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MJ and his hair

At first I wasn't sure if she should share these things but my curiosity wins. I'm glad we still get to learn more about Michael 17 years later.
 
MissAshley said:
You're right, nonsense alone does not say much. That's why it's the thesis, which is then supported with various reasoning. Moving on, is this AI? This reads like AI slop, I'm sorry, but even the checkers seem to agree. My intuition, given my history debating over the years, is telling me yes.

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Anyway, I don't mind debating GPT, I'm used to it at this point.

Documentation has always been the default, historically. Any sort of absence of display is not the default moral position as you seem to imply. If we take your position for granted, then perhaps we ought to have a sort of affirmative moral justification for documentation. But I'm not going to presuppose a value judgement there, because there's no reason to. Once again, historically, it is restriction that requires justification (think active harm through clear exploitative intent in a privacy or legal context).

Karen has stated what her purpose is, and its actually twofold. If you bothered to read her tweets about it, you would understand. But you didn't, or you would not be asking vague questions about intent or talking about how it's framed.

Even if you consider Karen's framing poor, it is not unethical. Something can be legit while also being incomplete, or ungraceful, or minimal. Tabloids are unethical (dubious given Michael's own involvement in some cases) because of intent and distortion. They have a selective sensationalist slant to ridicule and manipulate for profit. Karen showing an artifact that she worked hard on, because she is also an artist, and as she stated this is about her journey as an artist, does not reproduce any of those harms. Given how this avoids narrative distortion, it is quite literally the opposite.

You don't seem to knowing anything about the history of museums, let alone holocaust museums. They documented first, and then had the ethical debate for another day. Museums have a contentious history, often evolving from private and uncontextualized archives. You cannot reasonably demand museum-level justification from individual artists or collectors. Although, I will say, Karen however disorganized, has not breached any ethics a modern museum wouldn't.

Oh, society does? Interesting, because society bolsters this behavior all the time. It's only the strange, obsessive fans that seem to take issue. In fact, why is it that fans seem to only vehemently attack women that were in Michael's life? Hmmmmm. Geeee, what's the word I'm looking for... I think it starts with an "m". Almost like it frames this discussion from the onset into the additional problems generated by harassers and bad faith interlocutors.

Also lmao, posthumous consent is not an accepted concept. The dead cannot consent to begin with, as they are dead, they are no longer a person. What actually matters here would be proportionality of harm, which does not favor a single argument you have made. Michael's physical condition, even when he was alive, was barely a private footnote, as it became an integral discussion point of his life, which he contributed to on various occasions. This severely weakens the idea that Karen's artifacts are off-limits because of ethical concerns.

Moral legitimacy has nothing to do with productivity. Value can simply be accuracy, completeness, countering mythologization, resisting sanitization or whatever else. History does not have to justify itself to emotional appeals and their beneficiaries. Using this logic, empathy thus is not a veto power as you have used it. I can easily claim the antithesis at these things being hidden, and then the two feelings from opposite persons are canceled. That's why this is an incredibly poor ethical system.
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Thank you for this post because this clarifies everything. We are both working from different frameworks. You are framing documentation as a moral default and restriction as something that always requires justification. So that’s basically a philosophical position and not a neutral historical fact.

Modern ethics in medicine, journalism, archiving, and museums very explicitly reject the idea that documentation is automatically justified simply because it can be done. Context, proportionality are also core considerations. Saying that something is ungraceful or poorly frame and yet still is “legitimate” is exactly the point under dispute. Ethical evaluation doesn’t solely rely only on intent or distortion. It also includes whether exposure is necessary, proportionate, and meaningfully contextualized. Avoiding sensationalism alone does not exhaust ethical responsibility.

And yes, back to the Museum’s… Their history is contentious, and many practices we now criticize were once common. But that’s not a defense of repeating those patterns and it shouldn’t be. It’s evidence of why ethical standards have come to be in the first place. Pointing out that institutions once documented first and debated later doesn’t establish that this was right, only that it happened. I’d also like to point out, again, that death does not erase ethical obligations. That’s why estates, defamation standards, and professional codes exist at all.

