MusePaper
January 29th, 2004
The Michael Jackson
Fiasco . .
. "It's the Attack on Uniqueness, Stupid!"
by Mickel Adzema,
M.A.
Scapegoat Par Excellence!
More about Michael Jackson. Well, just about everyone
else, soooo, why not me, too? In "Howard Dean's "Primal
Scream", Part Two," I talked about
how we tend to scapegoat those that represent feeling and gentleness, and
I used Michael Jackson as an example of that, simply in the way he is
being talked about in the media. I said, in particular:
"Feeling" People --
Lightning Rods for Abuse, aaaand . . . Michael Jackson
Still, this pattern of beating back, hating, and persecuting those
who represent feeling or softness -- rendering them as "pervs"
-- all in order to prop up one's own sense of manliness, especially among
other men, is played out even in the social dramas of the day:
Witness the jocular Santa Barbara prosecutor in the Michael Jackson
case -- buoyed up by his own sense of being a 
"manly man among
men" at his press conference -- going after a man who more than
anyone in the world represents a soft-spoken, gentle, effeminate, or
childlike, or at least not grown-up enough, man -- espousing love --
"Love you more!" -- and standing up for causes of compassion
toward others and other such "not-manly" endeavors, rather than
what men are supposed to do: that is, be gruff-speaking,
self-serving, egocentric, butterfly
mashers.
Now, I don't know if Michael Jackson is guilty. I only know
that the gentlest souls among us -- Christ the perfect example -- are
lightning rods for abuse: Because we have been taught to hate in ourselves
that which is gentle (lest we not be "loved" by Dad, or accepted
into the male peer group) and so we are driven (not consciously, but
totally without our realizing our motivations, surely by the time we are
adults -- at least unless we go through Primal Therapy) to hate and abuse
that same thing we've learned to hate, beat back, and abuse in ourselves
when we see it represented by some person or other. Simply put, we
do to people who come across as being "feeling" and
"soft" exactly what we've been forced, or chosen, to do to the
feeling and softness inside ourselves. We do this because in doing
so, the world is made "right"; one's outer world coincides with
one's inner world. Our inner feelingness and compassion repressed,
punished, ridiculed, and beaten back into our unconscious, the world too
must repress, beat back, ridicule, and punish those who represent
feelingness and compassion. We simply cannot have gentle,
soft-speaking, compassionate people mucking about (let alone being popular
and loved -- Michael Jackson; or being powerful -- Bill Clinton), when we
have not been allowed to have those things. ("How dare they be
like that, when I wasn't allowed to? . . . and wanted
to!" says our unconscious self.)
And so the Pundits and Talk-Show Comedians pile it on, getting
ratings galore from similar, cynical, repressed, compassion-deprived,
love-deprived, pathetically shriveled up souls who need to express their
hate, lest they feel how they've been screwed over -- which is too painful
for them to want to look at.
Projection and Scapegoating by
the Talking Heads
Now, back to this MusePaper: I realized afterwards how
the media distortions surrounding Michael Jackson are timely and salient
examples of the patterns of projection and scapegoating that pervade our
media and social consciousness. Again, not being omniscient, I
cannot say whether Michael Jackson is actually guilty of anything
or not. But what I can point out is what the patterns in the
reporting about him say about us, and in particular, about those doing
the "reporting."
Dangling Babies
As if it is some kind of evidence, the media show endlessly
the clip of Michael
Jackson holding his child over a railing for his adoring crowd to
see as an example that Jackson is insensitive to babies, and by
implication, is capable of child molestation, and indirectly, of
child abuse. Along with this tiring, incessantly overplayed
image are the ones of Jackson's children's wearing veils. And
the implications we are supposed to draw from them are the same as
that of his action on the balcony.
OK, folks, here is where I admit I am forced to pull
rank. As a Primal Therapist and Primal Breathwork facilitator,
who has facilitated hundreds of people as they relived and expressed
their traumas from the prenatal, the perinatal, infanthood,
childhood, and afterwards, I have to say I have yet to hear anyone
express any trauma whatsoever over being "dangled," or
veiled. Well, you might say that they are rare events.
But I daresay I should know a little something about what
traumatizes babies. In addition, one only need to read some of
the other articles on this site, by other authors -- some of which I have
links to at the bottom -- to get an idea of what constitutes trauma.
But, let's address it this way: I saw the clip of the dangling
(ooooh, did I see it!). The look on the baby's face was one of
confusion. One might say there was terror there. But primarily
I saw confusion, probably at the crowd below. A natural reaction
facing a multitude of people. But if it was even bordering on
traumatic, the baby would have started to cry. Everyone can see that
did not appear to be even beginning to happen.
