ABSTRACT
A ghetto can be a place of vitality; a sanctuary can become a prison. Michael Jackson escaped the ghetto of Gary, Indiana, and built the sanctuary of Neverland. It's become a circuslike prison, emblematic of his mind. Think of Michael Jackson's mind as a funhouse, and look at some of the exhibits on display. When people praise Michael Jackson today, recall his gifts and why they loved him, they always mention the 1983 Thriller video. Art makes all of this bearable, even thrilling. But when art crosses back into life and fantasy becomes biography, we are appalled. That's what happened to Michael Jackson in the 1990s. Even as his music and dance were mattering less and less, his looks, his marriages, his masked children, the first round of sexual abuse charges, the out-of-court settlement, all took center stage. With the onset of the new millennium, there were now reissues of old hits and new charges of sexual abuse.
