In 1984, when Ronald Reagan awarded Michael Jackson the Presidential Public Safety Commendation for allowing “Beat It” to be used in an anti-drunk-driving campaign, the president famously remarked, “Your success is an American dream come true.” At the time, this would have appeared to no one as an exaggeration. Everyone knows the inspirational story: The eighth child in a working-class family from Gary, Indiana, Jackson transcended physical and emotional abuse from his manager/father to become the child prodigy at the center of the Jackson Five. This early, earned success laid the groundwork for Jackson’s rise to become the King of Pop.
Michael Jackson is by far the most prominent African-American “crossover artist” in history. Thriller remains the best-selling album of all time, and Jackson’s cultural significance transcends race and genre in ways that few other artists have ever achieved. The star is profoundly entangled in the history of American popular music and culture since the 1960s. If you want to explain how Elvis, James Brown, and Diana Ross are connected to NSYNC, Beyoncé, and Lady Gaga, you can’t do it without Michael Jackson.
The power of this remarkable narrative is why the allegations of child molestation and abuse perpetrated by Jackson, which began to emerge in the early 1990s, have always been met with popular disbelief, not to mention fierce resistance from Jackson and his estate. Jackson survived two separate rounds of highly publicized allegations. The first ended out of court in 1994 in a massive $23,000,000 settlement. The second went to trial in Santa Barbara County Superior Court in Santa Maria, but ended in an acquittal in 2005, much to the delight of Jackson “Believers” who saw the star himself as the persecuted victim for his eccentricity.