I'll tell you what trauma would have been, the kind I hear
about: a baby is hurt or frightened and starts to cry, and then the trauma
comes when the baby is slapped, to stop he or she from crying. That's
trauma. The baby, until he or she gets to Primal Therapy, will feel
from then on that even when scared or confused, he or she is not allowed
even to cry. And so the baby "determines" never to cry
again. Of course it's extremely rare that one event like that causes
such repression, but
the event of crying and being punished for it is usually not something
that the parent does only once, it is usually a pattern of doing
so. So crying very often, over time, gets
associated with physical abuse -- which is totally terrifying to an
infant in that she or he does not know if this hitting will actually kill him or
her. And yes, far more terrifying than being lifted over a balcony
is a baby's real fear of dying; one might say that fear of death is
"biologically wired," and forget the complications of where that
comes from (or see Falls From
Grace for the spiritual-psychodynamic roots of the fear of death).
At any rate, we do have that fear of dying at that early young
age, very much so. And it is not all that unrealistic either,
considering the many incidences we hear of where child abuse, hitting, for
example, actually leads to the death of the child. At any rate, that
is the kind of trauma I hear about from my clients -- that concerning
hitting, the fear that they might actually be killed, and especially when it is made worse by not allowing even the
crying that naturally comes from that, when, that is, the crying is followed by more hitting, to
shut up the child. (See "Tears
For Trauma: Birth Trauma, Crying, and Child Abuse" by
Aletha Solter, PhD, on this site for her making this case from the
experimental and academic literature.)
But, in the "dangling" incident with Michael Jackson, the baby didn't
cry, not at all. And for a few good reasons: For one thing, babies are not
aware of relative distances and do not have a fear of falling; that
is "learned" later. It has been demonstrated, in
child psychology experiments, that they are aware of differences in
height and will shy away from going off a height, even when they are
on a glass table and it might be thought that they might not be able
to tell the difference between the table, which they can see through
to the floor, and the end of the table, where they see the floor
directly. They will shy away from the end of the table, thus
demonstrating an awareness of height.
But they are not terrified of the end of the table nor do they
staunchly, petrified, steer clear of it. They are simply aware
of a difference in height. I can't prove it, but I
think it can be said that infants at that age do not know much about
the differences in height -- if they can even perceive them
-- for there is some evidence that the baby's field of vision is
limited to a rather small radius, starting out with only about 18
inches to a couple feet, a little while after birth, little more
than the distance from a baby's face to its mother's when being
held, and expanding slowly over time. Therefore, a difference
in height is simply a difference in height; and as mentioned from
the experiment, is no huge deal . . . just something to be avoided.
The crucial thing to the child is, "Am I being
held? Firmly? And by someone I trust?" These
are much more important to the child. And in the Jackson
incident, the baby was in his male caretaker's arms; Michael had one
arm solidly around the waist of the child. I think the baby
knew those arms very well; they were quite familiar to him or her.
The baby, I believe, was more concerned with being in her or his father's
arms, held firmly, and this new stimulus of being held a slight bit
about and away from his father's body was something he or she had
undoubtedly experienced before. The only new element was that
of the spectacle of the crowd. I say "only," because
it has to be assumed that the baby, when it is carried, is aware of
being a distance from the floor. And for the reasons mentioned
earlier, I don't believe the baby perceived any difference between
being held a story or two up from the ground and simply being held
above a floor.
As for the spectacle of the crowd, even that is suspect as
being terrifying, as children take a while to discern and understand
complex perceptual stimuli, like the crowd. The crowd was
probably perceived as just some unusual blur of sight and
sound. It may have been only as confusing as a new but complex
mobile placed in his or her crib to play with, or as terrifying as a
strangely shaped and unfamiliar mask or drawing of an unusual
face. We've all seen how babies react to strangers, sometimes
they cry. It is simply because that sort of face is farther
off in familiarity to what the baby's experience has been so far --
which is usually the faces of his or her mother, father, caretakers,
family, and friends -- of which more so, depending upon the baby's
age and experience with different faces.
The evidence from child psychology is that babies react to the
unfamiliar and the overly complex, even if it happens in the baby's
crib. And the further removed from familiarity the object
presented happens to be, the more likely the baby will cry.
