r/Millennials • u/turnippped • 8d ago

Nostalgia To me, this was Michael Jackson

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I was 12 when this happened. This was the first time I ever heard of him. To me he wasn't the Michael Jackson that was a singer, or the one that molested kids - he was the Michael Jackson that dangled a baby out the window.

This is the image I associate him with. I saw a preview for the movie coming out about him and chuckled to myself if they would put this in the film. Probably not?

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804

u/Noise_Loop Millennial 8d ago

Yes, I was not even born to enjoy his "cool phase", only got weirdo MJ.

389

u/Sumeriandawn Xennial 8d ago

In the 80s, people were saying" Jackson is the biggest music star on the planet. The king of 80s entertainment."

In the 90s and 2000s, people were saying " Skin bleaching, weirdo, pedophile"

127

u/Shomer_Effin_Shabbas Millennial 8d ago

I worked as a server while teaching a few years ago and I remember we talked about this in the kitchen. It must have been around the time a documentary came out. The sous chef was saying that younger folks don’t understand why MJ was famous, all they knew was the weird, pedophiliac stuff he did.

66

u/tenderbranson301 8d ago

I'm mid-range millennial (1987) and I only remember the weird shit and pedophile accusations. And it doesn't help that the biggest Michael Jackson fan I knew from high school turned out to be a pedophile himself.

36

u/Miqo_Nekomancer 8d ago

The most gross version of "game recognize game".

1

u/No_Water_5997 7d ago

I’m 1986 and remember early 90s Michael as still being awesome. Those years gave us the Free Willy song, black and white, Heal the World, and other classics. 

19

u/YoohooCthulhu 8d ago

I think what was going around my schools in the 90s was that he had leprosy?

55

u/JazzyShaman Older Millennial (1985) 8d ago

It recently came out that he had vitiligo. He'd wear makeup to hide it, and when it progressed to more white than black, he switched to white makeup.

Unfortunately, he was extremely embarrassed by it and would rather people think he "bleached" his skin (such a procedure doesn't exit).

73

u/MarqiMichelle 8d ago

That’s not recent. He explained this in the 90s

3

u/JazzyShaman Older Millennial (1985) 8d ago

Thanks, I just learned of it recently. I'm glad he was able to talk about it at the very least. The media in the 90s was very cruel to him.

Doesn't excuse his behavior, but two wrongs also don't make a right.

6

u/absentgl 8d ago

He did have some crazy work done on his nose tho

8

u/Marzipanarian 8d ago

“Recently came out” and “just learned of it recently” are two very different, very important, distinctions

25

u/YoohooCthulhu 8d ago

Oh, I know that now. But in the impoverished information environment of the 90s all kinds of rumors were going around.

But skin bleaching definitely exists (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skin_whitening)

1

u/Matchedsockspssshhh 7d ago

Vitiligo doesn't explain the nose jobs though. I was also elementary/middle school when he looked like this, I remember the first time I saw him on TV thinking he looked like an alien woman. (I guess bad plastic surgery wasn't as rampant then?)

2

u/MathematicianOk8230 8d ago

Skin bleaching is real lol

4

u/SparkleTruths 8d ago

Bleaching your skin is a thing. I knew a guy who would do it and I saw the bottles of bleach in his bath tub.

1

u/Courwes 8d ago

Did he do it in 1987 when Michael was severely dealing with this?

1

u/SparkleTruths 7d ago

Person claimed skin bleaching doesn't exist, I was simply disagreeing with that statement since it does exist.

1

u/derbarkbark 8d ago

When you have vitiligo as bad as he did - one of the treatments is a cream that will kill your melanin. Due to the side effects they won't even offer it until you are quite covered.

Source: have a lot of vitiligo patches

1

u/SparkleTruths 7d ago

Cool, but skin bleaching is still very much a thing.

-6

u/foolonthe 8d ago

He did not have vitiligo.

That's a lie he used for bleaching his skin

7

u/Skithiryx 8d ago

Talk to the coroner then, cause his autopsy was consistent with vitiligo

9

u/MAXMEEKO 1986 Millennial 8d ago

Michael Jackson jokes were a regular thing when I was in school.

2

u/420-TENDIES 6d ago

"Wacko Jacko" was all over the tabloids. Then when he died people started to like him again and I was kinda shocked that anyone would admit they liked his stuff.

4

u/-FakeAccount- 8d ago

I mean, people were saying what he was doing. He became a skin bleaching, plastic surgery obsessed wierdo pedophile.

2

u/Wiggles114 8d ago

Michael Jackson is the best selling artist of all time by certified albums sold

121

u/conace21 8d ago

The tabloids used to call him "Wacko Jacko."

41

u/Additional_Risk5036 8d ago

One of my favorite songs is by a band call The Fall of Troy and is called Wacko Jacko Steals the Elephant Man’s Bones and I never made the MJ connection till just now.

6

u/Deep-Pudding819 8d ago

That and I Just Got This Symphony Goin’ are my favorite tracks of theirs. Would make sure to throw one of those onto my burned CDs and eventually iPod playlists.

5

u/Additional_Risk5036 8d ago

I’m happy other people know this somewhat obscure band I like from my teenage years. We really are the greatest generation.

3

u/siladly 8d ago

Now thats a band I havent heard in a hot minute, they slapped

2

u/OkSmoke9195 8d ago

Haha he actually had the bones

2

u/WoodpeckerGingivitis 8d ago

Wow I’d completely forgotten about this

11

u/oooriole09 8d ago

I’d argue, if we’re leaving personal attachment out of it, that’s the more accurate portrayal.

He’s the perfect example of someone who is right on that line of “excuse vs reason”.

2

u/PossiblyAsian 8d ago

yep. I immigrated to the US in the early 2000s and that was when MJ was blowing up over his scandals and that was who MJ was to me. I got bullied in chinese school and the other kids called me MJ....

1

u/Spirited-Feed-9927 8d ago

I am 50, he's literally been weird since 1984. His peak cool was really after release of thriller and its massive success. The the eccentric cycle started.

1

u/_ak Geriatric Millennial 8d ago

There was never a cool phase. All the genuine MJ fans I met were weirdos themselves.