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Fatwah / June 26, 2009
By Eileen Jones

doublemichael-jackson

I just saw an article headlined, “Michael Jackson Dead Too Soon at 50.” Dead too soon, you sadists? The more fitting headline, if you have any heart at all, is “Michael Jackson Dead Not a Moment Too Soon”! Because if ever there was a merciful release, for him and the whole wide world, this was it.

Jackson was about to start a big concert tour when blessed cardiac arrest came to the rescue. Why are we not all cheering whatever combination of drugs helped the miserable no-nosed sod out of this mortal coil? Can you imagine the ongoing carny freak show that was about to ensue? Frail, pale Jackson with a face like the Phantom of the Opera desperately moonwalking from city to city to pay off his 400 million dollar debt? And those gangs of pitifully weird fans, also aging in ghastly ways, turning out to watch, as if the International Association of Mental Institutions had all released their patients simultaneously for the occasion?

mugshot__michael-jackson

It’s monstrous, lamenting Jackson’s death, wishing him back in his bleached body and up on a stage somewhere wearing a glitter glove and grabbing his skeletal crotch. All that guff from people like Quincy Jones, who ought to know better, saying he had so much more to give. Nobody ever saw such a used-up husk of a person, such a walking corpse, as Michael Jackson. Couldn’t one honest person who knew him stand up and say, “Thank God that’s over!” He’s out of his misery now, and we don’t have to shudder at the sight of him anymore! There will be no more pathetic comeback CDs! No more offspring named Prince Michael III, IV, and V! Assorted children are safe from his creepy affections! O Death, where is thy sting, when it comes to Michael Jackson?

The fact is, Michael Jackson peaked at age ten, when he was still a black kid with a robust voice who could really belt it out: “OHHH baby give me one more CHAAAAAAANCE….” He’s the only guy in the world whose voice broke and got subsequently higher and reedier. It went from a fierce yowl too big for the kid’s body to a breathy contralto, and a speaking voice so exaggeratedly girly it sounded like Marilyn Monroe vocally reincarnated.

michael_jackson_1971_got_to_be_there

As so many have asked in the intervening years—what the hell happened to him? Was he an inadvertent castrato or something? Did his vicious father Joe do him some permanent injury to the groin area during one of the legendary childhood beatings? Or did Jackson himself make a bold first step toward achieving white girlhood, starting with the nuts and moving on to the nose?

The new soft breathiness of his voice was already noticeable in the ballad “Ben.” (That’s a love song fourteen-year-old Jackson sang to a rat. If you weren’t around in the ‘70s you wouldn’t understand about the whole vermin-film subgenre that seemed so right for that decade in America.) Even the more energetic songs he did later for Off the Wall and Thriller are airy and anemic compared with the splendid childhood stuff: “Bill-hee Jean is not my luv-huh…” Maybe it was the type of arrangements that were favored then, in that distressing era of ‘80s pop, but there seemed to be a lot of gratuitous “WHOOOs” and stuff in those songs, as if to show that Jackson could still throw out a big note when he wanted to.

Speaking of breathy voices, Farrah Fawcett’s dead too. We have a celebrity-death two-fer. Fawcett’s less interesting, of course, because she never had any talent to lose. The source of her fascination was how on earth she stayed famous for decades just from one poster that showcased her nipples. Plus a stupid hairdo that became a cultural blight. It wouldn’t go away. Up through the ‘90s, when I went back east to my hick hometown for a visit, I’d still see women flaunting that appalling flipped-back ‘do.

flipfarrah_fawcett-242x300

Critics and pundits are trying to make posthumous claims that Fawcett had substance (“A Serious Actress with Range” is the tile of Peter Hartlaub’s “appreciation”) but let’s be serious here for a moment. She was a terrible actress and a painfully dippy celebrity presence and a wearying exhibitionist too, judging by that rolling-naked-in-paint attempt at artistry for the Playboy Channel and the I’m-a-proud-anal-cancer-victim documentary with her mortifying fat git boyfriend Ryan O’Neill hogging the camera. Her death spares us further Farrah-docs, anyway. Shouldn’t there be some policy for putting celebrities down–like horses with broken legs who thrash around maiming themselves horribly–when they get past a certain point of public self-abasement? We shoot horses, don’t we?

farrah-fawcett-sick

But on the other hand, I have to admit, she was a courteous woman. That’s not a small thing. I can say this because I had a Farrah Fawcett encounter once, years ago. It was at a Hollywood party, a real cliché of a Hollywood party, with wall-to-wall stars and an almost incredible lack of revelry going on. Everybody was working, see, “making contacts,” showing themselves off to other industry bigshots, trying to move up a rank in the star hierarchy. It was quite a thing to watch, but one of the worst parties I ever attended if you cling to the standard notion of the word “party.”

