Chapter 162 161. All-round siege, forced compromise

The School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California is the cradle of many time travelers.

As an art school and a school that has supplied a large number of talents to Hollywood, the students here have always been open-minded and are also very keen on paying attention to the entertainment industry.

Similarly, influenced by the celebrity effect, Facebook’s promotion effect here is also exceptionally good. The vast majority of students are Facebook users, and they are active users.

Just this morning, everyone received a system message.

This is not the post-era. In order to make profits, manufacturers will accept a large number of advertisements and send a large number of spam emails and messages.

Pornographic services, credit card processing, financial fraud, etc. pollute the users' eyes.

So when they see the icon light up, almost 100% of people will click it.

Then the story of Maikou naturally came into view, and finally a questionnaire with several options was given about whether public power was abused.

Students who can go to university, especially prestigious ones, generally have high qualities, so there is no doubt about what they choose.

Although the wording of this tweet is exquisite, it is actually not very long and cannot give people a full picture of the incident.

Many curious people naturally opened Google and Yahoo and started searching.

This situation is not only happening at the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California, but also at other major universities such as Princeton, Harvard, and Yale.

In addition to reading and understanding on their own, students also communicate with each other, and topics with substance and depth quickly become topics of conversation.

At this time, Eric's second wave of public opinion offensive also arrived.

The first round only reported news related to Maikou, but the content was still relatively vague.

The second round naturally involves releasing videos. When the rooster crows, the world becomes bright. With the video as evidence, the result is final.

Those who were originally wavering in the debate changed their positions instantly, and the Internet was soon filled with condemnations of Tom Schneider and the police, accompanied by criticisms of violent law enforcement and abuse of public power.

People not only criticized the Santa Barbara Police Department, but also gradually raised the issue to the Santa Barbara City Government.

People also began to expose various power abuse issues around them, and the topic spread in all directions, moving towards how to effectively supervise prosecutors.

While criticizing, the public's sympathy for Michael also spread on the Internet, with a large number of people expressing their concern for him and feeling sorry for the injustice he suffered.

Especially after college students joined, they became the main force of Internet surfing and had a strong sense of justice.

After learning the truth of the matter, they naturally joined in on this major event. A few hours later, this incident had already topped the topic list.

News about Iraq discovering weapons of mass destruction, Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez announcing their wedding date, and Bush Jr. announcing talks with Lisboa all received much less attention.

Forums and chat rooms are all discussing this matter.

As for those black fans of Mike, they have all fallen silent at this moment.

The few who are still clamoring that the police breaking the law and Michael Jackson molesting children are two different things, the former cannot prove that the latter does not exist.

Logically speaking, what they said was correct, but in reality they were immediately criticized, attacked online, and threatened.

Think about the case of Floyd being killed by kneeling on his neck, which triggered the Black Lives Matter movement. The police absolutely used violent law enforcement and committed manslaughter, and there is no way to excuse this.

But many people don’t know, or it is deliberately hidden and covered up, that is, Floyd is not actually a good person, he is a repeat offender.

He has been to prison six times and spent eight years in jail. He has done everything from taking drugs, transporting drugs, and committing armed robbery. He also broke into a house and robbed a pregnant woman.

He pointed a gun at a pregnant woman's belly and forced her to hand over her money. The fact that he could attack a pregnant woman shows that Floyd was a cruel and ruthless person and a social scum.

But just because such a scum of society died, people instantly worshipped him as a great hero and a spiritual idol.

As for his past criminal history, no one dares to mention it anymore. If you mention it, it means you are racist and you will be attacked online.

Please, he's dead, and you're still attacking him. Do you have any compassion? Don't you know what "death is greater than death" means? Don't you know what "debts are cancelled when one dies" means? But after Floyd's death, his brother, wife, and sister opened three accounts to raise funds from the public, completely treating his death as a consumer product.

More than 10 million US dollars were raised, but in the end there was no grand funeral and the use of the money was widely questioned.

A piece of trash can be turned into a hero and whitewashed, let alone a positive energy star like Michael Jordan who has a large number of fans.

It is very unwise to accuse him of pedophilia at this time. Simply put, he is out of his mind! This is the reality.

Since the latest media reports have not yet been released, not many people know how the incident has progressed.

So many people thought of Facebook, which is now the only social account of Mike, where he frequently updates his status.

Those who had accounts rushed to Maikou’s homepage and found that there was no update yet, so they left a message to greet him and asked him to post an update to let him know he was safe.

Those who were not fans clicked to follow him, which led to a rapid increase in the number of Mike's fans, which increased to more than 500,000 in just a few hours.

As for those who don’t have a Facebook account, naturally a group of people choose to register, which indirectly brings a group of new users to Facebook.

New York, Times Square, the most prosperous street in Manhattan, is known as the crossroads of the world.

The flow of people here is terrifying. The street, which is half the size of a football field, has tens of millions of people passing through it every day.

Including local New Yorkers, Americans from other places, and tourists from all over the world.

The surrounding high-rise buildings are covered with advertising screens. This place is not only a paradise for luxury goods, but also a favorite place for advertisers.

The weather is very good today, and the streets are still crowded, with people shopping and talking about something.

Suddenly, the electronic screens that were originally playing different advertisements almost all went black. The strange situation immediately attracted the attention of passers-by.

Then the big screens lit up again, but this time they were playing videos of the police raiding Neverland Ranch.

Some people originally thought it was a movie trailer, but the real video told them that this was real life.

"OMG! What are these people doing? They are going to destroy Michael's house, oh my god!"

A middle-aged woman in her forties exclaimed that as a Mai fan, her age meant that she was not a keen surfer of the Internet and had not known about this, but now she and her friends all knew about it.

"It's horrible that the prosecutor called Michael Jackson a nigger, he was a racist!"