But, it should be pointed out, even this is not
"trauma." One does not end up in Primal Therapy
having to heal the wounds of being presented with unfamiliar
objects! In fact, this process of gradually presenting
increasingly complex and increasingly stranger and stranger objects
to the child is what allows the child to grow. It is one of
the things that good parents do for their children, to stimulate
their sociocognitive processes, and even social
"skills." The main thing that gives the child the
courage to approach more complex and stranger stimuli, and
eventually include them in the safe arena of the familiar, is
always: the presence of the loving caretaker during this
process. As long as that familiar loved one is around, the
baby much more easily accepts the strange and the unusual.
OK, quite a bit of child psychology there, but bear with
me. The point should be obvious: Michael Jackson was
that baby's refuge of the familiar, and he was being held firmly by
him, was very much "in touch" with him. And the stimuli
the baby was presented
with was perhaps strange, complex, and unusual; but note that the
child did not even cry!
And as for this ridiculous notion that Michael Jackson might have
dropped the baby: oh, let's get real! Let's give the guy a little
credit for caring enough to hold the baby tightly and not project such
bizzarro possibilities into the mix. If nothing else, the tape
showed that he was firmly holding the baby with one arm fully around him;
his feet were dangling but, come on! How often do parents hold their
children that exact same way when standing up, and the baby's feet
dangle. It is not something that the baby is not used to!
Still, the way the critics would have you think, using a term like
"dangling the baby," you would think that Jackson had been
casually swinging him over the crowd, holding him only by an arm, a hand,
or patch of the baby's jamies!
But the way Jackson did it, and his reason for doing it -- "I
wanted to show my loyal fans my new baby!" -- are both harmless and
reasonable, though you won't hear anyone say that. In fact, I will venture to say I might have done the same thing with
my own baby, as long as I, like Michael, was holding him or her firmly.
Most of all, this particular assault on Jackson, to me, demonstrates
projection -- i.e., we see in others what is actually in
ourselves. I have this feeling, from listening to the folks who are
haranguing Jackson on these events, that they are the types who probably
would not hesitate to "lay the lumber" to their own child --
under the ruse of "discipline," of course. He has been
criticized by right-wing Talking Heads, and these people typically believe
that "sparing the rod" actually does harm a child, that the only
way to instill a sense of right and wrong is to abide by such an Old
Testament adage. No doubt these same people are in favor of the
death penalty, "no-tolerance" policies in schools (See "The
Only Important Education"), and stiffer
penalties for juvenile offenders, among just a few of the harsh right-wing
causes and proposals for dealing with, what used to be considered, simple
juvenile acting out or, at the most, "delinquency."
What it comes down to is that a vast number of parents are not
good, loving parents. I see the results of their harsh parenting in
my session rooms and primal box. And these people "know,"
at some level, that they are not good parents. At least subconsciously they are
aware of it. But rather than face that, it is easier to find
scapegoats, easy scapegoats . . . and Michael Jackson has set himself up
as the perfect one.
The Family Bed
In Michael Jackson's unusual innocence, he even admits that children sleep in his
bed. All the Talking Heads agree it was foolhardy for him to admit
such a thing. Not once have I heard it mentioned that the reason
that he didn't hide that fact is that maybe he just is innocent;
and that his sleepovers are exactly what he claims they are: sweet,
kindly sleepovers. The Talking Heads without fail spin his words to
say that he admitted to "sleeping with these boys," which is
exactly not what he said. For the record, and the record seems
always to need to be affirmed here, for, like I said, without fail these
folks have, in their hatred at what Jackson represents, feel it their
(unconscious) right to skew his words . . . for the record, Michael
Jackson said he slept on the floor, that there were people in adjoining
rooms at all times, and even that they would be coming in and out during
the night. Indeed, one might ask, if he was so stupid as to admit
that he lets children sleep in his bed, why wasn't he also so stupid to
say that he slept in the bed with them . . . that is, if he had. I
mean why wouldn't he have avoided the topic altogether if he had anything
to hide? That is why the "experts" we hear on the tube
think he was stupid; they assume he does have something to hide.
And there's a lot to be said about them from that assumption.
Specifically, the fact that everyone agrees that he should not
have admitted he had children sleep in his bed, once again, says, about the people saying
that, that they have things in their own lives
that they are trying to hide, and they live a life where they have to
watch their words lest they be found out. So, they themselves, having
a hidden agenda, it never occurs to them that someone else might
not. I've discussed this at length elsewhere in describing how the
Pundits cynically impugn the motives behind every good action by a
Democrat, seeing each and every, on the surface, good statement, good
proposal, or good action as having some ulterior motive: If Hillary
Clinton goes to visit the troops in Iraq, well it is politically
motivated. If the Republican President does the same thing, it is a
noble and humanitarian thing.
