Michael Jackson: "Black or White"?
Michael Jackson is still questioning ten years after his disappearance. One of the questions that keeps coming back is how she looks. His black skin began to lighten in the 1980s. His physical change fueled rumors and controversies revolving around questions of identity.
How did Michael Jackson go white?
From the 1980s, the King of Pop revealed to the whole world an increasingly clear skin, to become entirely white. This radical change in physical appearance arouses questions, incomprehension and sometimes anger.
For his detractors, Michael Jackson, has had his skin whitened because of the bad relationship he had with his father since childhood. Others accuse him of "betraying his race" by resorting to this practice. Faced with these controversies Michael evokes, in an interview with Oprah Winfrey in 1993, his physical transformation and speaks of the accusations of which he is the subject: "I am a black American. I am proud to be a black American. I am proud of my race and proud of who I am. I am worthy and have a lot of pride in the person I am. I have a skin disorder which destroys the pigmentation of it. C ' is something I can't stop. When people make things up about me and I don't like it, it hurts. "
The skin disorder mentioned by Michael Jackson that whitens his skin is vitiligo, a disease that causes spots on the skin. The latter loses its pigmentation. According to Fabiosa magazine, Michael's dermatologist, Dr. Arnold Klein, has confirmed that the most awarded star in history has this poorly understood condition, which affects only one percent of the world's population. And the forensic pathologist who conducted the autopsy on Michael Jackson, Christopher Rogers adds. According to him, the singer did indeed have vitiligo with patches around his face, arms, chest and abdomen. He also confirmed that Michael Jackson was using a special Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved treatment called Benoquin Cream to match the color of the patches with the rest of his skin.
During searches of the singer's house after his death, investigators did find 19 tubes of hydroquinone and 18 tubes of this Benoquin, the products used in the treatment of vitiligo to lighten the skin. This is the technique that Michael Jackson is said to have used to whiten skin affected by vitiligo.
But beyond Michael's white skin it is the question of identity that is put forward. There are those who wanted to see in Michael the one who would represent the black question in a country marked by it historically, and those who saw in Michael only what he is, an extraordinary man. So is Michael Jackson "Black or White"?
Michael Jackson young "white"?
Michael Jackson, because of his appearance, crystallizes around him contradictions and judgments.
In a special issue of Inrock magazine dated December 1, 2018, the journalist recalled how many went so far as to consider that by having white skin Michael "betrayed" his race and denied it, going so far as to question his music because of his skin change.
Conversely, as Gala magazine recalls in an article devoted to the appearance of Michael, a Senegalese journalist, evokes the "negritude" of Michael Jackson in his songs, he himself writes: "In any case, here , nobody forgets that Michael Jackson was a black, in spite of everything. Moreover, his greatest hits date from the time when he was still completely black, in particular Thriller… He always tried to hide his blackness, but his music in the background was black. I don't care what he did with his personal life, I don't judge him on that. "
And yet, the performer of the planetary hit "Black or White" is also associated with a universal figure. Some see in Michael Jackson a person who brings together fans of all origins. And his particular physique makes him universal, as the Gala journalist writes in an article entitled "Michael Jackson was very black": "Blacks, Whites, Asians, Hispanics welded in fever as close as possible to the scene where" moonwalked "that idol who looked like all of them, because she didn't look like anyone anymore."
Everyone gives their opinion on the singer's physical appearance. Yet the King of Pop remains the most awarded artist in history and until recently was the singer with the most sales of albums, 66 million, with "Thriller". Proof of a talent that goes beyond controversy.
