coercion -"If you love me, you’ll sleep on the bed," Jackson admitted he had said to Arvizo. The physical affection was blatant.
But we liked the idea that Jackson just loved, really loved, children. It felt true because we so desperately wanted it to be.
So we turned up the music a little louder.
Maybe it was that Jackson didn't attempt to hide what he was doing that made him all the more convincing.
Like the family friend invited into the home, or the Priest who asks the school boys to stay back, or the uncle who takes a particular interest in a child, there's a level of visibility that renders one invisible.
Isn't that the paradox of sexual abuse?
Often, the perpetrator doesn't creep into the window in the middle of the night. Rather, they're the person you greet at the door, and then step kindly out of the way, welcoming them in.
We all stepped out of the way for Michael Jackson, didn't we?
For decades, it now seems, we were groomed by the most famous man in the world.
And now it's time to turn down the music and listen to what might have been happening next door all along.
If this post has raised issues for you, please seek professional help and contact Lifeline on 13 11 14. If you are in immediate danger, call 000.
Read more on this topic:
The signs Michael Jackson was grooming the children he was close to that so many missed.
"It wasn't going to mean anything": Why Michael Jackson married Lisa Marie Presley.
'Blanket' Jackson was just seven when his father died. This week he stopped talking.
The two boys who followed Wade Robson into Michael Jackson's bed insist they weren't abused.
Debbie Rowe says she gifted Michael Jackson two children because he was a 'wonderful man'.
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Top Comments
Not enough evidence to convict him. That was outcome of his trial. You can say that I'm in denial, but I would say that those who claim to know what occured, beyond a reasonable doubt, are the ones in denial.
Yes, the public generally accepted Jackson's explanations. Why? It's a testament to our humanity. We chose to believe in his innocence and that it is possible for a man to simply be a good human being.
I watched LN and came away from it deeply troubled by the sick acts described by the alleged victims. Yet, I have so many questions and I wish that the accusers could be cross-examined and that MJ were alive to provide an alibi and his account of events.
To destroy the legacy of arguably one of the most inspirational, talented and compassionate human beings to walk the face of the Earth is a tragedy. The fact that he was a Black man makes it all the more tragic.
Have to break my 2 replies to you up as they got caught by spamfilter.
Not enough evidence? Just what more evidence do you need? As for trial outcome, OJ SIMPSON ring a bell? Rich and famous people like Simpson and Jackson get off all the time. Especially if they have a cult-like persona.
"Yes, the public generally accepted Jackson's explanations. Why? It's a testament to our humanity. We chose to believe in his innocence and that it is possible for a man to simply be a good human being."
Can I ask you something? Why do you not show humanity and choose to believe the victims? Men don't make this shit up, ok? Safechuck in particular was visibly shattered. His hands were shaking when he talked and showed the rings. (Later on after the documentary aired, a news anchor thought it sounded familiar and he looked through their tv station archives and found TV FOOTAGE OF JACKSON AND SAFECHUCK SHOPPING FOR RINGS. Complete with interviews from people who were there and saw them. https://www.news.com.au/ent...
It PROVES SAFECHUCK TOLD THE TRUTH ABOUT THE RINGS. It is clear evidence and proof, that he was telling the TRUTH! )
As a child psychologist associated with police liaison said elsewhere regarding the documentary: "I think it's interesting that sexual abuse is the only crime where the default position is to be suspicious of the accuser, to scrutinise every aspect of their demeanour and make judgements about whether it fits with how we think a "victim" should behave. It's hardly surprising that so few come forward."
Yet, I have so many questions and I wish that the accusers could be cross-examined and that MJ were alive to provide an alibi and his account of events.
See, this is why victims don't come forward. They are cross-examined and it is brutal, the defence attorneys call them a liar and try to break them. And here you are, promoting the practice. Why is it you don't mention Jackson should be 'cross-examined'? You want him to 'provide an alibi'. Wow. And we already know Jackson's account of any events. It was simple, it was loving, why can't you just share your bed, etc? Seriously. Why don't you choose as your default, to believe the victims, and not automatically doubt them? If someone said they were burgled, you wouldn't doubt them.
cont--- Don't think their behavior is wrong: "Many pedophiles refuse to recognize that what they do is even wrong. They say to themselves, 'Society just doesn't understand what I do. I'm not a bad person. I'm just engaging in something which is now politically incorrect and [that will] change down the road'. The consensus of opinion is there is no cure for pedophilia. There may be treatments for it, there may be things you can do to help these individuals control their behavior...but if you're not admitting what you've done, then you can't even begin treatment--that's the problem."