But not to get off the subject (for that topic is endless with
examples), let's get back to Jackson. From a primal perspective, and
looking cross-culturally, it has been common for parents and children, up
to an age that would seem obscene to Puritanical, "dirty" minded
Westerners, to share the same bed. It has been known that this
sharing of a bed for a good deal of childhood, whilst at the same time
allowing the child to sleep alone whenever he or she wants to, forms a
basis of self-regard and a strong emotional foundation. Primal
parents, knowing this, have been known to implement this in their own
child-caring; and the results have been astonishingly positive for the
mental and emotional and overall health of the children. These
children, unlike the average Western infant, are not traumatized,
and this time I do really mean it. Because when the opposite occurs,
it is the kind of thing that does come up in Primal and
Holotropic relivings. By opposite, I mean being forced to sleep
alone, not long after coming out of the safe, totally enclosed, totally
familiar space of the mother's womb. The usual thing that is done is
that a nice, pretty little nursery is set up for the child -- with bunny
and teddy pair and cutesy pink-toned baby rattles and such type of
wallpaper (as if the baby can see or cares). And then in this room
is installed the CRIB -- what the baby perceives as the prison bars keeping him
or her from the familiar feel, smell, and taste of the only really
familiar thing in this world to the baby -- its MOTHER!
And what do we find? The baby cries all night
long. Parents can't get any sleep. How can they? The
baby is crying out for some solace from the terror of being separated into
this strange, cage-like environment, with her or his whole familiar world
-- the Mother -- nowhere in sight! This is real trauma.
Holding babies above and slightly over a railing for a second is
not! But the nightly separation, for those long, endless periods
which seem not to ever be going to end is deep enduring trauma. For the baby's sense of time
is still so much in the Now, and that almost eternal Now will not begin
being chopped up into a foreseeable patch of future for quite a
while. Until then, night after night the baby endures the
gut-churning fearsome estrangement and exile, not knowing if it will ever
end.
Eventually the baby starts crying less, and then eventually, most
often, not at all. He or she has either been slapped or ignored into
shutting up. And ever after that baby will have repressed that
horror. And that fear of being left out, being kicked out of a
group, of not being accepted by Mommy, Daddy, or by teenage peers, will
cause him or her to do whatever it is that THEY want. Even at the
expense of one's own self, one's own true inclinations, desires, talents,
and so on. And, further on in life, if Daddy hates Democrats, then
the child will also (can't risk being "exiled."). And
beyond that, when the inevitable stony-hearted candidate is put up for
election by Republicans, that child, now grown, will vote for him, not
having a clue that it is that fear of being totally kicked out of the
sphere of seeming affection that is guiding that vote. (See Dean,
"Part One: The Republican
Media, Repression, and the Appeal of Stony-Hearted Presidents.")
The point about The Family Bed that will never be understood by
right-wingers is that it is about affection, not sex. And for
right-wingers, who are universally so starved for affection -- having gone
through the estrangement from the mother after birth and then afterwards
in the Crib, among many other affectional deprivations, which conservative
parents in particular lavish on their children, trying to "toughen
them up" -- that they, when they grow up, usually experience a
semblance of that so dearly needed affection first and foremost and only in relation to
sex. Hence, they are incapable of truly thinking of intimate affection that is not sexual.
They are sex-obsessed, and the culture they create with their wealth is
sex-obsessed.
Now, Jackson's experiences with sleeping are different than the
Family Bed in that the kids hanging out were mostly not his
children. But affection and cuddling can be part of
"sleeping together," as in the Family Bed, and not be sexual;
again something that right-wingers cannot comprehend for the reasons
mentioned above. Yet that is exactly Michael Jackson's claim; and
because of their upbringing those are the reasons that right-wingers are
so sure he is guilty. Hell,
sleeping and cuddling together for affection's sake is even a part of
friendship between men and women at times, though we don't talk about it,
because our culture -- for the reasons mentioned -- can't keep itself from
seeing sex in everything. Sometimes when
sex is not occurring, even, friends may say that it is, just to shut up
their dirty minded friends! These are not the kinds of things you
hear about, though, or do you even see them in nightly, or even daytime, scripted
dramas. You have to take a look at what happens on some of those much-maligned
Reality TV shows to see it; perhaps why they call them "Reality"
TV. Ya think!?
