The Tentacled Monkey

Today, or yesterday now, saw the deaths of two of the most iconic figures from the 1970’s and the 1980’s. Many people have mourned the passing of Farrah Fawcett after a long struggle against cancer, my sympathies go out to her remaining family and children.

Unfortunately her death is now being over shadowed of a sort by the death of iconic pedophile pop-singer, Michael Jackson. I think it safe to assume that like me, many other people have thought of Mr. Jackson as being dead for a number of years now. So his actual passing is somewhat anti-climatic.

What this teaches us is that the American people as a whole love drama. We thrive on it. We embody it. So instead of remembering these people for who they were in life, we remember them in snapshots of our lives. We don’t remember Michael Jackson the nut-job, pedophile- baby-dangler, no we remember Thriller because it is more convenient.

Conversely, we don’t remember Farrah Fawcett the strong cancer battling mother and feminist from the Burning Bed. Instead we remember the poster, and her stunning beauty on Charlie’s Angels. In a sense we are selling these two short, both are likely more than the sum of their televised parts, but did we really ever know them?

Did we ever really know them enough to really mourn them? Can we look back in our lives right now and say, “My life is in shambles now that Michael Jackson is dead?” If you honestly can then you are family, a very close friend, or delusional. The average Tom, Dick, & Harry have no emotional bond to Mr. Jackson the man. The bond is with Mr. Jackson’s music, and I believe that is still around.

So who is it that so many people are mourning today? No one really knows but their family, and to them my heart goes out. Both were parents and the children are the losers here today, they are the ones we should mourn. Not the artist and the bombshell from our memories, because they are still with us.