Jedi Council Forums - Hollywood Death Watch: Patrick Swayze (1952-2009)

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Author	Topic: Hollywood Death Watch: Patrick Swayze (1952-2009)
Zaz Title: Manager, The Ampitheatre Registered: Oct '98	Date Posted: 6/26 8:32am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	Absolutely.
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Jabbadabbado Title: Senate Floor Manager Registered: Mar '99	Date Posted: 6/26 8:34am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	And "Michael Jackson impersonator" will become even more of a viable career choice. -----signature----- "As a Chicago sports fan you get used to disappointment."
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Zaz Title: Manager, The Ampitheatre Registered: Oct '98	Date Posted: 6/26 8:36am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	Now that's a chilling thought. I doubt he had 'any more to give us'. A popular entertainer usually has a short window of time when they do their best work. His was 20+ years ago.
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Jabbadabbado Title: Senate Floor Manager Registered: Mar '99	Date Posted: 6/26 8:44am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009) - Date Edited: 6/26 8:50am (2 edits total) Edited By: Jabbadabbado
	Bloated Has-Been Elvis was selling out large venues in the mid 70s. Michael Jackson had sold out 49 shows in London. From far enough out in the bleachers, it would have been hard to tell that Jackson was 51 years old and looked only marginally humanoid. To be fair, the exact same thing could be said for Madonna. Interestingly, Madonna is exactly 13 days older than Michael Jackson. What a study in career contrasts. -----signature----- "As a Chicago sports fan you get used to disappointment."
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Gonk Registered: Jul '98	Date Posted: 6/26 10:27am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	As far as his career goes, Jackson certainly never enjoyed a comeback with new material. He should have asked Neil Young how he does it, seeing how Neil's had at least two to four. -----signature----- What shall we do to fill the empty spaces Where waves of hunger gnaw? Shall we set out upon this sea of faces In search of more and more and more?
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Rogue1-and-a-half Title: Manager: Amphitheatre Registered: Nov '00	Date Posted: 6/26 2:11pm Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	I am just almost sick over Jackson's death; I find him one of the most tragic figures of the last fifty years. Earlier today, I caught a slide show of photos from early Jackson 5 to as recently as his announcement of his big 50 show blowout that was set to start in about a month. It makes me almost unbearably sad to think about him; he was just a normal kid once - but he hit a point and struck something like arrested development. I can't imagine what it was like inside his head; what a miserable life he had. Probably, he couldn't help losing his mind. -----signature----- Don't be a fool, don't be blind Heart of mine If you can't do the time, don't do the crime Heart of mine
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Merlin_Ambrosius69 Registered: Aug '08	Date Posted: 6/26 3:35pm Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	Well said. The pressures of global, phenomenal fame coupled with a brilliant artistic mind, jammed up against a hyper-controlled and deprived (yes, deprived) childhood, infused with a likely sexual identity crisis, along with other elements which we can never know for certain, were too potent a mix for the psychology of a single human being. He appears to have reverted to a permanent childlike state which evidently did not include a firm grasp of finance or the limits of his own physical abilities. By many accounts he was too thin and weak to have even contemplated the upcoming 50 shows, which may -- and I'm speculating here -- have led to anxiety, tension and ultimately, cardiac arrest. -----signature----- "Chance makes playthings of us all." -- Seneca Shameless non-Manager Emeritus sock of Vortigern99. Fan of George RR Martin, JK Rowling and JRR Tolkien.
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Rogue1-and-a-half Title: Manager: Amphitheatre Registered: Nov '00	Date Posted: 6/27 10:20am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	Yes, I think you said it even better than I did. I was just thinking last night - 50 years is very young really. But then you consider that he was a performer for 45 of those years, a star for 40 and an icon for 25. It's sad really, listening to some of his later music; I listened to HIStory a few years back and found it (the disc of new songs that is, not the greatest hits disc that came with it) like staring into the abyss. His paranoia just turned against everyone; he seemed angry and petulant and sick. It was just . . . disturbing. It's sad; his work with the Jackson 5 was amazing; and Thriller, Off the Wall and, to a lesser degree, Bad are all essential albums. (Off the Wall, though not mentioned as often, is, I think, practically every bit as great as Thriller.) But he soured as he aged; the same thing really happened to Fawcett. Neither one of them seemed to really see themselves when they looked in the mirror as their lives wound down. Cautionary tales, really. I'll never get rid of my Jackson albums (I own Thriller, Off the Wall and Bad; the 5's ABC I lost at some point); he was a great artist, backed by great artists, and he changed music forever. But at a terrible cost, I think. -----signature----- Don't be a fool, don't be blind Heart of mine If you can't do the time, don't do the crime Heart of mine
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Zaz Title: Manager, The Ampitheatre Registered: Oct '98	Date Posted: 6/27 10:19pm Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	I'm thinking of what someone said after Elvis Presley's death: "Good career move." Presley was a bloated joke prior to his death, and then there was a media firestorm, and he was the "King of Rock 'n Roll" again, and people were bringing flowers to Graceland, etc. It's very strange indeed. In the case of Jackson, what really intrigues me was the eagerness of the media to shuffle his dark side under the rug as soon as he died. This happened with Presley as well, but Jackson had much more to hide. Yes, I do think he was a pedophile, but the chances of him being ever convicted of it were negligible, the wages of fame being what they are these days. "The King of Pop"? Pop's been dead for years, and in a way, so has Jackson.
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Moff_D Registered: Aug '02	Date Posted: 6/28 7:01am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	On the other hand, perhaps he faked his death to avoid the upcoming concerts and get out of his debt. Can't wait for the years of "Michael Jackson spotted..." tabloid headlines that await us. ...or maybe he was working for the FBI... -----signature----- 'Why are you always smiling?' 'Cause it's all so ******* hysterical.' -Road To Perdition. Apt, no?