You seem to be stuck on “fan obsession” instead of engaging with the substance of the critique, which is exactly why I posed the moral question in my first post. Ethical reasoning does not work by canceling our feelings and declaring the remainder objective. You weigh values, impacts and necessity. And I still don’t see any compelling case for why his wigs and hairpieces needed public exposure.

It seems clear we’re operating from different premises about dignity, proportionality, and what ethical restraint looks like when it comes to deceased public figures like MJ. That’s fine, but it also means we’re unlikely to convince each other or even have a productive discussion.
 
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Themidwestcowboy said:
Thank you for this post because this clarifies everything. We are both working from different frameworks. You are framing documentation as a moral default and restriction as something that always requires justification. So that’s basically a philosophical position and not a neutral historical fact.

Modern ethics in medicine, journalism, archiving, and museums very explicitly reject the idea that documentation is automatically justified simply because it can be done. Context, proportionality are also core considerations. Saying that something is ungraceful or poorly frame and yet still is “legitimate” is exactly the point under dispute. Ethical evaluation doesn’t solely rely only on intent or distortion. It also includes whether exposure is necessary, proportionate, and meaningfully contextualized. Avoiding sensationalism alone does not exhaust ethical responsibility.

And yes, back to the Museum’s… Their history is contentious, and many practices we now criticize were once common. But that’s not a defense of repeating those patterns and it shouldn’t be. It’s evidence of why ethical standards have come to be in the first place. Pointing out that institutions once documented first and debated later doesn’t establish that this was right, only that it happened. I’d also like to point out, again, that death does not erase ethical obligations. That’s why estates, defamation standards, and professional codes exist at all.

You seem to be stuck on “fan obsession” instead of engaging with the substance of the critique, which is exactly why I posed the moral question in my first post. Ethical reasoning does not work by canceling our feelings and declaring the remainder objective. You weigh values, impacts and necessity. And I still don’t see any compelling case for why his wigs and hairpieces needed public exposure.

It seems clear we’re operating from different premises about dignity, proportionality, and what ethical restraint looks like when it comes to deceased public figures like MJ, That’s fine, but it also means we’re unlikely to convince each other or even have a productive discussion.
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No response to the AI allegations? Didn't think so. You should at least bother to craft your own arguments, they might end up more concrete, you know.

What you miss about modern ethics is the fact it has no necessity threshold with a defined emotional/moral payoff. You mention medicine and journalism, but the standard there is absolutely not "only document what is strictly necessary." It's actually: "document unless you have a CLEAR, demonstrable harm that outweighs your ought." That is a huge difference both in theory and practice.

And necessity of what? Your arguments are so vague, likely from the AI I suspect. You make a statement, but add zero clarification. Funny how you seem to argue I do something similar at the end of each post, but I clearly explain every point I'm making. So necessity of what? Education? Morals? Those can be valid sure, but they're not the prerequisites for legitimacy. They are no more valid than anything I have previously mentioned. Proportionality is much more important in this case.

And in that vein, the exposure from Karen is a lot of objects--not of a living person, and there's nothing actually graphic, that was a blatant lie earlier in the thread that obfuscated the context. There is no personal harm, period. You can also argue these items are already embedded in the public narrative Michael did not, and likely could not, keep private. They are in the mythos so to speak, and to have clarity in that sense is beneficial (read: demythologization).

My guy, I literally addressed the "substance" of your AI essay, and then brought up the fan obsession as an additional point. What is nuance? Is she in the room with us? You have provided zero logically sound arguments for why Karen has done anything wrong, and that does, indeed, come across as unhinged fan behavior. You also cannot interface with where the constant barrage of hate originates from, which is true in this case as it appears to be in other women's lives that were involved with Michael (which you completely ignored). That is the conclusion, not the substance of the critique, ironically.

You have presented a claim, that dignity is primarily preserved through restriction. You have not provided sufficient reasoning for this. You could boil this down to a philosophical debate about showing what we can defend (morally), or instead in the case of a clear ethical violation. This does not make someone "not see Michael Jackson as a person" as you have so asserted. It's an absurd claim.
 
