{"id":73,"date":"2009-07-06T22:56:23","date_gmt":"2009-07-06T22:56:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/everydayethics\/2009\/07\/my-gut-is-treating-michael-jackson-unethically.html"},"modified":"2009-07-06T22:56:23","modified_gmt":"2009-07-06T22:56:23","slug":"my-gut-is-treating-michael-jackson-unethically","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/2009\/07\/my-gut-is-treating-michael-jackson-unethically.html","title":{"rendered":"My Gut is Treating Michael Jackson Unethically"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

I scared myself a bit today – while I’ve always prided
\nmyself for being independent enough to see past the ol’ Republican\/Democrat
\ndivide, I’ve never actually
\nexperienced a time in which my gut (as opposed to my head) agreed with an
\noutspoken Republican.<\/p>\n

I’m referring to New York Representative Peter King, who finds it
\nrepugnant that so much media and fan attention is being paid to Michael
\nJackson’s death. King went so far to release a YouTube video calling Jackson a
\npedophile and pervert, <\/a>asking why the media was concentrating on Jackson rather
\nthan the men and women serving in the military. <\/p>\n

Intellectually, I strongly disagree with his statement.
\nJackson was acquitted once and settled in another instance. Legally<\/span> he was innocent (Update<\/b>: a commenter below corrected me that legally, he was simply “not guilty”. I concede this point, though I stick by the intended message), something King would do well
\nto remember. <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

My gut, however, is uncomfortable to say the least. I’m uncomfortable with the circus<\/a> of celebrity worship surrounding Jackson’s funeral and memorial, and worse,\u00a0I’m uncomfortable with my discomfort! I\u00a0believe<\/i>\u00a0in that whole “innocent until proven guilty” thing. Yet I’m conflicted.<\/p>\n

Possible pedophilia aside (though that’s generally a pretty tough thing to put aside), my gut agrees that it is just plain disturbing to see the level of celebrity worship our society has reached. And it breaks my heart because there are so many men and women working to improve horrific conditions around the world who garner no recognition – not that they do it for the fame.<\/p>\n

These two sets of emotions make it hard to distinguish if my gut is thinking ethically when I hear it cheer on King’s statement. (Sidenote: Hillary’s recent post, “Morality: Does It Come from the Heart or the Head?”<\/a> tackles this very situation.)<\/p>\n

In case you couldn’t tell, it seriously disturbs me to discover this part of me that’s in agreement with King, especially because my gut also knows it’s wrong to slander the dead.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, if I’m acting as my own judge and jury here, I think I have to accuse my gut of being quite unethical.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I scared myself a bit today – while I’ve always prided myself for being independent enough to see past the ol’ Republican\/Democrat divide, I’ve never actually experienced a time in which my gut (as opposed to my head) agreed with an outspoken Republican. I’m referring to New York Representative Peter King, who finds it repugnant…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":198,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,22,6,12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-by-padmini-mangunta","category-celebrity-behavior","category-current-events","category-moral-ethics"],"yoast_head":"\nMy Gut is Treating Michael Jackson Unethically - Everyday Ethics<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/2009\/07\/my-gut-is-treating-michael-jackson-unethically.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"My Gut is Treating Michael Jackson Unethically - Everyday Ethics\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I scared myself a bit today – while I’ve always prided myself for being independent enough to see past the ol’ Republican\/Democrat divide, I’ve never actually experienced a time in which my gut (as opposed to my head) agreed with an outspoken Republican. I’m referring to New York Representative Peter King, who finds it repugnant…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/2009\/07\/my-gut-is-treating-michael-jackson-unethically.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Everyday Ethics\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-07-06T22:56:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Padmini Mangunta\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"My Gut is Treating Michael Jackson Unethically - Everyday Ethics","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/2009\/07\/my-gut-is-treating-michael-jackson-unethically.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"My Gut is Treating Michael Jackson Unethically - Everyday Ethics","og_description":"I scared myself a bit today – while I’ve always prided myself for being independent enough to see past the ol’ Republican\/Democrat divide, I’ve never actually experienced a time in which my gut (as opposed to my head) agreed with an outspoken Republican. 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In addition to writing for a various print and online publications, such as Parenting Magazine and iVillage, she was the Website Manager for the Henry Street Settlement, a social services and arts organization serving Manhattan's Lower East Side. Most recently, she worked on the Thai-Myanmar border as a writer for the Burma Human Rights Yearbook. Her curiosity about human nature, coupled with duel streaks of idealism and Midwestern pragmatism, developed into an ongoing discussion with friends, family and strangers on ethical quandaries. When she's not asking \"Why?\" you might have trouble finding her, as her hobbies include nosing around used bookstores, exploring the world (near and far), meeting new people and occasionally twiddling her thumbs while daydreaming.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/author\/pmangunta"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/198"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/everydayethics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}