Jacko and the media, there are no surprises left

There are a lot of things I don’t quite
get in this world. Why would anyone put
pineapple on a pizza? Why does MTV never
show videos any more? Why put up an endless
string of road construction cones along 30
when there isn’t a road crew in sight? If
Jesus was a carpenter, how much did he charge
for a bookshelf? Is true love possible? Cats.
But if there is one thing that tops my list
of brain teasers it’s why anyone has a hard
time coming to terms with King of Pop Michael
Jackson’s weirdness. In years past, I’ve made
mention of Michael Jackson. Some mentions have
been harsher than others, but mostly they were
all designed to get some laughs while shedding
a little light. Even considering the nature of
his alleged crimes, one cannot allow oneself
to get too overwrought by them. Everyone should
have seen what was coming from far, far away.

Here’s the rub for me though. I like to check
the headline each day on My Yahoo! It’s got AP,
Reuters, national, world, politics, technology
and entertainment news. I find entertainment
stories to be the most refreshingly stupid
stories I’ve ever read. The headlines don’t
fail to draw my attention with their shocking
revelations about people in the one area of
American culture where every form of perversion
and human debasement has occurred at least on
film if not at Roman Polanski’s house. Why
pretend shock? It’s all for us. So let’s
check it out.

My favorite E! Entertainment headline from
this week was the delightfully understated
faux shocked sentiment in “Michael Jackson
a ‘Sociopath?’” Apparently, there is some
debate in his current trial over whether
or not the woman he paid to bear his children
called him a sociopath, whether he might be
one, whether that term means anything since
she isn’t an expert and has since called him
a genius and wonderful father or if we should
all just acknowledge that sociopaths are a
dime a dozen these days, as I will show in a bit.

Now, I remember about 10 years ago when Michael
was trying to buy the Elephant Man’s bones. He
wanted to “take care of him.” It was about 5
percent sweet and 150 percent creepy. It was
around the same time he was pictured sleeping
in an oxygen tent with his monkey or something
to stay young forever. Early signs, that’s all
it was.

Monkey business aside, the bones thing freaked
me out. The guy had been hanging out with little
kids for some time and everyone thought it was
cute. But I was pretty sure at that point that
Michael Jackson might be a good deal weirder
than any of us had previously considered or
discussed in the media. Oh sure, in England
they started calling him Wacko Jacko as soon
as it was possible, but their tabloid press
is full of savages who find no level of public
discourse too base or vulgar for public
consumption.

I had friends, no doubt “Thriller” fans, who
thought I was far off the mark suggesting
that Michael Jackson might, just possibly,
be a bad, bad man. It’s all about the signs
and portents after all. Today, if the charges
prove correct, few would disagree that his
actions warrant such acrimony.

But at what point in the last 10 years could
anyone have doubted that the man was a
sociopath? Sure, it sounds like a harsh judgment,
but in a world where we can see deadly sins on
TV and even pay good legal tender for a few of
them, sociopaths are not exactly hard to come
by, are they? The term “sociopath” sounds bad,
but if you take a look at what one really is,
it could be the person sitting next to you.
Don’t look now. Wait until their back is turned.
Culling knowledge from my years of watching
“Law & Order,” a couple of community college
abnormal psyche classes and a quick trip to
MedicineNet, I can tell you that a sociopath
is someone with antisocial personality disorder.

That’s a mild way to say they disregard the
rights of others and are unwilling to conform
to the norms of society. That’s most teenagers
and outlaw bikers right there.

There is usually a history of antisocial behavior
starting before 15 that just keeps on going into
the adult years. Sociopaths do bad things more
often than we normal people but they can’t be
dissuaded by consequences. They usually are
irresponsible academic failures with poor
job performance records who do crimes, take
chances and act on impulse. Not too bizarre
yet let alone King of Popish.

Here’s where we see Jacko though. In addition
to being unable to stand boredom, a sociopath
usually feels victimized; their personality
will bring them into conflict with society
because of a pattern of amoral and unethical
behavior.

They might be contemptuous of those who try
to understand them. They won’t perceive that
anything is wrong with them. They are
authoritarian (or their entourage is). They
might be secretive, paranoid, extremely narcissistic
and grandiose. They are unable to feel remorse or
guilt. They are looking for approval and admiration
while controlling those they abuse. They justify
their crimes, are emotionally needy, incapable of
real human attachments and may actually say they’d
like to rule the world.

Maintaining a conventional appearance is on the
list too, but I think we are pretty aware that
Jacko totally lost control of his normal appearance
after the first few surgeries.

But hey, we can’t all be perfect sociopaths.