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MissAshley said:
No response to the AI allegations? Didn't think so. You should at least bother to craft your own arguments, they might end up more concrete, you know.

What you miss about modern ethics is the fact it has no necessity threshold with a defined emotional/moral payoff. You mention medicine and journalism, but the standard there is absolutely not "only document what is strictly necessary." It's actually: "document unless you have a CLEAR, demonstrable harm that outweighs your ought." That is a huge difference both in theory and practice.

And necessity of what? Your arguments are so vague, likely from the AI I suspect. You make a statement, but add zero clarification. Funny how you seem to argue I do something similar at the end of each post, but I clearly explain every point I'm making. So necessity of what? Education? Morals? Those can be valid sure, but they're not the prerequisites for legitimacy. They are no more valid than anything I have previously mentioned. Proportionality is much more important in this case.

And in that vein, the exposure from Karen is a lot of objects--not of a living person, and there's nothing actually graphic, that was a blatant lie earlier in the thread that obfuscated the context. There is no personal harm, period. You can also argue these items are already embedded in the public narrative Michael did not, and likely could not, keep private. They are in the mythos so to speak, and to have clarity in that sense is beneficial (read: demythologization).

My guy, I literally addressed the "substance" of your AI essay, and then brought up the fan obsession as an additional point. What is nuance? Is she in the room with us? You have provided zero logically sound arguments for why Karen has done anything wrong, and that does, indeed, come across as unhinged fan behavior. You also cannot interface with where the constant barrage of hate originates from, which is true in this case as it appears to be in other women's lives that were involved with Michael (which you completely ignored). That is the conclusion, not the substance of the critique, ironically.

You have presented a claim, that dignity is primarily preserved through restriction. You have not provided sufficient reasoning for this. You could boil this down to a philosophical debate about showing what we can defend (morally), or instead in the case of a clear ethical violation. This does not make someone "not see Michael Jackson as a person" as you have so asserted. It's an absurd claim.
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I’ve addressed your arguments head on and in detail in all my posts. I’m not going to take the bait with your repeated AI insinuations, parasocial framing, thinly veiled misogyny claim or speculation about my mental state. These are all just rhetorical moves, not rebuttals. I did not come here to do any of that. I’ve come to the conclusion that we’re working from different ethical premises. My stance does not stem from fan obsession, it’s a principled stance. Other than that, I’ve been clear about what I meant when talking about proportionality, and necessity. I don’t think continuing is going to resolve anything. So I’ll leave it here.
 
Themidwestcowboy said:
I’ve addressed your arguments head on and in detail in all my posts. I’m not going to take the bait with your repeated AI insinuations, parasocial framing, thinly veiled misogyny claim or speculation about my mental state. These are all just rhetorical moves, not rebuttals. I did not come here to do any of that. I’ve come to the conclusion that we’re working from different ethical premises. My stance does not stem from fan obsession, it’s a principled stance. Other than that, I’ve been clear about what I meant when talking about proportionality, and necessity. I don’t think continuing is going to resolve anything. So I’ll leave it here.
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Yes, I'm sure my intuition and the checkers are all completely wrong. You never actually addressed the points separate to those either. You didn't even bother to define necessity while saying you have been clear (claim without evidence). You literally claimed people that don't agree with you don't see Michael as human and lack empathy. It's absurd, and you failed at every turn to actually back this conclusion up.

You also did not identify a single demonstrable harm that Karen has caused. You pivoted and ignored this section. You didn't refute the fact there is no accepted notion of posthumous consent, especially in application to what you are calling your ethical premise. You also did not explain why neutral presentation by Karen is unethical inherently rather than insufficient regarding your own subjectivity. You did not address how absence of curatorial framing can equate to exploitation. Proportionality was not reconciled with the nature of Karen's posts, which has no blameworthy harm. Ethical costs of suppression/restriction were not addressed as a canceling effect, and you provided no workable solution for the line beyond your moral intuition (even less substantiation than what I provided for your AI usage).
 