I was one of the nobodies who happened to be there, for complicated reasons, so naturally I only talked to other nobodies while stars talked to other stars. I was in a line for the bathroom next to Farrah Fawcett, and she made polite conversation with me while we waited. An amazing breach of protocol! Never Engage the Nobodies is one of the basic rules of Hollywood stardom; don’t even make eye contact; they’ll only try to give you a script or something.

She was very small and thin and rather pretty considering the fact that she had grey skin, I remember. I’d never seen anyone with grey skin before, and I’ve wondered about it ever since. How does a person get grey skin? But that’s the thing with celebrities, it’s always a freak show of one sort or another. Mark Wahlberg, for example, is approximately four feet tall. Just FYI.

If we’re going to do death-tributes, here are some honest ones: Farrah Fawcett, a Surprisingly Polite Woman! Michael Jackson, If Only He’d Died Younger!

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59 Comments

Add your own

  • 1. Mark Nuckols  |  June 26th, 2009 at 10:28 pm

    Oh I have to disagree. I relished all eight years of Bush, Jr. I even gave him money in 2004, marveling that Americans could re-elect an obvious moron. A idiot President for a nation of idiots. (Query: why were leftists all hot and bothered by Bush anyway? really, why give a fuck?) And I personally would have enjoyed the spectacle of Jackson performing in sell-out concerts worldwide, giving lie to the ridiculous myth that only Americans have appallingly bad tastes in culture. RIP, Michael.

  • 2. Strahlungsamt  |  June 27th, 2009 at 6:35 am

    Think things are bad now? The shit hasn’t hit the fan yet!

    Wait until the made for TV movies (plus endless talk shows) about MJ and his childhood, his Bubbles, his plastic surgery, his oxygen bubble etc. come out.

    Remember folks, you heard it here first.

  • 3. pompus jerk  |  June 27th, 2009 at 7:31 am

    michael jackson’s death has been like when the weird dude finally leaves the room and everyone spends five minutes talking about how weird he was

  • 4. geo8rge  |  June 27th, 2009 at 7:57 am

    Did you notice there are no big acts any more? MJ might be the end of Anglo American pop music domination.

    If you were going to put together a hits of the 2000s what would it be? Outkast: He-Ya and what? Bjork?

  • 5. Peter  |  June 27th, 2009 at 8:49 am

    As for the gray skin, I knew a very pretty girl who hooked up with a passive-aggressive vegan “punk” who passive-aggressived her into vegandom (and making all of his vegan meals). Her skin went all gray, it was pretty tragic. Not sure if that’s applicable in Fawcett’s case, but there you are.

  • 6. Antonio B.  |  June 27th, 2009 at 8:51 am

    Learn grammar.

  • 7. Thuggin  |  June 27th, 2009 at 12:27 pm

    For real, Eileen. I felt the same way about it, when I heard he died. What a freak. A sad, sad fucker.

    I’m waitin for the images of his cryogenically frozen head being spliced onto a human child’s body.

  • 8. carchedi  |  June 27th, 2009 at 1:12 pm

    I have to agree. the ongoing existence of MJ always inflicted a sharp feeling of shame on me, though i was obviously not complicit in his lengthy career of self-degradation.
    Thank God it’s over. Better for him and better for us, let’s face it.
    In a certain sense it’s celebrities who have the most miserable lives of all.

  • 9. monodork  |  June 27th, 2009 at 1:47 pm

    Funny that MJ had to be killed twice even three times, first by Bush Sr. for whatever reasons when they changed him for an Italian actor, then the Italian guy ‘went abroad ‘ , now we have one more body with disfigured face.

    The second case could be more easily explained – there was a private party, she was in the list, marked as one of Charlie Angels, etc., some invited high rank CIA official’s hillbilly cousine high on cocaine grabbed a shortgun and shot her in the face. Mark Wahlberg is next he shouted Prison of Apes my ass. Can you hear me you f..g dwarf!!!
    Exile online magazine team member saw everything… FYI, littlepeople-f…k. Wahl-wahl-waaaahhhl. You are f#$&g next!

