* Joe Vogel's book-length essay ''Earth Song: Inside MichaelJackson's Magnum Opus'' argues that (to quote its back cover) the 1995 number "defied the cynicism and apathy of Generation X...it demanded accountability in an era of corporate greed, globalization and environmental indifference". He argues that this was a major reason why the song and video didn't catch on in the U.S.; the video got airplay, but Sony didn't release it as a radio single. The "challenging" message is that...pollution, environmental destruction, the killing of wild animals (''especially'' endangered ones), and war are bad things. Those "cynical" Generation Xers, and most everyone else in the U.S., knew that already by TheNineties, a decade rife with green Aesops. Worse, from Jackson's point of view these problems exist because people are in it ForTheEvulz and {{Greed}} and could just ''stop'' at any time; no realistic solutions to the problems are given in the song or video, so there's not even anything to act on!

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* MichaelJackson gets some of this from the VocalMinority of his fanbase:
** Joe Vogel's book-length essay ''Earth Song: Inside MichaelJackson's Magnum Opus'' argues that (to quote its back cover) the 1995 number "defied the cynicism and apathy of Generation X...it demanded accountability in an era of corporate greed, globalization and environmental indifference", which was a major reason why the song and video didn't catch on in the U.S. But the "challenging" message is that...pollution, environmental destruction, the killing of wild animals (''especially'' endangered ones), and war are bad things. Those "cynical" Generation Xers, and most everyone else in the U.S., knew that already by TheNineties, a decade ''rife'' with [[GreenAesop green Aesops]]. 
** "Black or White" also [[http://www.allforloveblog.com/?p=7890 gets praised]] for saying that racism, war, and the Ku Klux Klan are bad -- in 1991.  Even if the infamous crotch-grabbing "panther dance" coda is interpreted as Jackson showing solidarity with groups like the Black Panthers, he was rather late to the party on that one.

9th Apr '13 4:00:43 PM Paradisesnake

Send Paradisesnake a PM notification explaining the badness of natter: natter-fy

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