We all know Michael wore wigs and hair extensions so what's the issue with seeing the actual pieces? We swoon over unreleased pictures and TII outfits he was supposed to wear but when Karen posts something unreleased, we draw the line?
 
BlackAnon said:
We all know Michael wore wigs and hair extensions so what's the issue with seeing the actual pieces? We swoon over unreleased pictures and TII outfits he was supposed to wear but when Karen posts something unreleased, we draw the line?
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It's not about Karen, it's about revealing very personal stuff. The last posts explain it very well, I think.

But I guess it depends on how much empathy one has if it is an issue or not. It's subjective, so the discussion is pretty pointless.
 
someplace_else said:
It's not about Karen, it's about revealing very personal stuff. The last posts explain it very well, I think.

But I guess it depends on how much empathy one has if it is an issue or not. It's subjective, so the discussion is pretty pointless.
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What's personal about a hair piece though?
 
Fuzball said:
To me, leaking video material of the actual accident to the media felt more off than what Karen's posting on twitter/X.

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Well one thing doesn't justify another 💁. There are many things out there in the www that I don't like, but that's just my opinion. If other people don't agree, that's okay.
 
MsAshley said:
Yes, I'm sure my intuition and the checkers are all completely wrong. You never actually addressed the points separate to those either. You didn't even bother to define necessity while saying you have been clear (claim without evidence). You literally claimed people that don't agree with you don't see Michael as human and lack empathy. It's absurd, and you failed at every turn to actually back this conclusion up.

You also did not identify a single demonstrable harm that Karen has caused. You pivoted and ignored this section. You didn't refute the fact there is no accepted notion of posthumous consent, especially in application to what you are calling your ethical premise. You also did not explain why neutral presentation by Karen is unethical inherently rather than insufficient regarding your own subjectivity. You did not address how absence of curatorial framing can equate to exploitation. Proportionality was not reconciled with the nature of Karen's posts, which has no blameworthy harm. Ethical costs of suppression/restriction were not addressed as a canceling effect, and you provided no workable solution for the line beyond your moral intuition (even less substantiation than what I provided for your AI usage).
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I can admit whenever I do sweeping generalizations such as this one. That’s a fair point. But you make the same kind of generalizations in another direction when you try to equate all ethical objection to unhinged fan obsession. It seems inconceivable to you that some may find what Karen shared tasteless and unnecessary (!!), on ethical grounds, regardless of who the person is.

You keep insisting on demonstrable harm but I reject that premise because I don’t believe ethics only activates once damage is measurable.
The Smithsonian now admits that historically neutral and productive documentation of human remains is now considered unethical under modern standards of dignity and respect, even as demonstrable harm is absent. I interpret this as evolving ethical duties beyond just demonstrable injury or question of consent. But I have to be upfront, they are talking about human remains here but they aren’t singling them out as being special.

I came across this academic book chapter, included in an edited scholarly volume (Anthropology of Violent Death: Theoretical Foundations for Forensic Humanitarian Action). This is written by a historian and ethicist named “Antoon De Baets” He talks about the posthumous dignity of a dead person. It’s not long, it’s about 25 pages (I can share it if you want to read it) He argues for how I see the concept of demonstrable harm. What he’s essentially saying is, “no demonstrable harm doesn’t equal ethically fine.” Ethical duties toward the dead still exist even though they are not alive and cannot be harmed in a conventional way. Yes, the dead cannot consent but that doesnt erase ethical responsibility. I think the real argument lies in here, and this would be much more fun to unpack and discuss. I really thought about what you said about no harm being done to someone not living. And then I thought about what the author write about posthumous dignity and respect. So my question to you is,

Do you consider it harm when someone is accused of something that posthumously harms someone’s reputation? Or can anything be said and done to someone who isn’t alive?

Link to Smithsonian article:
 
Themidwestcowboy said:
I can admit whenever I do sweeping generalizations such as this one. That’s a fair point. But you make the same kind of generalizations in another direction when you try to equate all ethical objection to unhinged fan obsession. It seems inconceivable to you that some may find what Karen shared tasteless and unnecessary (!!), on ethical grounds, regardless of who the person is.