  • 10. memzilla  |  June 27th, 2009 at 2:00 pm

    As was written on ehowa.com: “Who knew little boy semen was so high in cholesterol?”

  • 11. Mike Flugennock  |  June 28th, 2009 at 5:26 am

    Rolling naked in paint?

    Didn’t Ann-Margret do that in 1966 or thereabouts? (Still, I think A-M wore some kind of sheer bodystocking for that scene.)

  • 12. Allen  |  June 28th, 2009 at 7:05 am

    Hilariously apt. From what I hear the news networks (CNN, etc) are holding a 24 hour memorial to him; and even that icy bitch Nancy Grace is took a break from making money off murder-tainment to say that Michael Jackson will sorely be missed.

    They love their celebrities after they die, huh?

  • 13. fajensen  |  June 28th, 2009 at 8:43 am

    I heard Michael Jacson choked on some 12 year old nuts.

  • 14. Frank McG  |  June 28th, 2009 at 12:36 pm

    So celebrities are horrible monsters that deserve to be put down…

    …UNTIL one of them sprinkles a little attention on you at a star fucker party.

    Congrats, Eileen. You’re officially the bitter bitch always going on about what a bastard their ex was but would get back with them for a second if they asked.

  • 15. Frednelore  |  June 28th, 2009 at 7:16 pm

    You’re surprinsingly intelligent for a woman.

    The thing with him and his influence was less the music and more the performance –hence the videos. So we had Britney, Backstreet Boys, etc and dozens of the boys, like Timberlake and so, all owing to him. Madonna too; with a little more sense of reality (or ear).

  • 16. Nat  |  June 29th, 2009 at 5:14 am

    “Farrah Fawcett died and went to heaven. She met God and he granted her one wish. She asked for all the children in the world to be safe. So he killed Micheal Jackson.”

    Not mine, but IMHO kinda cool.

  • 17. SweetLeftFoot  |  June 29th, 2009 at 6:23 am

    For the record, Jackson wasn’t going to embark on a huge global tour. He was going to do 50 dates at the 02 Centre in London as even the vicious bloodsuckers who were planning to cream some healthy cash off his desperate attempts to keep the financial wolf from the door knew he was too fucked to face a proper tour.

  • 18. Plamen Petkov  |  June 29th, 2009 at 7:24 am

    LOVE the article, right on target; problem is 1 down, 10,000 more to go. But admit it his “comeback tour woudan been so pathetic it robbed us of all the predicable stuff: Jackson fainting on stage, Jackson voice giving up on him, cancellations of tour dates, his idiotic fans coming up in droves screaming and fainting too. In other words, he depraved us of great circus. Damn you Michael for dying just a few months too early.

  • 19. Bro  |  June 29th, 2009 at 11:10 am

    Mark Wahlberg is approximately 5’7″ tall. Shall I assume that the rest of the article is pretty much BS too?

  • 20. Zog  |  June 29th, 2009 at 1:48 pm

    I heard Obama killed Michael Jackson to provide media cover for his Cap & Trade Agreement which was passed the same day the King of Poop had a heart attack.

  • 21. Lestor  |  June 29th, 2009 at 2:42 pm

    I’m wondering if The Black Savior can kill so easily for purely image purposes what kind of soul he has.

  • 22. Philipp  |  June 29th, 2009 at 3:09 pm

    Why THEY are dead thank God?
    Why Farrah’s demise is so, kind of decisively included in the list of deaths Eileen feels good about?
    What was her guilt to be mentioned in the toilet context?

  • 23. CJT  |  June 29th, 2009 at 5:16 pm

    Would that you could have been in line to the bathroom and talked to Jackson. You would have at least a two page write here.

  • 24. FSB Agent 008  |  June 29th, 2009 at 8:47 pm

    Transformation of Michael Jackson mirrored transformation of America itself. Today’s US looks not much better than the King of Poop at 50. MJ is dead, and USA cannot be far behind.

  • 25. Ilona  |  June 29th, 2009 at 11:49 pm

    Michael Jackson won’t be cremated or buried. He’ll be recycled as Lego blocks, since his body contains 86% of plastic, so children
    could continue playing with him forever and ever.

