St. Michael Jackson of Topeka and Brooklyn

For the past few weeks, I've had a running joke with my mother about getting a Michael Jackson statue put up in front of Kansas's state capitol building in Topeka. My mother was briefly considering running for the state legislature, though she has now decided against it. One day when she was starved for something to write about on a political blog, I recommended that she write about what she as a state legislator would do about the death of Michael Jackson. She shot back that she would have a gold-plated statue of him erected in front of the statehouse.

All summer long, it seemed there was no escaping Michael Jackson. He was on the cover of endless magazines and took over what passes for programming on the TV Guide channel. But now it seems he may be about to take over a subway station in Brooklyn I remember well from my days as a straphanger.

The New York Times reported today that an offhand remark by one city official to a reporter "on a slow newsday" has spawned petitions to rename Hoyt-Schermerhorn Station in Brooklyn Michael Jackson Station and to put up some kind of plaque or memorial therein. Apparently, the now-deceased King of Pop filmed one of his music videos there, and some locals think that honoring Jackson in some way there might boost tourism to the area.

Now, I've been at this particular station countless times switching from the A/C to the G train. I know the surroundings well, and I honestly don't see how an ugly statue of Michael Jackson would do anything to improve either the station's looks or the prospect of tourists flocking into the immediate vicinity. The area around Hoyt-Schermerhorn is Fulton Street in Downtown Brooklyn--a decidedly run-down shopping area that seems to sell nothing except pirate DVDs and polyester hair extensions. Already the third-largest shopping district in metro New York (after Midtown and Lower Manhattan), Fulton Street is already heavily crowded and the Hoyt-Schermerhorn stop even more so, as it houses a vital link between the F and A/C lines. The last thing it needs are people coming to gawk at an ugly statue.

Why do I assume the statue would be ugly? Because I've seen other examples of what the MTA considers subway "art." While I was at Columbia, my subway stop was 116th Street, on the 1/9 line. Frequently, when I went downtown from there, I sat on a hideous monstrosity called the "subway rider's throne". This was, literally, a giant throne someone had put next to the downtown benches, with a plaque on the wall. I knew of nobody who respected the throne's pretentions of being "art".

Moreover, I'm not really keen on the idea of New York doing anything to honor an artist who did nothing to further the life of the city except to film a music video there. In my view, art should honor people who've made a substantial contribution to the life of the city, in some way. Michael Jackson doesn't remotely fall into this category. And of course, there were all those creepy incidents involving small children.

On the other hand, the article raises the possibility of some group or other donating large amounts of money to refurbish the station as well as place Jackson-themed art in the Hoyt-Schermerhorn station. Hoyt-Schermerhorn could definitely use the makeover--so much so that I'd even be happy to have Ty Pennington come in and supervise it (and there are certainly New Yorkers for whom this would constitute an "Extreme Makeover" of their home).

So what am I to do when two deeply held desires--not to see New York honor someone who was likely a child molester, and to see Hoyt-Schermerhorn turn into someplace halfway pleasant to be--collide?

What position would you take?