You keep insisting on demonstrable harm but I reject that premise because I don’t believe ethics only activates once damage is measurable.
The Smithsonian now admits that historically neutral and productive documentation of human remains is now considered unethical under modern standards of dignity and respect, even as demonstrable harm is absent. I interpret this as evolving ethical duties beyond just demonstrable injury or question of consent. But I have to be upfront, they are talking about human remains here but they aren’t singling them out as being special.

I came across this academic book chapter, included in an edited scholarly volume (Anthropology of Violent Death: Theoretical Foundations for Forensic Humanitarian Action). This is written by a historian and ethicist named “Antoon De Baets” He talks about the posthumous dignity of a dead person. It’s not long, it’s about 25 pages (I can share it if you want to read it) He argues for how I see the concept of demonstrable harm. What he’s essentially saying is, “no demonstrable harm doesn’t equal ethically fine.” Ethical duties toward the dead still exist even though they are not alive and cannot be harmed in a conventional way. Yes, the dead cannot consent but that doesnt erase ethical responsibility. I think the real argument lies in here, and this would be much more fun to unpack and discuss. I really thought about what you said about no harm being done to someone not living. And then I thought about what the author write about posthumous dignity and respect. So my question to you is,

Do you consider it harm when someone is accused of something that posthumously harms someone’s reputation? Or can anything be said and done to someone who isn’t alive?

Link to Smithsonian article:
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If you did not make that claim about empathy and not seeing MJ as a person (something clearly aimed at me), I would not have even bothered to reply, as I already stated. That was the conclusion you made that soured your entire post. If this was something serious, like I don't know, presenting Michael's nudes from the DA office, I would totally agree that's damaging. But wigs and a mold? I'll tone down what you call rhetoric because this post seems more genuine from you.

Anyway, I am not equating ALL ethical objections with fan obsession, let us make that clear here. I have been explicit in that ethical concerns can indeed be principled, but what I have been arguing is a much more narrow thing. So I will proceed from there. Emotional responses alone cannot function, sufficiently at least, as ethical criterion. When you invoke dignity in that way, you requite a rule that scales. Finding something unnecessary, for example, is not an ethical judgement.

Moving onto harms: I reject that notion that harm is asserted when you cannot specify the moral interest that is therein violated and how. Emphasis on how. We need an identification here to move forward, otherwise the harm is then just a generalized veto rather than anything reasonable.

The Smithsonian. So there's limits here. Human remains are treated specially by institutions... so I'm not too sure what you mean by not being treated specially in practice? Because they are the person--that is the remainder of what the person was; that is all that is left of this person in the universe--naturally that would lead to special considerations. Remains are not representations. They are not wigs or molds; they are the corporeal identity, a very different thing. Ethical frameworks usually single this out. There is nothing self-evident about extending this beyond the body. It requires an argument that isn't based in implication.

As for De Baets, I will read it if you link it to be good faith. On its head, I would say this: I wouldn't even necessarily disagree you can have ethical duties with some regards to the dead. That is separate to posthumous consent, which you have agreed is not a thing. The dead cannot consent, as they do not exist, yada yada etc etc. Thus we must focus on how the duties can be operationalized. There is no implication in the dignity of the dead for maximal restraint or non disclosure (these are fundamental to my points here, consider them narrowly). You need a catalyst such as distortion, degradation, etc. You were correct initially, you do not need it (the harm) to occur, but it must be reasonably argued that it may occur (the potential).

"Do you consider it harm when someone is accused of something that posthumously harms someone’s reputation? Or can anything be said and done to someone who isn’t alive?"
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This is a good question. I think there is harm, because it affects the historical understanding and moral record; there is ethical meaning here. It can also affect relatives and so forth. This is why Wade and Jimmy are clowns that should probably face legal sanctions for damaging Michael's reputation. In the case of Karen, I do not think it can be reasonably argued that there is so much as the potential of harm there. Whereas if I said I met Michael and was assaulted, there would be harm in me concocting and saying it despite being an obvious falsehood. The potential and the action is there in both cases. I find that a lot of criticisms of Karen are very unfairly leveled against her for reasons I've touched on above.
 
