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Did Michael Jackson molest children?

Michael Jackson was put on trial for molesting Gavin Arvizo, a 13 year old boy (at the time of the offenses). On 13 Jun 2005 the jury acquitted Michael Jackson of all charges. However, his reputation has never fully recovered, with comedians joking about him molesting kids both before anything was proven and long after he was found innocent. Michael Jackson died on the 25th of June, 2009, from a heart attack, at age 50.

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Experts and Influencers

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Agree
Miscellaneous Experts


Janet Arvizo    Mother of Alleged Child Victim of Michael Jackon
Agree
Neverland is all about pornography, booze and sex with boys.
15 Apr 2005    Source


Disagree
Experts In Crime


Aphrodite Jones    True Crime Writer
Disagree
To the outside world, news reports would have people believe that Jackson’s Neverland was filled with dark undercurrents, with sinister games to lure children into a trap. However, inside the courtroom, where it really counted, it turned out that the pop icon, through his own privately recorded statements, had convinced the jury that he was an innocent pawn.
01 Jun 2007    Source


Experts In Entertainment


Macaulay Culkin    Actor
Disagree
[The allegations are] absolutely ridiculous. ... Somebody told me you should probably check out CNN because they're saying something about you. I just couldn't believe it. It was amazing to me that nobody even approached me and asked if these allegations were true.
11 May 2005    Source


Phonte    Musician, Rapper
Disagree
...the only thing Michael was guilty of in my opinion, was naivete. While cuddling in the bed with children isn't technically illegal, it does violate several social norms; norms that a man who [...] refers to himself as “Peter Pan” would certainly pay a higher price for breaking. ...laying in bed with those children, watching movies, tickling, and engaging in general horseplay, sounds less like the work of a pedophile and more like the actions of a man trying to experience a [lost] childhood.
30 Jun 2009    Source


Miscellaneous Experts


Disagree
We thoroughly studied the testimony, evidence, rules and procedures. We confidently came to our verdict [of not guilty on all 10 counts of child molestation].
13 Jun 2005    Source



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0 Points      jayquan      5 days ago      General Comment
hello i am 16 and an up incomming musician my life for as long as i have ever known was hell i said to myself a long time ago when i was about 10 i said to my self when i become rich and famous i wanna make sure that no child go through what i went through but because of the way the world is now if a child needed a ride home from school and you didnt know them you would be better off leaving him/her there alone than picking him/her up


so sick of what the world has become o wait it hasnt changed were just alot more open and in everyones buiesness


0 Points      Anonymous      08 Aug 2010      Stance on Question: Disagree
Michael Jackson did not molest those kids. I can't tell you how I know....I just do... and so does GOD.


0 Points      Benja      09 Aug 2010      General Comment
Well that settles the matter.



0 Points      Benja      01 Jul 2010      Stance on Question: Disagree
The two competing scenarios are:

1. MJ was guilty of pedophilia.
2. MJ's accusers were guilty of extortion.

I find '2' more likely. It seems highly plausible, having run the Neverland Ranch for that long, and being such an eccentric person in both behavior and appearance, that such an accusation would occur. Given that the parents of the kid MJ was accused of molesting had a track-record of lying, this really seems to confirm this scenario. Ultimately, the court not only failed to find any conclusive evidence against him, but the jury said that they "confidently came to their verdict". I can't rule out the possibility he was guilty, but the evidence strongly points towards his innocence. Furthermore, as a matter of principle, I believe people should be regarded as innocent until proven guilty. I've seen first hand that self-described "good people" can talk themselves into a lie that benefits them, even if it costs another person their time, money, and reputation. The principle of presuming innocence serves to fight that injustice.


0 Points      JDR      01 Sep 2009      Stance on Question: Agree
Common sense tells me that heterosexual adult men do not sleep in the same bed as children. They also do not spend millions of dollars turning themselves into a pseudo woman. Are the people who believe Jackson was innocent insane?

You don’t get arrested and spend millions of dollars on an elite defense team and months and months in court if there is no evidence against you. Without evidence a judge will throw the case out immediately. In addition why would anyone award a family millions of dollars to drop the charges against you if you were innocent? In my mind that is as good as admitting guilt. If he was innocent he should have defended his good name to the end.

