Dear Oprah,
Horatio
Nelson once said, “Desperate affairs require desperate measures.” Judging
by the recurring headlines detailing OWN Network’s dismal performance after a
year and a half on the air, you must be looking for those “desperate measures”.
We
can’t help but notice the irony of the current situation: the man you spent the
better part of the last decade, bashing and stopping short of labeling a child
molester, is the very man’s name and progeny, you are now using to salvage your
sinking network. No doubt, at the top of OWN TV’s Rescue List would be a repeat
of HIStory?
Remember
in 1993, your Oprah show experienced record ratings, over 100 millions viewers
tuned in, to watch you interview the world's biggest superstar, the King of
Pop, Michael Jackson. While you were a somewhat hot commodity in the United
States then, Michael Jackson introduced you to an international audience.
When a few years later, Mr.
Jackson had sex abuse allegations leveled against him, we all watched in dismay
you turned on him, appointed yourself judge and jury, deciding even before
evidence was presented in court, that he MUST be guilty of the charges. After
a jury of his peers rejected those accusations and returned a NOT GUILTY verdict
on ALL counts, you continued to openly question his innocence with snide
remarks, and demonized him to your audience and guests. You have made it very
clear, whether by airing “Is Michael Jackson Guilty?” show during
jury deliberations or molestation shows before or after interviewing members of
Mr. Jackson’s family, that Lady O’s opinion is more important than those 12
jurors who sat through the grueling trial.
Randy Jackson, younger
brother of Mr. Jackson confirmed in a 2010 interview, that Mr. Jackson was well
aware of your smear campaign and your dubious attitude towards him. Though he
never made his feelings about you public, his brother reiterated, “She [Oprah] is
the last person on earth he [Michael Jackson] would want around his
children." Having
crowned yourself a “child defender”, we find it distasteful, disgraceful and
hypocritical, that you are now using grieving children, whose father you tried
to sway a jury to send behind
bars, when it suits you. Few in the media have called out your shameful
exploitation and hypocrisy, but we applaud the few who did.