MsAshley said:
If you did not make that claim about empathy and not seeing MJ as a person (something clearly aimed at me), I would not have even bothered to reply, as I already stated. That was the conclusion you made that soured your entire post. If this was something serious, like I don't know, presenting Michael's nudes from the DA office, I would totally agree that's damaging. But wigs and a mold? I'll tone down what you call rhetoric because this post seems more genuine from you.

Anyway, I am not equating ALL ethical objections with fan obsession, let us make that clear here. I have been explicit in that ethical concerns can indeed be principled, but what I have been arguing is a much more narrow thing. So I will proceed from there. Emotional responses alone cannot function, sufficiently at least, as ethical criterion. When you invoke dignity in that way, you requite a rule that scales. Finding something unnecessary, for example, is not an ethical judgement.

Moving onto harms: I reject that notion that harm is asserted when you cannot specify the moral interest that is therein violated and how. Emphasis on how. We need an identification here to move forward, otherwise the harm is then just a generalized veto rather than anything reasonable.

The Smithsonian. So there's limits here. Human remains are treated specially by institutions... so I'm not too sure what you mean by not being treated specially in practice? Because they are the person--that is the remainder of what the person was; that is all that is left of this person in the universe--naturally that would lead to special considerations. Remains are not representations. They are not wigs or molds; they are the corporeal identity, a very different thing. Ethical frameworks usually single this out. There is nothing self-evident about extending this beyond the body. It requires an argument that isn't based in implication.

As for De Baets, I will read it if you link it to be good faith. On its head, I would say this: I wouldn't even necessarily disagree you can have ethical duties with some regards to the dead. That is separate to posthumous consent, which you have agreed is not a thing. The dead cannot consent, as they do not exist, yada yada etc etc. Thus we must focus on how the duties can be operationalized. There is no implication in the dignity of the dead for maximal restraint or non disclosure (these are fundamental to my points here, consider them narrowly). You need a catalyst such as distortion, degradation, etc. You were correct initially, you do not need it (the harm) to occur, but it must be reasonably argued that it may occur (the potential).



This is a good question. I think there is harm, because it affects the historical understanding and moral record; there is ethical meaning here. It can also affect relatives and so forth. This is why Wade and Jimmy are clowns that should probably face legal sanctions for damaging Michael's reputation. In the case of Karen, I do not think it can be reasonably argued that there is so much as the potential of harm there. Whereas if I said I met Michael and was assaulted, there would be harm in me concocting and saying it despite being an obvious falsehood. The potential and the action is there in both cases. I find that a lot of criticisms of Karen are very unfairly leveled against her for reasons I've touched on above.
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I mean, really our stances are not that different. Because, as I understand it, you do believe that ethical concerns can be principled and I understand where you’re coming from now more clearly. I think I see your point and that I’ve been conflating two things together. I’ve been using the way “harm” when I actually meant “embarrassing.” And the thing is, for something to be embarrassing, the person in question must be here to feel this emotion, and they cannot if they’re dead. Whereas you talk about harm in ways that are quantifiable and measured such as monetary loss (estate), distress (family), or revision of history (false claims) which can lead to all the aforementioned. I hear that.

But this still doesn’t explain why this is a normal phenomenon that occurs in everyday life. Perhaps we’re not solely talking about ethics anymore. Sure, there are people who, let’s say, go out of their way to watch photographs of deceased people, or you know, something morbid like that. Then there are people who think something along those lines of, “ I’d be rolling in my grave if something like that happened to me” and they refuse to partake in that. And it’s not because they have a clue about ethical dignity or have spend a second mulling over ideas of ethical judgement. But because somewhere in them, it feels wrong, and it may very well be that their own sense of empathy is governing this behavior. Even though this doesn’t fall into all the stuff about monetary loss etc,

So when I see that mold of his head I know he’s not here to be hurt by it being shown or even embarrassed but I, personally, would be horrified of the idea of something that caused me agony and trauma being shown to the world. Something that was meant to be private (at least that’s what I believe, but maybe it was a never meant to be private?) The wigs and hair pieces are not major things for me, but the mold is really pushing it.

