The world has been captivated by the Leaving Neverland documentary, which paints legendary singer Michael Jackson as a child abuser.
The controversial HBO documentary debuted on March 3, but information about it has been leaking to the public over the course of many weeks.
As a result, some radio stations around the world have decided to stop playing his hits.
Three stations in Canada have made the decision to pull songs like ‘Beat It’, ‘Wanna Be Starting Something’, ‘Thriller’ and ‘Billie Jean’ (just to name a few) from their repertoire.
Cogeco spokeswoman Christine Dicaire says the move was made based off of listener requests.
A similar decision has been made in New Zealand, with any station owned by MediaWorks and New Zealand Media Entertainment now banned from busting out tracks from the King of Pop.
MediaWorks Group content director Leon Wratt said: “We aren’t deciding whether Michael Jackson is guilty of paedophilia, we’re just making sure our radio stations are going to play the music people want to hear.”
He was interviewed by radio station Magic Talk, where he added: “You’ve got 500 songs on a playlist and you have to make the decisions which 500 are the ones people will want to listen to.”
One of the shocking claims made in Leaving Neverland was that Jackson married one of the boys who’s accused him of abuse.
James Safechuck says he was just 10 years old when he married the King of Pop – then 30 – in a ceremony in the singer’s bedroom and says he still has the jewellery to prove it.
Safechuck says: “I was really into jewellery at that time and he would reward me with jewellery for doing sexual acts to him.
“He would say that I need to sell him some so I could earn the gift.”
Now a father of two, computer programmer Safechuck says it wasn’t long into their relationship when Jackson decided to take things a step further.
He says: “So we were like this married couple. I say ‘married’ because we had this mock wedding ceremony.
“We did this in his bedroom and we filled out some vows, like we would be bonded forever. It felt good. And the ring is nice – it has a row of diamonds, the wedding ring.”
The pair had met a year earlier, on the set of a Pepsi commercial in 1987. Just a few months later however, Safechuck says he was being abused by the star – but says he still feels some guilt.
