Truthfully Speaking

Michael Jackson – The Ugly

It’s time for
reality! Let me say that I loved Michael Jackson. I was one of the ones that
felt that he was tormented – and, I understood his eccentricities. When I
watched him, I saw a child that was screwed up by his money hungry father and
docile mother. I always question how a truly loving mother would allow their children
to be put through such psychologically damaging situations. But, I then
understand that some women take a back seat and allow their man to be the “ruler”
of the home. In the end, it’s not a surprise that so many of the

Jackson

clan members are screwed up. Unfortunately,
Michael seemed to be damaged the worst. 
I never believed the allegations about Michael molesting those boys –
but, I wasn’t there. What I can speak on, is his unwillingness to be truthful,
even in instances that were very obvious – like, how he went from being black
to being powder.

Last night,
Dateline replayed the interview between Michael and Martin Bashir. As I watched
it, I couldn’t help but note the lies that he, so blatantly, told. The first
question of note was that of his skin color change. To that question, he stated
that it was all “ridiculous”. He then went on to say that people of the other
complexion would go outside and get tans, but no one said anything about that.
For him to actually believe that what he was saying was logical, truly
disturbed me. In the same vein, he was asked about the changing of his facial
shape, the cleft chin, the enlargement of lips, the eyebrows, etc. To all of
those, he responded that it was puberty and growing up. He maintained that this
was true even when Bashir reminded him that these changes came after the years
of puberty. Still, Michael stated that it was puberty. As I re-watched, I
became increasingly agitated. I then remembered why I didn’t want to remember that
interview.

Then came the stuff
about the kids. Bashir asked about the paternity and conception of the kids.
Michael stated that the first two were “gifts” – that Debbie Rowe said, “You
need to be a father” and had the kids for him. When asked about the other
child, he first stated that she was a surrogate. Bashir asked him if he’d had a
relationship with her and Michael said that he did. He then stated that ALL
three of those children had his sperm and that the mother of the last child was
a black woman. When asked about the complexions, he pointed to Joe Jackson’s
eyes and side of the family. Later, when asked about the children again, he
stated that the he did not know the mother of that child and that she was just
a surrogate. But, when you look at those kids, you knew that they ARE NOT HIS!
How mentally ill must you be to believe that you can go from being black to
white, with total facial feature changes, and then have children who look pure
white – when, not one of your own siblings resembles anyone white. It was sad.

Fast forward to
today – revealed that neither Michael nor Debbie Rowe are the biological
parents of those children, and NONE of the children are Michael’s. Worse than
that, he didn’t even adopt ANY of them because he felt that no one would ever
battle him for custody. So, now, three kids hang in the balance and no one
knows who their biological parents are.

I don’t know what is
more crazy, but while I choose to remember the great about Michael, things like
this keep people from being able to see him as a reputable individual. His
personal life and privileged decisions are direct factors in the determination
of what will happen with three innocent kids. And, it wont be until they grow
up that we’ll probably ever have the opportunity to know the real truth about
Michael.

Revisiting Parallel Lives

It’s hard to be a
writer because you’re always having to consider feelings. Folk take things
personally and always feel that it’s about them. Being a writer just isn’t a
popular thing – at least, not when you want to keep it real and talk about this
life. For 10 years, I’ve been writing about life and sharing my thoughts with
complete strangers. For a nice period of time, I focused on the concept of “parallel
lives”. I don’t know if I coined the term, but I used it often in my writing.
What I was referring to in my talks about parallel lives, was the uncanny
coincidence that other people’s stories were exactly the same as mine; that, in
making it public, someone else was able to feel solace about an identical
situation happening simultaneously in their own lives.  I realized then that we are not individuals –
but carbon copies of multiple people in this universe. 

In my quest for
self realization and actualization, I’ve taken many roads. This process has
often caused me great deals of torment. But, on a positive note, it’s helped me
to understand people so much more. Many people talk about their willingness to
be open, but for the most part, people don’t want to feel like they are the
fuel for any fire. Neither does any one want to know that their tormented situations
have been immortalized on paper for the whole world to view and discuss. I
recognize that people can’t help but feel guilt or vanity when they read
something that, they feel, is about them. The reality is – it’s never just
about you! Our words and actions might trigger thoughts and emotions that were
harvested, but to think that one is the sole contributor in any specific
scenario is nothing short of narcissistic. I’ll leave you with one of my
favorite phrases:

“Get over yourself!” 