Defenders of Jackson keep saying that the so called “haters” are uneducated in regards to the facts but in reality they are actually the people who unaware and blind to the facts. Have none of you ever heard of his secret room and the contents that were discovered during the police search of Neverland Ranch? The thousands of pornographic items belonging to Jackson that was uncovered? Why would an innocent childlike man have these items? Do you not remember him admitting to serving alcohol to young children who were there for “sleepovers”? Open your eyes and pretend for a moment that these same facts and charges were in relation to man living in your neighborhood and see if you still feel the same about Jackson.

Whether or not Jackson was a product of his abusive childhood or was considered by his many fans as talented is irrelevant. Personally I look at the facts and put aside any like or dislike for the music and common sense tells me he was a deeply disturbed child molester.


0 Points      Anonymous      30 Jun 2010      General Comment
im sorry, i just had to comment on this. he was not heterosexual, he did spend money on some plastic surgery, but so what? who's business is that anyway? as he once said in the interview with oprah winfrey, he did not invent plastic surgery.

about the evidence against michael, uhm, are you aware of the fact that false evidence was made against him?? if he really was a pedophile, why was he not proven guilty? are you telling me the justice system in the US gives a free pass out of jail to pedophiles? i didn't think so.
about the money jackson paid the accusers, think about it in a different way, why did they back the hell off once michael jackson paid them money?? would you accept money from a celebrity if you knew he had molested your child? i didn't think so. (if you'd answer yes, then you have no moral).

next, jackson did in fact once mention magazines and the like that were rather explosive, but he said FANS sent those to him. he didnt get those himself.

another thing, have you ever listened to his songs? songs like scream, money, tabloid junkie? theyre about how the media and everyone falsely judge him. do you think a real pedophile would even think of writing such songs??

seriously, this discussion is beyond rediculous. he was proven innocent, so he is NOT a pedophile. learn to live with that fact.


0 Points      Anonymous      26 Apr 2010      Stance on Question: Disagree
mj might've been a bit weird, but he did NOT admit to giving a child alchohol. and when people searched his house, they never found anything pornographic. besides, if he wanted to become a woman, would'nt he have just done sex change operation? he was very depressed, though. but still, he didn't sleep in the same bed as kids, the kids slept on his bed and he slept on the floor. so why didn't he defend his name? he never expected people to make such a case against him. and even if he did molest children, why do you look at that? look at his talent.


0 Points      kiama      23 Apr 2010      General Comment
I do not want to believe this 'cause he spent so much on children do you think he had sex with children? Hmmmm.


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0 Points      Blitzkrieg      11 Aug 2009      Stance on Question: Disagree
The proof of him molesting children was never found.


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3 Points      Professor Robin Barnes      26 Jul 2009      Stance on Question: Disagree
In pure visceral terms, John Lennon's hit song Imagine remains the greatest musical expression of global desire for world peace and unity that we have ever known. Michael Jackson’s 1988 video Man in the Mirror was on a similar trajectory toward inspiring a closer look at mass consciousness. If Jackson’s bold political commentary and visual depictions of the horrors of imperialist tendencies signaled a Lennonesque problem for those in power, it would have been dwarfed in scope by the public fervor ready to be unleashed over the nightmare unfolding in New England.

Indictments of Catholic Priests came fast and furious from 1992-1993. Within the year, twenty nine hundred miles away, in August of 1993, a confidential case report completed by the Los Angeles Department of Children and Family Services was leaked to Hard Copy television. Within hours a British tabloid sold copies to reporters for $750 each. Dramatic headlines offered lurid speculation around allegations of sexual molestation. By September 1994, police officials had interviewed more than 400 witnesses when prosecutors announced that no child molestation charges would be filed. Former employees who first testified that they never witnessed anything sexual were only too happy to recant and claim that they had witnessed something after their extortion attempts failed.

