I, like the rest of the world, was saddened and shocked last week when we lost one of our greatest celebrities. He was a fixture in our households, and many of us have his voice committed to our memory. I’m talking, of course, about Ed McMahon. He was ... OK fine, that wasn’t really the celebrity I was thinking about. It was, instead, Farrah Fawcett. Her crazy lovely hair and name alliteration will be engrained in our nation’s mind long after ... fine, I wasn’t really thinking about her either. Billy Mays was a marvelous pitchman for ... wait, it’s not him either. The King of Pop, Michael Jackson, died this week, and I’m simply thrilled pissless that half of the world and most of the morons are up in arms about the whole incident.

I’m trying not to be disrespectful to the dead, but geez Louise, he’s getting more press coverage than some of the really important things, such as healthcare, the financial crisis and the Cardinals getting Mark DeRosa. Each of those things is vastly more interesting to me than Michael Jackson. I watched people on TV crying at vigils as if they’ve just been handed a bulletin reading “God is dead.” I’ve seen press releases from everyone who’s even sort of a celebrity, talking of this great loss of this great talent. I’ve seen news programs breaking into coverage to talk about any miniscule development. It’s fine, I suppose. It doesn’t make me like or dislike Michael Jackson any more or any less than I already did. It does make me question the mental stability of our nation a bit more than usual.

I don’t want to seem like a complete dick. I can appreciate Michael Jackson on some levels. I think “I Want You Back” by the Jackson Five is a truly freaking great song. I think Thriller is an almost perfect album, even though it’s not especially my cup of tea. I seem to remember crying once when I heard “Man in the Mirror” on the radio when I was driving. I was very hungover and hyper emotional, but the beauty of the song still struck me. Hell, I’ve even tried to do a drunken moonwalk a few times while I was dancing at weddings. All of that stuff was great. All of that stuff is also not nearly enough for me to have a breakdown now that he’s gone.

I guess I sort of understand it. He was famous — biggest-star-in-the-world famous — but that still doesn’t necessarily mean he was a fine sort of fella. We know he liked children, which is usually an endearing quality, but not so much in this case. In fairness, he was never convicted of molesting children, even though I’m sure we all have some sort of idea about his guilt. Either way, if you’re an adult and you have a hankering to play with children who are not related to you and have them come into your bedroom, that is really not the kind of person you should probably be. At the very least, he’s guilty of being a really creepy person. If he didn’t have the money he had for lawyers and payoffs, I have a fairly strong feeling he would be guilty of far much more.

He also appeared to have a bit of a problem with the way he looked. It would be bad enough if he just wore those little outfits to make him seem like a freak show, but he really went the extra mile and had exponential surgery to really solidify that freak show status. I’m sure he had his own set of personal problems that were a cause of all this, and that’s really too bad. In most cases, this might be enough for him to draw our sympathy. In his situation, it was enough to draw our adoration. Weird.

Apparently we’ve all got to that place in our society where if you simply entertain us, we will overlook all of the other things, no matter what they happen to be. We are so freaking bored and talent hungry that any person who amuses us even a little gets a free pass that a less entertaining person would never qualify for.

I know it’s a rat bastard move to criticize someone who has just died, but I’m really tired of the media and the entertainment industry shitting in my mouth and telling me it’s pumpkin pie. He was what he was, and he was a guy who most sane people wouldn’t let come over for Sunday dinner — which was awkward to begin with because who knows whether you have to have a separate place setting for his chimp? I just don’t get the feeling he was what I would call “a good guy.”

Everyone keeps saying he will be missed. I’m sure his family and his real friends will miss him; that’s only natural. I’m sure his kid whom he hung out a window that time is probably sleeping a little better this week, but he will even probably miss him. I’m just not sure why anyone else would miss him quite this much. He was a great entertainer. He was an even greater celebrity. He did those things we love our celebrities to do, such as have trials and hit rock bottom and make us seem normal. He made some fine albums. His music undoubtedly made the world a better place. I’m just not convinced that the man himself ever did.