However, Michael Jackson might still have done it. However
implausible; and however much "sickness" the attacks on him
display. Then again, I think of all the hundreds, thousands?, of
children that slept there; and even though they put out a call nationwide
for all and anyone to call in to say they were molested, they could still
not get any others. Indeed, with all of his wealth, I am surprised,
very surprised, that only a couple have made this claim. The prize
for saying so being so great, it would seem to me that if it were really
true, it would have been pounced on far and wide. In fact, I wouldn't
be surprised if had that same nationwide search gone out to find molested
children of, say, an innocent priest (not one of the child molesters), or
anyone, actually, who spends time with a lot of children, to discover a
greater response than was found for Michael Jackson! I would think there would have been a greater
response of people saying it, just because there are so many
"sick" people in this world that you will almost always find
someone or someones who will say it's true, for whatever perverted reason,
if you make the search wide and well-known enough. And of course, in
my example, the motivation would not even have that huge,
potential price tag attached. Still, that is my opinion,
for what are the likely results when you make such a massive and public
outcalling, on just about any issue!
Move On
Regardless of Jackson's guilt or innocence, I say again, these soap
operas that are played out by the media in detail, edging out real news, are evidence of sham news, straw man issues, to keep our society's
consciousness in the sand so that we will not look up to see the real
issues that need immediate attention: the environment, matters of
justice for minorities, jobs, the two economies created by each Republican
administration that gets power and immediately gives away wealth to those
who have it, saddling generations to come with a debt that will prevent
their ever being able to afford the programs that would make this a more
compassionate, humanitarian society. See Dean,
Part Two, in particular, and Part
One, and/or click on the Related Articles
below for more elaboration on this tendency.
I am reminded of the genesis of the organization, moveon.org, which
has become such a force in the current election. Its beginning was hundreds-of-thousands of Americans who signed a petition, during the
impeachment of President Bill Clinton, to "move on" from this
national diversion and address the real issues of government -- the real
problems we were facing.
Thankfully, that organization is even more powerful now, as people still feel
the need to to bring back the America that was -- where we were not
constantly blinded by a media assault of false issues -- and could focus
on issues like civil rights, the economy, and the environment, to name
just a few important issues that lie waiting as we waste our airwaves on
the modern equivalent of "bread and circuses." So their
strength shows that there are many more people like myself -- and you too,
I would assume, if you are not reading this and shouting red-faced at the
screen (Dean would have more composure :-) -- who see
through this conspiracy to keep us unconscious while corporations do their
dirty work -- and in the case of the environment, literally.
So again I say, let us "wake up"! We have another
election -- unfortunately another culture clash. And I urge people
to vote, and to vote for Democrats. We have a strong field of
Democratic Presidential candidates, far more qualified than Bush, to hold that
office, and who would each do so for the purpose of making this country
and world a better one, rather than for personal ego-aggrandizement,
profit, and further political gain at the behest of wealthy contributors,
as is currently the case.
Let's get active, early; let's donate what we can. But above
all vote for a Democratic President. Let's get back a Democratic
administration -- let's get back our democracy! -- and let's "not get
fooled again!" Oh, and lest I forget, let's give Michael
Jackson (and Howard Dean) a break. Leave Michael to the courts, and
hopefully the truth will out. But let us not condemn him ahead of
time on the grounds put forth by the sex-obsessed, psychologically
ignorant, Pundits, Talking Heads, and Talk-Show Comics. For if it is
no longer OK to be unique in America, when we are committing no crime,
then the uniqueness of everyone of us is diminished. I said about
Clinton, "It's the Attack on
Privacy, Stupid!" If Michael Jackson is innocent, and even
if he is not -- that is, to the extent that he was ridiculed and assumed
guilty based on the behaviors discussed above -- the real tragedy is that,
in America in the 21st Century, just as in the McCarthy era, we all feel
at least a little more scared about being our unique, true self. We
all feel a little more guilty when we open up and act (non-criminally)
outside of the boundaries of "how everyone else behaves."
We all feel a little more reticent to say what we think and to be who we
are. The parameters of what is possible are being closed in around
us (with the threats of the Patriot Act and the erosion of other liberties
under this administration in the background and adding to the overall
fear), just like that Crib seemed to that little baby that we were.
And it will be a long, sleepless, agonizing night before dawn, if we don't
stop it.
Copyright © 2004 by Michael Derzak Adzema
Related Article: Go to "The
Scenery of Healing: Commentary on deMause's 'Restaging Prenatal and
Birth Trauma in War and Social Violence"
by Mickel Adzema.
Related Article: Go to "
Planetary Survival and Consciousness Evolution: Psychological Roots
of Human Violence and Greed
" by Stanislav Grof, M.D.
Comments? E-mail me by clicking on:
mickel@primalspirit.com
Mickel Adzema
