Leaving Neverland

"Feet of clay: an unexpected flaw or vulnerable point in the character of a hero or any admired person."
-From the "Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins" by Robert Hendrickson

I know, I know.

I'm months late to the Leaving Neverland game. But watching this four-hour HBO documentary tonight has left me full of thoughts and emotions that need processing.

So here I go.

I grew up with Michael Jackson. He was just a few months older than me, so our childhoods intertwined through the Jackson Five's smoking hot Motown career in the early seventies. His solo career took off during my college days, and Off The Wall played as the soundtrack to much of my senior year. Though I was never anything close to a super fan, I always considered Michael's music to be a vital part of who I am.

But as the eighties stretched into the nineties, and Michael moved from Thriller to Bad to Dangerous, something about him began to feel more and more wrong.

His skin changed color.
His face bore evidence of many plastic surgeries.
He spoke in an eerie falsetto.
He lived in a place called Neverland and played with chimps.
He claimed to have fathered white kids and dangled one of them over a hotel balcony.

During these years, I looked at Michael Jackson and saw the wheels coming off a human being. Despite his outrageous success as a pop star, I saw him as a profoundly broken man. And even though he did a lot of good for the world, I looked at Michael Jackson and saw evil, though I never knew exactly why.

When we were both fifty years old,  Michael Jackson died. I felt nothing but relief that his crazy ricocheting ping-pong ball of a life had finally come to rest. God grant him peace.

* * * * *

Wade Robson and James Safechuck were children pulled into the madness of Michael Jackson's life. In Leaving Neverland, they each tell the story of how they were befriended, intentionally groomed, and sexually abused by Michael Jackson.

Their stories punched me in the gut.

I find both Wade and James to be intelligent, articulate, deeply thoughtful men.

I feel the sharp edges of their brokenness, and the weight of evil that bound them for so many years.

I have deep and profound compassion for Wade and James. Their lives were derailed and their identities crushed by the years of abuse they suffered.

I admire them for all they have done, and for all they continue to do, to break free of their pain and to reclaim their lives.

* * * * *

As much as I hate the things he did to Wade and James and Lord only knows how many other young boys, I have compassion for Michael Jackson. It's likely that someone did those same things to him when he was a boy, and he never found a way to heal. Despite all his success, Michael's life was tragic.

* * * * *

Now I've read the angry reviews and the hateful comments; I've even heard from people I know who believe that these two men, these so-called victims, are just scam artists who've come round with their trumped-up false accusations, trying to suck a few millions out of Jackson's estate or, even worse, damage his reputation as the king of pop.

And to them, I also offer compassion. Because when we put our heroes up on pedestals and refuse to look honestly at the people they truly are, we deny them their humanity.

To truly care about Michael Jackson as a human being, we must be willing to look at his life honestly, and accept his feet of clay.