Fulham’s Michael Jackson Statue: the Beauty Is the Absurdity
When a statue of Michael Jackson was ceremoniously unveiled, with as much confusion as fanfare, outside Fulham’s stadium in April of last year, many supporters at Craven Cottage were left with a litany of lingering questions, such as: Why Michael Jackson? Why at Fulham? Is this some sort of April Fool’s joke? No seriously, it’s a joke, right?
I would say “sorry” to those harboring such questions (especially the last two), but Fulham’s owner, Mohamed Al Fayed, is not permitting room for any such apologies. He defiantly told a crowd of bewildered and disgruntled supporters: “If some stupid fans don’t understand and appreciate such a gift they can go to hell.” He then presumably tried to soften the charge (but perhaps made it more acrimonious?) by offering Chelsea as an alternate destination for dissenters.
Of course, even fans of the King of Pop, who were apparently prepared to tolerate the statue, have some right to at least scratch their heads; according to a follow-up article in The Guardian, “Jackson’s links to Fulham are tenuous to say the least – he watched a game there as a guest of Al Fayed in 1999.” Al Fayed’s claims that people from all over the UK would queue up to see the statue (perhaps as the culmination of some sort of religious pilgrimage?) did not assuage many supporters’ public grief. Nor has the inevitable line of crappy merchandise.
Yet, I for one commend the decision to erect the statue, if only for the simple reason that it’s the actualization of the question “why not?”. Sure, it has little or no relevance to Fulham F.C. nor to its local community, but I find myself lauding the bronze homage (or whatever it’s made of) for its recalcitrant absurdity; it functions as a glittery middle finger to the existing order of things, which seems to me to be in dire need of such fist-waving. With every eye-roll, head-shake, or silent feeling of delight that the statue prompts, a little piece is chiseled away from the monolith that is our homogenized, globalized culture.
Admittedly, I can imagine critics responding with that charge that Michael Jackson quite comprehensively symbolizes the very culture of consumerism and conformity that I’m suggesting should be railed against, but in this case the symbolism lies in the context: a mega-star, for all intents and purposes irrelevant to the local population, ironically promenading in perpetuity (relatively speaking) in front of an institution of football, a place of provincial ritual—a place of ostensible seriousness. In this context, the beauty is the absurdity.
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Wait, there’s MERCHANDISE?!
Paedophilia is not prohibited in Muslim countries.
In what world does Michael Jackson represent conformity?