Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Original poster

Do you think Michael Jackson was guilty?

702 replies

InnocentOrGuilty · 12/05/2024 09:48

Of the sexual abuse of boys.
I'm interested in a poll.
G = you think he was definitely guilty
I = you think he was innocent
(Stemming from a debate with DH last night!)

OP posts:
Thread gallery
21
beguilingeyes · 13/05/2024 11:17

I was in a restaurant yesterday and MJ was playing. I thought about how Gary Glitter is absolutely verboten but MJ is still revered. New musical in the West End also.
Money talks.

misszebra · 13/05/2024 11:30

LauderSyme · 13/05/2024 08:39

Yes he was able to buy an accomplished defence team who outplayed the public prosecutors.

Also his case became a huge race issue and he benefitted from backlash against police bigotry towards Black people.

Show quote history

yes and some of that defence team also were on MJ's defence team! MJ also had an accomplished defence team.

SuprasternalNotch · 13/05/2024 11:47

beguilingeyes · 13/05/2024 11:17

I was in a restaurant yesterday and MJ was playing. I thought about how Gary Glitter is absolutely verboten but MJ is still revered. New musical in the West End also.
Money talks.

Isn’t the issue in part that Gary Glitter was essentially a lame novelty act, while MJ was a musical genius?

Puppuccino · 13/05/2024 11:47

beguilingeyes · 13/05/2024 11:17

I was in a restaurant yesterday and MJ was playing. I thought about how Gary Glitter is absolutely verboten but MJ is still revered. New musical in the West End also.
Money talks.

His music is just better, like him or not, who even listens to Gary Glitter

Puppuccino · 13/05/2024 11:51

@YaMuvva you're logic makes no sense.

And you're angry because others (who are not informed on the criminal trial) don't have an opinion?

SerafinasGoose · 13/05/2024 12:06

Ioverslept · 12/05/2024 10:09

G
As for playing his music, well it's a tricky one but you'd be amazed how many great works of art (painting, literature, music etc) would get "cancelled" if we took into account the deplorable actions of their creators

I, for one, wouldn't be amazed. If all people with dubious politics or deviant proclivites had their work wiped off the map, then the cultural and artistic sphere would be greatly more impoverished than it is. I don't hold with 'cancel culture' and am able to separate the art from the artist.

He was not found guilty in a court of law, but the overwhelming evidence found at his estate - not least the witness testimony - means that as far as I'm concerned his guilt is not in doubt. It deeply saddens me that society will dismiss the testimony (and trauma) of mere children before it questions the behaviour of adult men. The crime statistics as to lying victims as opposed to male perpetration of sexual crime speak for themselves as to how skewed these proprities are.

I'm with 'G'.

YaMuvva · 13/05/2024 12:25

Puppuccino · 13/05/2024 11:51

@YaMuvva you're logic makes no sense.

And you're angry because others (who are not informed on the criminal trial) don't have an opinion?

What makes no sense?

And no - when did I say that?

beguilingeyes · 13/05/2024 12:29

SuprasternalNotch · 13/05/2024 11:47

Isn’t the issue in part that Gary Glitter was essentially a lame novelty act, while MJ was a musical genius?

Show quote history

They're not in the same league,.but GG was massive in the 70s. A lot of number one singles.
No more a novelty act than any of the glam bands.

CarnDûm · 13/05/2024 12:48

Mirabai · 13/05/2024 08:39

Why not read the itemised police list of all the stuff found in his room? Not on his pc, actually in his room. It included what I described - adult porn and books of nude children and adolescents. He got away with it because adult porn is not illegal and neither “arty” books of naked children. There was also a bag with underwear with blood on.

Show quote history

Is there a link you could provide?

For what is worth, I am not arguing he is innocent.
There is no smoke without a fire and the 'he was a child at heart, he was a naive, he just wanted to be a child again etc etc' I think it's a ridiculous defence. As an adult he would have known sleepovers with children would be inappropriate even if nothing happened. Why even go there?