So honestly, I’ve come to this insight. I’m willing to treat empathetic restraint as ethically relevant, and I suspect this is a sticky point for you because it cannot be operationalized in the way you prefer, because you want a clearer pathway to harm. I think the main difference there is where we believe ethical responsibility begins.
 
Themidwestcowboy said:
I mean, really our stances are not that different. Because, as I understand it, you do believe that ethical concerns can be principled and I understand where you’re coming from now more clearly. I think I see your point and that I’ve been conflating two things together. I’ve been using the way “harm” when I actually meant “embarrassing.” And the thing is, for something to be embarrassing, the person in question must be here to feel this emotion, and they cannot if they’re dead. Whereas you talk about harm in ways that are quantifiable and measured such as monetary loss (estate), distress (family), or revision of history (false claims) which can lead to all the aforementioned. I hear that.

But this still doesn’t explain why this is a normal phenomenon that occurs in everyday life. Perhaps we’re not solely talking about ethics anymore. Sure, there are people who, let’s say, go out of their way to watch photographs of deceased people, or you know, something morbid like that. Then there are people who think something along those lines of, “ I’d be rolling in my grave if something like that happened to me” and they refuse to partake in that. And it’s not because they have a clue about ethical dignity or have spend a second mulling over ideas of ethical judgement. But because somewhere in them, it feels wrong, and it may very well be that their own sense of empathy is governing this behavior. Even though this doesn’t fall into all the stuff about monetary loss etc,

So when I see that mold of his head I know he’s not here to be hurt by it being shown or even embarrassed but I, personally, would be horrified of the idea of something that caused me agony and trauma being shown to the world. Something that was meant to be private (at least that’s what I believe, but maybe it was a never meant to be private?) The wigs and hair pieces are not major things for me, but the mold is really pushing it.

So honestly, I’ve come to this insight. I’m willing to treat empathetic restraint as ethically relevant, and I suspect this is a sticky point for you because it cannot be operationalized in the way you prefer, because you want a clearer pathway to harm. I think the main difference there is where we believe ethical responsibility begins.
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I had a nice post written out, but accidentally closed the tab. I'll try to retype it as I remember it: Is English not your first language? Because that would make sense about the miscommunication there.

Why is it a normal phenomenon? I think it varies. The situation you describe would indicate cognitive dissonance, because humans on average are not rational actors. I would find that hypothetical person to be motivated by morbid curiosity, and then the dissonance based on self-awareness. If they are aware but cannot help it, we may consider it a sort of compulsion. A curious compulsion. I would say this is because death is hard to conceptualize for the human mind, and in many ways ends up being taboo in Western culture under certain circumstances. When something is taboo, it naturally attracts curious visitors.

Still, the normalization of death and gore interests can be seen to manifest in gendered subgroups (via subcultures). For women, I've seen this manifest mostly in two ways. The first, I'll start with an anecdote from the other day. I came across a very odd channel on YouTube. It was by a woman who made videos going into the dying process, executions, and just all things death. I texted my girlfriend a link and said, "isn't this creepy?" Because though I did not see anything wrong with it, I was still unsettled. This woman would belong to the female mortuary/gothic subgroup--the ones that seem to approach it as a communion almost. Death is treated as a normal state of life (which it is, to be frank), and presented in a way that we ought to treat no differently from anything else. It is neutral and nothing to fear or demonize. The other group tends to stem from true crime, which is very popular in women's entertainment. I've noticed more of a focus here on risk management/education, facing your fears, etc. in addition to a morbid curiosity about the dark parts of the human mind. These women tend to want to understand and seek reconciliation in some capacity (whether emotionally or scientifically).

Men on the other hand tend to be different in how this gets normalized. If you have been around gore obsessed guys (I have), it's almost treated like a fix. A dopamine hit requiring the next extreme thing due to desensitization. On some level it's about power and control, as hierarchies are quickly established in these communities, with users receiving reputations for knowledge or possession of goods... kind of like here (bleh).

