The Los Angeles county coroner has decided that Michael Jackson’s death was a homicide. It is now left for a culprit to be established. All bets are on his personal physician, Conrad Murray, to be charged for administering the drugs that killed the legendary pop star. Dr. Murray is about to get caught up in a sprawling drama, for which any offence he might have committed is only a bit part.
The backdrop for this story is money, power and celebrity – Michael Jackson’s celebrity. In this gilded world, there were very few limits. MJ could indulge all his whims and fancy. He had a chimp for a pet, slept in an oxygen tent and built a fantastical ranch as a commitment to never growing old. But for the legal troubles that dogged him in recent years, few of Michael’s choices were subject to any consequential review. The negotiations that govern everyday interaction and serve as its checks and balances, were trumped by Michael’s enormous fame and fortune.
Who could tell Michael Jackson when his behavior might have been harmful? What seemed excessive to others was completely normalized in MJ’s world. His serial plastic surgery was the grotesque reminder that the singer was out of control. As was his feisty refusal to observe rules of propriety about relating with children. The singer’s prescription drug habit was just one part of a dangerous architecture.
For sure, a medical doctor who enables substance abuse is acting outside the law. But the person with the monstrous demand must take primary responsibility for the harm that befalls him. Michael Jackson’s celebrity sustained a syndicate that fed him the anesthetic propofol, along with other sedatives and painkillers. The core of the matter was Jacko's unchecked desire. It is the singer himself, who bears responsibility for his own untimely death.
The backdrop for this story is money, power and celebrity – Michael Jackson’s celebrity. In this gilded world, there were very few limits. MJ could indulge all his whims and fancy. He had a chimp for a pet, slept in an oxygen tent and built a fantastical ranch as a commitment to never growing old. But for the legal troubles that dogged him in recent years, few of Michael’s choices were subject to any consequential review. The negotiations that govern everyday interaction and serve as its checks and balances, were trumped by Michael’s enormous fame and fortune.
Who could tell Michael Jackson when his behavior might have been harmful? What seemed excessive to others was completely normalized in MJ’s world. His serial plastic surgery was the grotesque reminder that the singer was out of control. As was his feisty refusal to observe rules of propriety about relating with children. The singer’s prescription drug habit was just one part of a dangerous architecture.
For sure, a medical doctor who enables substance abuse is acting outside the law. But the person with the monstrous demand must take primary responsibility for the harm that befalls him. Michael Jackson’s celebrity sustained a syndicate that fed him the anesthetic propofol, along with other sedatives and painkillers. The core of the matter was Jacko's unchecked desire. It is the singer himself, who bears responsibility for his own untimely death.
I disagree. The 'cardiologist' must bear alot of the responsibility for MJs death.
ReplyDelete1. Doctors supposed help patients as opposed to just giving them what they want even if it is harmful to the patient. Dr Murray took an oath. If MDs decide en masse to give patients what they want as opposed to what they need then we are really in trouble
2.He was not licensed to administer that drug mainly beacsue he was not trained in its use. But I suspect he had difficulty passing any boards anyway.
Anesthetists (usually pain specialists) are really the only doctors that use this drug routinely and they do this with full continous monitoring in a hospital setting with full emergency support. And they are specifically licensed to use it and to prescribe it. Dr Murray was not!
3.After administering several sedative drugs( which in high doses can decreases breathing) he gives MJ propofol which puts you to sleep AND specifically decreases breathing AND then leaves the room.!!!! and there is no monitoring! A first year medical student would know better!
4.Dr Murray unles he is as mentally fucked up as MJ should have known and done better but money makes you do strange things!
The michael jackson we all know and love died years ago. It was a suicide. The Michael Jackson who was murdered is a derivative of the original.
ReplyDeleteYou write: "It is the singer himself, who bears responsibility for his own untimely death."
ReplyDeleteI suppose one could put forward this viewpoint if Michael Jackson was truly autonomous in his decisions and desires. But was he? Can we fully ignore the forces and powers that have pushed his life in ominous directions?
Dennis
Did he ask to be euthanized? If so then it was his fault. If not it was Dr Deaths!
ReplyDeleteI agree with Adrian....Dr Murray must bear the brunt of the blame for MJs death.
ReplyDeleteMichael Jackson was only indulged by the good doctor and others of his ilk because of the money they earned from this kind of departure from what their training tells them is the right thing to do
Gosh, Philip, the Madonnaesque way you make yourself over as a different political stage persona time and again, has me craving more!
ReplyDeleteSometimes we have Philip the single-minded bastion of liberal, or shall we say "human rights," ethics, fighting valiantly for the dismantling of oppressive normative structures that keep marginalized groups and individuals perpetually trapped in marginality. Let us cast our minds back to June 30, when you chastised Martina Navratilova for not being willing or able to see past the limits of her own marginal status of lesbian in her campaign to rid womens' pro tennis of, er, grunting:
"Martina’s new campaign is an example of how calls for diversity can later be revealed as self–serving projects. By openly declaring her sexuality, Navratilova challenged the traditional tennis world to make space for difference. Having helped to get good progress in this regard, it is Martina who now leads a dubious campaign to preserve an outdated view of what is proper for women. How sad is that?"
Now, we are confronted by Philip the sad, reactionary fogey, denouncing Michael Jackson for his "harmful" and "excessive" behaviors, for the "dangerous architecture" (Oh I love that one!) he made of his life through his addiction to drugs, and last but not least, Jackson's "feisty refusal to observe rules of propriety about relating with children."
This is like the difference between Madonna in the "Express Yourself" video, and Madonna in the "Like a Prayer" video, respectively. The first, a snide takedown of a tennis hypocrite by an uberliberal with blonde ambition; the next, a raucous fire-and-brimstone sermon from the dizzying moral altitude of the pentecostal pulpit.
So let's get your performances right. If Navratilova was both amnesiac and hypocrite in her call for the institution of certain rules of propriety for women in tennis, what on earth must we make of you after hearing your call for "rules of propriety" in MJ's case? Why is this ever-expanding "space for difference" in your progressive imagination so terribly hostile to those who choose, by their own free will, to go under the plastic surgeon's knife, build fabulous homes, do drugs, or, God forbid, hang out with children and chimpanzees all the time?
Might I remind you that the very same "negotiations that govern everyday interaction and serve as its checks and balances" are the very same thing you otherwise call sexism, racism, classism, xenophobia, homophobia, etc. That so-called system of "checks and balances" you talk about is nothing but the same normative structures that you applaud Navratilova for challenging and berate her for championing.
My two simple questions are as follows: why is it that certain forms of social difference enjoy your unwavering soapbox support, while others are inexplicably subject to this kind of radical foreclosure? Do your inconsistencies not reveal a politically self-serving nature, just as Martina's apparently do?
I think the problem here is simply that you really have no properly defined political-philosophical program behind all of these highly entertaining, yet completely incompatible, incarnations.
Strike a pose... there's nothing to it.
LOL
ReplyDeleteExtremely thought provoking Philip... It is indeed hard for some to accept or imagine the power this level of affluence allows. When one uses such potent drugs one [I imagine] should expects one could go at any time..Which begs the question, was Dr. Murray being so handsomely rewarded that he threw caution to the wind. Can this "reward" assist in him being exonerated now? Was it really worth it?
ReplyDeleteTruly sad, especially since he is of Caribbean stock. Greed and ignorance never fail to motivate truly interesting actions...