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Merlin_Ambrosius69 Registered: Aug '08	Date Posted: 6/28 8:36am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	Zaz posted: Yes, I do think he was a pedophile, but the chances of him being ever convicted of it were negligible, the wages of fame being what they are these days. You can think whatever you like; the facts disagree with you. May I ask, have you looked into the facts of each case? Examined the chronology of events? Seen for yourself whether either "family" (a father in one case, a mother in the other) has a leg to stand on in terms of evidence, probability, believability, etc.? Or, have you taken a look at Michael's childlike persona, heard his high-pitched voice, seen the interview in which he discussed sleeping with children (in the sleeping sense, not in the sexual sense), and made up your mind right then and there? An a priori conclusion, in other words? Most people who believe Jackson to have been guilty do not know or understand the facts of those cases. They do not know that an audiotape exists on which the father in the 1993 case avowed to "destroy Michael Jackson" before his son ever even came forward with the accusation, nor that that same boy told his father time and again that Michael never touched him, never did anything wrong, until a certain point when he finally began to do his father's bidding, but there is no evidence and the case never went to trial, no charges were ever filed. In the 2003 case, the mother of the accusing child had filed charges of sexual molestation twice before, once against a department store security guard who followed her after she had shoplifted goods, and padded her down for the merchandise. She sued the store for sexual assault! Also, and here's the real damning evidence against her story, she contacted an attorney and asked about how to bring sexual assault charges against Michael Jackson, three years before her son ever met Michael. What does that tell you about her motivations and credibility? On trial, her story kept changing, and the chronology of events she claims happened simply do not make sense. I implore you to look into the facts of these cases before you make your mind up about what you think happened. -----signature----- "Chance makes playthings of us all." -- Seneca Shameless non-Manager Emeritus sock of Vortigern99. Fan of George RR Martin, JK Rowling and JRR Tolkien.
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Soontir-Fel Registered: Dec '01	Date Posted: 6/28 9:39am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	Billy Mayes is dead. This is terrible. -----signature----- Errent_Venture Wrote " Listen to Soontir-Fel for he is a man ruling over other men." Ender_Sai wrote "In other news, I confer Modly praise on Soontir and Rogue_wookie for being superior men, worth of the title of Spartan. They, may keep their penises"
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Merlin_Ambrosius69 Registered: Aug '08	Date Posted: 6/28 9:51am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	The infomercial guy? -----signature----- "Chance makes playthings of us all." -- Seneca Shameless non-Manager Emeritus sock of Vortigern99. Fan of George RR Martin, JK Rowling and JRR Tolkien.
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Zaz Title: Manager, The Ampitheatre Registered: Oct '98	Date Posted: 6/28 10:04am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
	Yeah, let's start leaving piles of flowers on the sidewalks. If there was no evidence, why did Jackson pay a voluntary multi-million dollar settlement? [reportedly between twenty and forty million] And really, Merlin, if you were accused of this, wouldn't avoid kiddy pajama parties at home in the future? Jackson said in an interview that kids not related to him shared his bed--innocently, he claimed--just before the second case. In other words, I can do what I want because I'm famous was his mantra. Predators also choose their victims very carefully. They are wont to select children from dysfunctional families, because it's easier to target the kid, and keep targeting him with the covert assistance of the parents, who are thrilled by access to money and power. What absolutely astonished me was that parents encouraged their children to have fun times with Mikey--including pillow fights--after the first case. They didn't care about the safety of their children, because, you know, fame is all.
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Merlin_Ambrosius69 Registered: Aug '08	Date Posted: 6/28 11:14am Subject: Hollywood Death Watch: Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) & Michael Jackson (1958-2009) - Date Edited: 6/28 11:15am (1 edits total) Edited By: Merlin_Ambrosius69
	We can postulate all the "shoulda/woulda/couldas" that we like ("If he was innocent, he shouldn't/wouldn't have paid off the family, etc."), but at the end of the day the evidence, or the lack of it, must be the deciding factor as to whether anything criminal occurred. Intuition and "I think he did it" is not sufficient to condemn a person for imagined and speculative crimes. At the end of the day, in the 1993 case we have the reluctant and detail-shifting story of a small child who for months denied any criminal wrongdoing on the part of MJ, and who only relented after his father bullied him into it. Before the accusation was made, the father was caught on audiotape saying he would "destroy Michael Jackson" and speaking of the star's impending financial ruin. The only evidence we have damns the father, not MJ. In the 2003-05 case we have the detail-changing story and incongruous timeline of a known and documented frivolous litigator of sexual assault charges, who asked an attorney how to go about accusing MJ of sexual assault of a minor literally three years before her children ever met the star. Again the only evidence is the testimony of a small child or children whose stories do not mesh with the known chronology of events, and which are incongruous with the ever-changing testimony of the mother. Again, in case you missed it, this same mother accused a national department store of sexual assault after a security guard attempted to search her and her kids for shoplifted merchandise. Doesn't this tell you anything at all about her proclivity toward false and frivolous lawsuits? To modify your own phrasing, Zaz, if there was evidence, why was MJ acquitted? Did he pay off judge and jury? By what mechanism could MJ have been acquitted of criminal wrongdoing based on his stardom? Why, if celebrities are supposedly let off the hook for crimes they definitely committed, is Welsey Snipes in prison for tax fraud? Doesn't this directly refute the contention that celebrities go scott-free regardless of guilt? It just doesn't add up. -----signature----- "Chance makes playthings of us all." -- Seneca Shameless non-Manager Emeritus sock of Vortigern99. Fan of George RR Martin, JK Rowling and JRR Tolkien.
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