Women's fascination can sometimes, in ethnographic literature, be said to operate as a sort of risk education, as well as anxiety diffusion. This tends to be true of the true crime subgroup. But that sorta gothic/mortuary subgroup, it can be more ritual I think. The interest here tends to focus more on the process, the care of the body, dignity of the body (relevant to our conversation), and the legibility of death rather than sensation. Historically, I believe this has allowed women to engage with the idea of death without aggression or "dominance", and a sort of beauty around the decay. Men on the other hand, will approach it more as a technical problem, with roots in desensitization via transgression, shock, and aesthetic extremity. A good comparison would be communion versus control.

So four paragraphs off on a tangent, but I think it matters because it's a deviation from ethics to explain the why. Most human beings are not too concerned with ethics in actuality, at least not on a formal level, from what I can tell. Instead, people tend to rely on their intuition more often than not. The average person would find unique information and rare artifacts as intriguing, which when you add in the nature of a social taboo, it becomes quite a powerful curiosity (not that this applies to Karen). I also say this has to do with a naturally occurring dichotomy, that there are people that view death with avoidance/reverence and exposure/confrontation. Given that these views are going to naturally occur, it stands to reason they will thus be normalized within subcultures. If enough people like something, if they think the same things, they tend to congregate and thus establish these groupings. Society's position on this has evolved of course. In 1980s America, religion acted as a gate to sanitize death and rebuke those interested in it. Harsh criticisms and all that. But now, it's much more ambivalent. We have moved that tenuous line across the world up in such a way that nothing is black or white, and we often tend to default more towards specific scenarios in order to avoid being specious. We might consider ethically, this can be considered voyeurism, if we are to tie it back in, but the arguments about voyeurism are entirely separate to anything discussed.

If it were me, I wouldn't care very much, as I would be dead, and therefore it would be impossible to care. So it's a consideration for the living me. And I think I have more important things to worry about than that. But would it bother me knowing that? I don't think so, really. I feel very indifferent about the idea. The wigs were definitely not private, but the mold was to Karen and Michael. Karen has specified it is part of her artistic legacy, and I agree, as it helps paint a full picture of her work and talent. I am glad she is giving fans such insightful information like no one else. She is not doing it to profit, to get clout, she just does it because she's an artist and admired Michael, through the good and the bad, which gives us a more complete picture. I get that people found some of her work on MJ to be not so flattering, but rarely does criticism stop there.

Let me tell you, when I ran the MJ Discord circuit, all those places were a boy's club, despite girls often being there. There was a frequent willingness to downplay or ignore this, which is just internalized misogyny or a fear of confrontation, and in many cases bolstered it by indulging in the same behaviors. This is why many of the women in MJ's life were dragged through the mud. In the case of the girls doing it, it was often out of this parasocial romantic jealousy (except Shana, she lies too much), while the boys doing it were just being pigs. Karen came up a lot because she interacts with fans so much, and the things I heard people say were sometimes very rude and disgusting. It's deranged given that Michael would obviously defend his friend if he was alive, and disavow fans like that if he saw the behavior. Some of them genuinely believe he would choose them personally over someone he knew for almost 30 years.

And yes, I do want a clearer pathway. It has to be boiled down to a set of valid propositions at the least.
 
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Is it fair to say that by aged 50, Michael was almost completely bald? I know the autopsy report stated something along those lines , he basically had a little bit of fuzz on top and that was it?
 
jarvis said:
My wife owns a salon and she says MJ is wearing lace-front wigs,I dont know anything about them. What does everyone think? Is that his real hair or is it lace fronts?
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I think at least from 2003 on he was wearing wigs. The long straight, silky hair were wigs, I’d say. Not that I really care. That being said…I think everyone who was around in 2009 knows that I’m a curls girl (remember the ”The curls are BACK!!!” thread!! 😬❤️😂😂😂). ❤️ Can’t help it! I just think he always looked the cutest with curls, wig or not, don’t care! ❤️❤️❤️
 
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