  • 26. Viking  |  June 30th, 2009 at 1:05 pm

    5’7″ may as well be 4 feet tall if you’re a man in the first world. It’s really short for a leading man.

    That was my feeling about MJ too.

  • 27. Ingvend Storrs  |  June 30th, 2009 at 1:32 pm

    Yeah, M.J. is dead. But we still have the nightmarish hell of a system that made him and all of the other fucking freaks that live off of fame and glamor attention to get by, megabucks and all. It’s one fucked up system/industry.

    BTW, I was NEVER a M.J. fan, nor the fan of many others. I am a fan of talent and good art. Those are far and few between.

  • 28. King Kong of Gothenburg  |  June 30th, 2009 at 2:28 pm

    Great idea, Ilona. I´ve always loved to play with LEGOs.

  • 29. rommel  |  July 1st, 2009 at 1:10 am

    “I was one of the nobodies”—
    true words in your article….even about me…you’re a great writer, but I will remain NOBODY and no gives a shit if I die today or tomorrow.there will be one more spitefull freak less.

  • 30. Dmitry, Russia  |  July 1st, 2009 at 1:13 am

    De mortuis aut bene, aut nihil!

  • 31. rommel  |  July 1st, 2009 at 1:35 am

    fucking sluts, you twisted my nutsack.stinky asshloes.we will nuke your fucking country of fucking usa!

  • 32. Sam  |  July 2nd, 2009 at 5:17 am

    Yeah, well, “The Burning Bed” is a kickass film and I’ll always respect Ms Fawcett for it …

  • 33. Carpenter  |  July 6th, 2009 at 8:42 am

    I hope all Americans had a great Fourth of July, knowing that Jacko’s death made the country that much better!

  • 34. Thuggin  |  July 6th, 2009 at 9:10 pm

    Too many fuckin babies posting comments. Look at em whine! God … Look what you started, Dolan!

  • 35. leipzig  |  July 7th, 2009 at 7:38 pm

    Ooh, “rommel,” what a coruscatingly brilliant comment you chose with which to bless us here. Are there no moderators on this site?

    This was a damn fine article, by the way!

  • 36. Owen O'Neill  |  July 10th, 2009 at 6:46 pm

    You can get permanent gray skin by taking enough “colloidial silver” (as pills- quack medicine).

  • 37. Joe Jackson  |  July 13th, 2009 at 1:05 pm

    Dead? DEAD?!

    WHEN?

    HOW?

  • 38. Yam Digger  |  July 14th, 2009 at 11:49 am

    Micheal Jackson died all wrong!!! He should have died on stage, at his first O2 concert, right in front of all his pathetic fans.

    I would have paid good money to see that!!!

  • 39. Just Sad  |  July 15th, 2009 at 12:39 pm

    I feel sad for all of you, especially the writer of the article. An artist of incredible talent just died and you mock his demise. Sad….

  • 40. Mark  |  July 18th, 2009 at 10:27 am

    The only thing grossly libelous and incorrect in this article is the assertion that _Ben_ of all things is superior to Off the Wall or Thriller.

  • 41. Adm. Halsey  |  July 18th, 2009 at 1:56 pm

    When MJ wasn’t cavorting with the young’uns, he put all his talent and energy into his career. This was a career move and a good one. Farrah waited a bit long to make the move, but both are in heaven now with Elvis and Marilyn. Unless the music playing is “Just the Way You Are” by Billy Joel… then they’re in hell.

  • 42. roy merritt  |  July 22nd, 2009 at 9:39 am

    Having been no great fan of Jackson I must admit I was ambivalent about his death and the same goes for Fawcett. On the whole I think celebrities are simply children who never grew up and thus the reason they in the main have pathetic lives. It is depressing seeing some old worn out hack of an actor who in their latter years is reduced to being hucksters for some new product on QVC or other infomerical outlet. I suspect the potential for wealth and fame are the allure of such a profession though on the whole most are relegated to a sort of obscure celebrity known to a mere few familiar with them and their efforts. I have casually met a few in my life and if one is able to engage them in conversation without acknowledging the aura of their celebrity, treating them as you would anyone else they on the whole seem to be no different than anyone else. I therefore think it is those around them who give them some sense that they are more important than the great unwashed. A few seem to be able to surmount such obstacles and achieve respect in other endeavors; Paul Newman comes to mind. In closing I think Jackson’s death was a relief for him and a quest he had been endeavoring to achieve since his notoriety began.