A man in a black suit shouted angrily.

"Don't you know yet? Go check the Internet. It's all about this. The TV stations will definitely follow up soon."

If Facebook mainly fueled the trend among college students, then the advertisements of these landmark buildings aroused social attention.

The target group has also expanded from young people to the working class, among whom there are more and more loyal fans of Maikou.

The same situation is happening not only in New York, but also in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston, Detroit, Salt Lake City and other places.

Eric invested a huge amount of money this time, and the cost of this event was no less than the public relations cost for an Oscar-winning best picture.

But money is not important, the effect is very important. It is important to let people know that I am not easy to mess with, and my friends are not easy to mess with either.

When it is noon, almost every TV station has the tradition of broadcasting the midday news.

At Fox TV, the female host had just finished broadcasting a somewhat funny news, and suddenly her expression became serious.

"Now let me break in some news for you. Just yesterday, Santa Barbara City Attorney Tom Schneider led dozens of police officers to search Neverland Ranch on the pretext of a child molestation case."

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"The law enforcement process was violent and discriminatory, caused serious damage to Michael Jackson's private property, and used discriminatory epithets against him."

"Michael Jackson was taken to the police station for questioning around 6pm yesterday, but the police again used violence during the enforcement process, causing injuries to Jackson's arms."

"Please watch the video of the shooting below."

The video edited the most violent clips and also included an interview with Tom Schneider, where his confident look at the beginning contrasted sharply with his pale expression at the end.

Especially the part where he said he swore on his badge was extremely embarrassing and disgusting.

After the video was played, the female host stared at the camera with a serious face: "I believe the video has proved everything, so we can't help but ask, did Prosecutor Tom Schneider break the law? Did the Santa Barbara Police Department break the law?"

"Fox News will continue to pay attention to the unfair treatment Michael Jackson suffered, whether it was because of the unproven child molestation case or because of the color of his skin."

NBC News Channel: "There is no doubt that this was a premeditated violent law enforcement action and the abuse of power is irrefutable. We have not yet received any information on the response of the Santa Barbara City Government."

CBS TV: "For a long time, prosecutors have had a transcendent position in the judicial system. This incident is clearly a model of prosecutorial power being abused due to the difficulty of supervision. This incident should serve as a wake-up call to the entire judicial system!"

ABC News Channel: "Even a public figure like Michael Jackson encountered violent law enforcement. One can imagine the difficulties ordinary people will face in protecting their rights. We must find effective ways to prevent similar incidents from happening again."

The TV news broadcast further amplified the incident, but that was not the end.

In the afternoon, the newspapers' media offensives took over, with all the major evening papers making a collective effort.

Moreover, unlike TV stations which maintained basic restraint during live broadcasts, many newspapers started to criticize directly, and their stance was very obvious.

In order to attract attention and highlight the features, different angles are chosen.

One used Tom Schneider's pale face being held up by someone as the cover, and another used Michael's arm scars showing as the cover.

The most amazing one is the Independent, which directly used two Playboy magazines as its cover. If you didn’t know, you would think it was a promotion for the magazine at first glance.

The Independent: "Instead of finding any evidence of child molestation, two rare Playboy copies were found in Michael Jackson's bedroom."

"So does this prove that Jackson is a person with normal sexual orientation? He also likes blonde hair, blue eyes and big waves, just like any normal adult man."

At night, inside the Dream Manor, Eric couldn't help laughing while reading the newspaper.

"Michael, why do you have this issue of Playboy with Madonna?"

Maikou covered his face in embarrassment: "I just saw it by chance, and then bought it. It's been several years and I forgot about it myself."

"Is it true? Then why are you still hiding in the bedroom?" Eric asked teasingly.

"If it's not in the bedroom, you can't put it in the collection room. Little Elizabeth has been in there to visit. It's not suitable for children."

"Well, what you said seems to make sense, but I always feel like something is wrong."

Lawyer Meserio walked in and said, "Good news, Mike. The current situation is very favorable to us. Public opinion is overwhelmingly in our favor."

"I just received news that several California legislators have criticized Tom Schneider and asked the Santa Barbara city government to respond quickly."

"We are in an absolute advantage this time. Both the pro-Republican and pro-Democratic media are on our side."

"And they can't produce any evidence to refute it. The situation is irreversible and public opinion is overwhelming. The Santa Barbara city government will soon be unable to withstand it."

"I think there will be preliminary results in three days at most, or tomorrow. Many people have already gone to the city hall gate to hold up signs to protest."

As he spoke, he opened his notebook and saw a picture that showed that the Santa Barbara City Hall was still brightly lit late at night, and there were still dozens of people protesting and had not left.

Eric sneered: "These officials are probably discussing how to deal with Tom Schneider. Let's just wait and see."

"Should I do something too? Many media have sent interview invitations," asked Mike.

"Accept it. Let's take the big stage. You can embellish your story and bring it up with some details. You can also bring it up with the case itself. This is a great opportunity for everyone to get to know you better and win a lot of favor and sympathy."

"But don't accept the Oprah talk show. Even though that woman is black, she is not a good person. She is a discriminator who lies all the time."

Michael nodded: "Eric, you should also ask your people to stop. Now that so many media have come out, you'd better stop quickly, hide yourself, and protect yourself."

Eric looked at him and said, "Don't worry, Mike. Everyone knows the relationship between us. Some things can't be hidden, and there's no need to hide them."

"If someone is interested, I won't be able to hide it, but at least no one dares to do it now. They have to wait until the wave passes."

"And don't forget that your trial is at the end of the month, so keep making a fuss for a few more days. I want to keep the heat going until the trial."

"Just think of this as our forewarning battle against Sony. That guy is our ultimate target, and he's even harder to deal with!"

(End of this chapter)