While Jackson had not yet become the threat that Lennon remained as a revolutionary activist, one would have to concede that stopping his momentum could have easily been an underling factor in the timing of the second set of charges. Indeed, only a “child molester poster-boy” as large as the Grand Canyon, could effectively divert public attention so that collective anger against the Catholic Church would not insure its ultimate and speedy demise.

ackson appears to have been a handy and convenient target for an establishment in desperate need for a scapegoat to spare the legions of Church leaders that “kept horrific tales of abuse out of the public eye through an elaborate culture of secrecy, deception, and intimidation.

By the end of 2002, it was clear that we were not dealing with one or two isolated incidents. Some 1,200 priests had been accused of abuse nationwide. “[R]epeat abusers, including priests who traded drugs for sex with minors, fathered children, and physically assaulted their victims:” were known predators that church officials shuffled from parish to another-- where they abused again.

In April 2004, Jackson was charged. According to Rolling Stone Magazine Jackson’s trial was nothing less than a zoo and a freak show. “The prosecution's case [boiled] down to this: In a panic over negative publicity, Jackson conspires to kidnap a boy and force him to deny acts of molestation that in fact never happened, and then he gets over his panic just long enough to actually molest the child at the very moment when the whole world is watching.”

You decide?


0 Points      drsolare      19 Jul 2009      Stance on Question: Disagree
I think he was not a molester at all...He was too caring person to be a molester. I have been a fan of his for 22 years and seen enough to convince me that he was an innocent caring loving person.

He was a true humanitarian...There are a lot of scumbag celebrities out there and all they do is to look nice and change lovers and cause scandals to attract attention and be in the news and there is nothing they are good for other than that!

In order to understand MJ you need to imagine yourself working since age 5!!!! All that attention, all that scrutiny all the time...Also incredible success...This is a coctail of events enough to shift any "normal" to a different level of normal....I say normal because I do think he was more normal than most given the circumstances...

The only thing I am upset about is him getting hooked on drugs. I keep asking myself what might have possessed him to do that or what got him into drugs...Yet, I must say he still did his best to give the right message to the youth about drugs, even if he was a victim of them, which I respect.

I think his talent will be remembered forever. In a way I see him like the Mozart of today...Saying that Mozart wasn't exactly a guy who conformed to what was considered to be the "normal" at the time, was he????

Perhaps it is part and parcel of being this gifted as well...


0 Points      rosie      13 Apr 2010      General Comment
i guess you are blessed for getting to know him for 22 years. i was never given that chance because i had judge him not by saying bad things about him just like what these scum bags are doing to make money out of him. i became a fan after he passed away and i feel sad that i will never get to know the man. i feel sad for him and i am glad that there are people like you who will always defend him. thank god that he is now at peace.
peace to you mj



0 Points      SadFan      17 Jul 2009      Stance on Question: Disagree
Michael Jackson wasn't a child abuser. The kids who accused him will soon be writing books and trying to get film deals to make a bit of cash out of the whole sordid sorry story.

I suffer from vitiligo since I'm five years old. At the age of 30, my whole body is white and depigmented and my mom used to try and use make-up to cover the blotches but than stopped as I had allergic reactions from some products. So yeah, I'm whiter than a blanket and have to avoid the sun at all accounts.

My husband's white and I'm mixed race. We have a beautiful little daughter born with jet-black hair and blue eyes. She's two now and her hair's changed to blonde.

Neither my husband or I have blue eyes and everyone swore that my daughter's eyes will change...Does it matter though?

Michael Jackson adored his kids. He was compassionate and loveable and wanted to believe the best about everyone. He gave to charities and wanted to save the world. Many of us want to do that, but Michael actually tried to make a difference by giving himself unconditionally to others...And all he got back was abuse.

I love you Michael Jackson...I hope that your children would be well-looked after and I'm sure that your true fans will let them know what a wonderful person you were!!!!


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0 Points      JCBartlett      04 Mar 2009      Stance on Question: Disagree
No.

He is one wacky fella. Perhaps a little mentally unhinged.
It was a case of people believing what they want to believe.

Shame he lost all his money, career, fame... because of false accusations.


-1 Point      Anonymous      14 Jun 2010      Stance on Question: Mostly Disagree
michael jackson was th king of pop

i have a firm belief that he could not have done that

the movies should stop making fun of him


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