FunLurker · 13/05/2024 12:51

YaMuvva · 12/05/2024 20:58

I’m quite dubious about his parenting abilities. He did dangle that baby off the balcony and I’m amazed that a man who was twice charged with child sex abuse could hold on to some random kids that weren’t even his. Did LA childrens services not get involved I wonder

Show quote history

I didn't mean he was capable of raising a family, as I don't think he was, I meant he was left with those 3 kids and no one bothered to be concerned about them.

x2boys · 13/05/2024 13:01

cultjarteriaky · 13/05/2024 08:24

People here comparing MJ to Jimmy S fail to accept that MJ was heavily investigated by the FBI for 10 years and was found not guilty while allegations against JS were made and investigated after his death, leading the police to conclude that he had been a predatory sex offender so if he was alive he would have been charged.

There is no comparison.

I’m not saying that MJ was a reasonable and stable man, he certainly was odd and eccentric, all artists are to some degree. But he is not guilty for the crimes he is accused of - if there is so much overwhelming evidence like people claim, why was he found not guilty?

Money I imagine he.bought people off and their families .

AhBiscuits · 13/05/2024 13:10

If I was innocent I'd definitely pay 23 million dollars to make a lawsuit go away. Sounds legit.

x2boys · 13/05/2024 13:28

FunLurker · 13/05/2024 12:51

I didn't mean he was capable of raising a family, as I don't think he was, I meant he was left with those 3 kids and no one bothered to be concerned about them.

Show quote history

He probably had teams of nannies doing the actual parenting ,
If he had been a skint oddball ,I imagine social services would have been far more concerned.

BigMandsTattooPortfolio · 13/05/2024 14:31

I hope I will never become so star struck and devoid of empathy that I go online and call child victims ‘liars’.

Peacelily001 · 13/05/2024 15:05

Those defending him as being ‘childlike’ as he’d had no childhood of his own, seem to forget that he was a shrewd businessman as well as being a master manipulator.

Peacelily001 · 13/05/2024 15:05

Guilty as hell.

Sunnyandsilly · 13/05/2024 15:09

Yes, I believe rhe children.

this doesn’t mean I don’t think his music was good, it was good, he was very talented, but we all know you can be both talented and a paedophile. The two are not mutually exclusive. I believe absolutely he was abusing young boys.

Sunnyandsilly · 13/05/2024 15:15

Sushilover14 · 13/05/2024 04:47

I don’t think he did it. I think he was stigmatised for being somewhat ‘odd’. But I think he regressed more into behaving like a child and so therefore looked to the company of children. I suppose it is hard for the masses to get, but this doesn’t automatically make him a SO.

He wasn’t stigmatised for being odd. Little boys gave harrowing accounts of their time with him. The sexual and emotional abuse they suffered. That’s not stigmatising as he was,odd.

ShadesofPoachedSmoke · 13/05/2024 16:11

StandingMyGround888 · 12/05/2024 20:36

Michael Jackson was not in possession of any child pornography.

"Images of child sexual abuse" is the correct term, not child pornography. Because it is always abuse, because there is no consent.

ShadesofPoachedSmoke · 13/05/2024 16:13

Guilty.

And I am grossed out that MJ the Musical is a thing. Yuk.

Newsenmum · 13/05/2024 16:14

beguilingeyes · 13/05/2024 12:29

They're not in the same league,.but GG was massive in the 70s. A lot of number one singles.
No more a novelty act than any of the glam bands.

Show quote history

Isn’t it because Glitter was actually found guilty? And always a bit grim.

Whereas Jackson was technically found innocent and people loved him. And his songs are actually good too.

Newsenmum · 13/05/2024 16:16

@Sushilover14 ok so read back again what you wrote. And you don’t think that would have included sex? He was a sexual being. He possibly felt innocent about it. It’s uncomfortable isn’t it.

Mirabai · 13/05/2024 16:20

Sunnyandsilly · 13/05/2024 15:15

He wasn’t stigmatised for being odd. Little boys gave harrowing accounts of their time with him. The sexual and emotional abuse they suffered. That’s not stigmatising as he was,odd.

Show quote history

I agree. He was stigmatised for being a drug abuser, sex abuser and cosmetic surgery addict, quite rightly.

FictionalCharacter · 13/05/2024 17:39

BigMandsTattooPortfolio · 13/05/2024 14:31

I hope I will never become so star struck and devoid of empathy that I go online and call child victims ‘liars’.

As a child victim myself, it sickens me enormously when people do this.

GrannyHelen1 · 13/05/2024 17:46

Guilty as a guilty thing. Very guilty. Super guilty. Even more guilty than that. In case I haven't made myself clear, I believe with every fibre of my being that he was guilty.