  • 43. Reverend Ike  |  July 28th, 2009 at 9:46 pm

    What was that? Ебанни в рот, dude! B рот!

  • 44. Antonio Garcia  |  October 1st, 2009 at 4:32 pm

    I’m glad i was not a Michael Jackson fan

  • 45. u dpf  |  March 6th, 2010 at 1:02 pm

    i`m not a massive fanv of micheal j but u smellllllllllll hahahahahahahahahaa

  • 46. u dpf  |  March 6th, 2010 at 1:02 pm

    u r smelly!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  • 47. denise  |  May 20th, 2010 at 9:09 am

    Fuck you.

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  • 51. Ignorantpeople  |  February 20th, 2011 at 3:12 am

    You all disgust me. You are ignorant, pathetic losers. A truly talented person died and you celebrate his death? He didn’t molest those kids, he didn’t molest anyone, one of the kids who claimed that Micheal molested him in court finally came out and said micheal never even touched him once.NONE of you ignorant people know Micheal and I bet most of you had never even met him before. I have met him and he was truly genuinely nice and a good person. I know I’ll get shit for this because all of you don’t like Micheal so you think your opinion is the right one just because it is what you think and Im okay with getting cussed out and snickered at for standing up for Micheal but I honestly couldn’t give a shit what you all think. You all should be the ones dying and going to hell for even saying such hateful and cruel things about someone.

  • 52. Shawnhyno  |  April 12th, 2011 at 10:18 pm

    Re-read what you just wrote. And tell me your not the most arrogant obnoxious person. As creepy or frail micheal was. He accomplish more goals by age 10. That you have or will ever do. Including this god awful blog or yours. Btw his skin wasn’t bleached. It was A cream. If you were a superstar pop star that people saw every single day! And you had blotches of white everywhere. I’d say fuck it and just balance it out. Which is exactly what he did.

  • 53. Trevor  |  February 8th, 2012 at 7:41 pm

    I really can’t wait til I die to see what people write about me, actually, they won’t write anything about me, so I should just die. I hope I die of something serious like cancer, so that I suffer the pain that you might have a good laugh. I am like a 10 yer old kid, I may as well have made a lame ass joke about how idiots I hang out with use the word poopie into our “jokes”. Very seldom can a comedian pull off cancer jokes, though when I die, it will be funny to someone. I would’nt even classify myself as a human being, because my meat is the most tasteless meat I have ever eaten in my life. If my impending painful death is so funny, why don’t I get my death over with already. Who goes on living when they write a moronic comment like this?? Good luck with everything you guys do, I fucking love you! I’ve donated a ton, I hope others do too. Though my fingernails won’t be short, my death will be sweet, and you’re still a serious talent. You get it.

  • 54. brooke nicole  |  February 17th, 2012 at 3:01 pm

    you know people who make mistakes they really deserve to die. every body deserves to die ? you need to continue disrespecting the dead , how would you feel if a retarded commenter such as myself died and everybody said thank god they finally died , disrespectful much ,. i think i proved my point, i am indeed a retard, goodbye i will die now.

  • 55. Diana Calderon  |  May 3rd, 2012 at 9:55 pm

    Excuse me I have to say that whoever wrote this you are you and are you gamouse cause if I were you I wouldn’t say anything because being gamouse could not be any easy and I also need to disagree because Mr.Jackson was a great man and I am pretty sure you werent

  • 56. Diana Calderon  |  May 3rd, 2012 at 10:01 pm

    I have to say that whoever wrote needs to shut up because you do not know what you are saying and if you are just gonna talk a bunch of shit you don’t have to post it up so everyone can see you talk a bunch of shit Michael Jackson was an amazing and I’m sure he was more smarter and more better than YOU!!!!!

  • 57. Dean  |  February 17th, 2013 at 3:32 pm

    Ya …fuck them both.

  • 58. SomeoneBehindU  |  May 8th, 2013 at 7:19 pm

    I misspelled “write” as “right” and for that alone, the Almighty Exiled Censor wisely improved this comment. By the way, I fucking loved this article; MJ’s death made me happy as hell, I just didn’t know it at the time.

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