Multiple victims: "A preferential molester is far more likely to have multiple victims, to not simply have molested one kid ten or twenty times or a hundred times, which sometimes happens. But a preferential molester is likely to have molested 5, 10, 50, 100, 200, 300, 400 kids. [It] begins in their adolescent years and probably continues until almost the day they die."
Why do victimized children continue to defend the molester, for months and years?
Agent Lanning says that, "That kind of thinking goes back to our idea that only monsters molest. These perpetrators are often seemingly the finest people ever to enter the child's life. Who wouldn't want to be with a popular coach, a great Scout Leader, the loyal postman, the favorite uncle, the neighbourhood priest? The perpetrator's station in life and what he gives the child--who is most often growing up in an emotionally if not financially needy situation--is an irresistible magnet."
"What society wants to look at," Lanning says, "are the simplistic molestation cases. Dirty, evil horrible offenders who snatch and grab sweet, innocent little kids and make them have sex. [But in most] cases, the child has been seduced. The child has cooperated in their victimization, the child has gone to the offender's home again and again and again....and pretty soon you say, 'Well, is that really a victim? He got brand-new shoes, he got a bike, he got a trip to Disneyland, and he got all these benefits.' [To some] this sounds almost like prostitution. Like it was the fault of the child or the parents." cont---
On Lanning telling police officers they need to look past the obvious:
"I try to tell them to embrace the suspect's seemingly good character because that's what a true pedophile acts like. After all, they wouldn't get very far seducing parents and children if they were mean people. Pedophiles usually work hard, go to church, give money to charity and children in the neighbourhood, and are generally helpful to others in the community."
What about after the molestation, when the child becomes too old?
"On any given day the pedophile is attempting to do four things: he is recruiting, seducing, molesting, and--to put it very bluntly--dumping. In other words, he recruits the kid, he seduces the kid, he molests the kid, and then at some point the kid gets too old so [he] wants to move the kid on...to get to his next victim. The hard part is when you finish with the child and the child begins to sense that the only reason this guy was nice to me and did all these wonderful things for me is because I was a child...And as soon as I lost that childlike appearance and characteristic he is not interested in me anymore. And here is where the threats, the blackmail, the violence, the threat of violence, may come into play, as a part of their effort to now keep this child quiet."
Former FBI Agent Ken Lanning there.
As you can see, Jackson ticks every box. Never has there been such an obvious paedophile hiding in plain sight.
Not sure why my other posts didn't go through but I'll try again.
"To destroy the legacy"
There you go again. Victim-blaming. As if you are resentful of the victims for daring to come forward, and for destroying your idol and his legacy. Seriously wtf is wrong with people who think like this?!? Jackson destroyed his own legacy! He did it to himself. He continued sleeping in a bed with children when advised not to. He continued to do unhinged things, and batted away any warnings. He DID THIS TO HIMSELF!
"compassionate human beings to walk the face of the Earth is a tragedy."
Firstly, Jackson was anything BUT 'compassionate', you seem to be rather brainwashed and brought into his faux charity act. Which was all to get access to children. It's called hiding in plain sight. He created a narrative of he was innocent, had no childhood, was like a child, loved children (as long as they were boys, and of a certain age demographic), yadayada. It was a COVER, so no one would suspect him. And you fell for it. Just as people did with Rolf Harris and his children's charity work. And Jimmy Savile and his children's charity work. It enables them to *look* innocent, while gaining access.
Lastly, Even if he wasn't a sexual abuser, which sure as the Pope is Catholic, he was, Jackson was an abuser and manipulator of children. He still abused them emotionally and psychologically. He messed with a child's personal boundaries, spent hours on the phone with them at a time, was with them almost every day, abused them each night, took them on tour, then unceremoniously DUMPED THEM! What he did was absolute evil. Jackson is a macabre, evil, manipulative and cruel freak. A monster in the truest of all senses. On every level. There was nothing 'compassionate' about him.
It's interesting to re-watch the Bashir interview. You can spot several moments where Jackson tries to manipulate him, but he's not having any of it.
E.g. Bashir brings up the issue of children sleeping in his bed, and Jackson automatically insists that it's a "loving" act, and that anyone who thinks otherwise is sick. When Bashir asks if it's OK for men to sleep with other people's children he says, "of course, it's loving".
There are other moments where Jackson plays the "I'm a big kid" act and Bashir keeps emphasising to him that he's a grown man.
There are also moments when Jackson goes out of his way to portray himself as a non-sexual person, such as when he was dating Tatum O'Neal and got frightened when was sexual towards him.
When I first saw the interview years ago I thought Bashir was biased against him and simply fishing for a "gotcha" moment, but re-watching it he seemed genuinely concerned at times.