Vendetta wrote:I thought this was common knowledge? I certainly heard a long time ago that it was this condition which caused Jackson to progressively bleach his skin to hide the effect.
No,
he did not bleach his skin.
Vitiligo bleached his skin. That's what it
does, it destroys the melanocytes in the skin. Actual skin bleaching, which is rare these days, does not leave patchiness of the sort seen in the photos. (I also presume MJ would have gone to a doctor for any cosmetic procedures - he had way too many of them, but at least stuck with MD's rather than DIY) I've had my doubts in the past, but the pictures are pretty convincing to me. He didn't chemically bleach his skin. If he had, the skin tone would have been more consistent and even.
As for why he went for lighter makeup rather than that matching his natural skin tone like Lee Thomas: racism. Really, I absolutely believe that was a factor in his choice. The music business is as full of racist bullshit as any other part of society. For
years MJ was the
only black performer on MTV (hard to believe these days, but it's true), and that was only because Sony threatened to pull
all of their artist videos if MTV didn't show Jackson's. Jackson grew up in the 1960's during all sorts of racial upheavals, he grew up in the Gary/Chicago area which even now still have more than its fair share of bigots, and he may have been a freak but he wasn't stupid. Did a lighter skin tone work to his advantage professionally? Almost certainly. Even in Motown - a music genre entirely dominated by black performers and largely controlled by them - the biggest stars tended to have the lighter skin, and many performers there also used makeup to lighten their skin color (though not to the extent Jackson did). Nor was that practice restricted to musicians - actors in movies and TV did the same damn thing. It's obvious with, say, Nichelle Nichols when comparing her in costume as Lt. Uhura for TOS vs. her appearing entirely without makeup, or in some of the later Star Trek movies. This is one of those ugly historical facts people like to ignore. Even if MJ had never had vitiligo he might have used makeup to lighten his skin tone (though probably not as much). Combine that with the sweat generated in his dance routines and its tendency to make the makeup run, a lighter makeup that ran during a performance was also going to be less noticeable than a darker color that ran and revealed totally white skin. Vitiligo might have pushed it to an extreme, but it wasn't the sole reason MJ wore so much makeup. It was, at least in part, driven by business concerns.
As to why his vitiligo was so extensive.... sometimes it just happens that way. Vitiligo is also, however, associated with autoimmune disorders. Jackson at one point reported he suffered from lupus. Now, not everyone with lupus has vitiligo (the performer Seal has lupus - that's what caused the extensive scarring on his face - but his skin color in intact) but lupus is a severe autoimmune disorder and anyone with vitiglio and lupus would be expected to have pretty severe vitiligo. I don't know if MJ actually had lupus or not, but it is possible.
I wish MJ had used his celebrity to bring some attention, sympathy, and understanding about vitiligo to the general public. Especially, given his star status globally, this might have done a lot of good in some other countries where those with vitiligo are treated as lepers - social ostracism, unemployment, family rejection, etc. However, he was not required to parade his disorder(s) in public. Indeed, many people wish his disorders had been
less on display. We are talking about someone with severe body image issues and, frankly, vitiligo isn't pretty to look at. I don't blame him for wanting to cover it up, most people with the disorder do so, even those who are light-skinned Caucasians to begin with much less dark skinned and of African descent.
Broomstick wrote:MJ admitted to nose surgery at one point, saying that as a young man he'd sustained a broken nose (pretty sure that's even true) and opted for surgical repair. It is possible that something went wrong with the initial nose surgery, leading to subsequent problems and more surgery
I think there's more to it than that. He had a lot more work done than his nose.
Oh, yes, I agree - I just saying it's a possibility for how the ball got rolling. Once you have one thing done it becomes much easier to keep snipping and trimming.
His jawline, for instance, changes significantly between the two pictures in the OP.
Hey, for awhile there his jawline changed on at least a yearly basis.