THE BLACK ENTERTAINMENT TRAGEDY – 2009 BET AWARDS

They always
honor you in death. Rarely, do they remember you in life. But on Sunday, June
28, 2009, Black Entertainment Television (the one I call the Black
Entertainment Tragedy) had the opportunity to pay great tribute to an icon who
left the world too soon while still keeping with their regular plans to present
the people with the 2009 BET Awards Ceremony. I don’t think anyone really
understands the magnitude of this man’s death. While this may not sound like
something substantial, Michael, in death, was responsible for making us all
tune in to a network that many of us had turned our backs on. So, those of us
who made the decision to keep VH1 Soul in constant rotation were now tuning to
BET to see the wonderful tribute. Recognizing that they only had a few days to
plan, it is important that we give them credit.

I have no
interest in discussing whether the tribute was poorly done or whether it was a
great attempt. My focus is on the “regularly scheduled” acts. I tuned in late,
but was kept current by the Twitter and Facebook Social networking avenues. I’ve
long been a proponent of the power these networks have in sharing news and
social commentary. Last night really proved how phenomenal Social Networks
really are. For the first time, I was able to see the comments of individuals
that felt the same way I did and also to see those who opposed. But the
conversations that ensued based on those initial postings were even more
phenomenal. But back to my point.

As I
watched the show, it became sadly apparent that the music that is being pumped
into the black airwaves does nothing but promote a wider scale of ignorance.
Save, a few positive performances, the music was largely “negro mess”. As I
watched everything from the ignorant chain of bondage around T – “Pains me to
look at’s” chest down to Lil’ Wayne, Drake, and company’s decisions to put
underage girls (and I don’t care if the girl is Wayne’s daughter) on the stage
while performing a song about wanting to screw every woman in the world, I was
just disgusted. In between those tragedies were moments that just made you
smile – Ne-Yo, (even if you hate her and her awful outfit) Beyonce, Maxwell,
BBD, the O’Jays (performance only), and even Jay- Z. There were more
respectable acts that just those. Even Tevin managed to look presentable and
sound … good (that was hard for me to admit). But, on a whole, I could only
think about what my students will remember. While the whole Soulja Boy
phenomena is heartbreaking, I couldn’t help but join in with the coonery , “Yeahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
git money! OWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!” The truth is, music has now come to a place
in life where it’s not about the content, it’s really about the style you bring
and the trends you set. Even T-Pain’s chain served as a commentary to how
foolish artists have become with wanting to outdo the next with ridiculous
amounts of ice.

Michael
Jackson’s flare and vision gave rise to the artists that we now see today.
Because of him, artists have an opportunity to be as flashy as they can.
Unfortunately, they missed an important part of what Michael was – tasteful.
And now, we have the great misfortune of this being the state of our black
music. What will people remember about the 2009 BET Awards? Nothing, because it
was a nightmare that needs to be pushed to the back of our minds and never to
be brought forward again.

RELAUNCHING

For approximately 3 years now, I've been wanting to own my domain name. I've fallen in love with it. It's been 6 years of blogging on typepad. Prior to that, I blogged at places that don't even exist anymore. I've been a blogger now for 10 years. That's amazing – even if you don't think so. In the past few years, I've fallen off. I guess I just was never able to get back into the swing of things regarding posting every day or even multiple times a week.

My newly created site will be quite different from this in that I will finally break down and do categories. Many of you have been doing that forever, but I always preferred the idea of simply blogging with no concern about category.

Right now, nothing is on the site, but I hope to have it launched by the end of this month or the middle of next month. I'll also be combining twitter and all those other social networking avenues to it. So, check me out. I'll give you all the name of the site when it no longer says GoDaddy.

10 year anniversary baby. The re-launch! Your girl Naið is coming back.