Content warning: This story includes mention of self-harm.
According to Michael Jackson’s daughter Paris, the best way to celebrate the late singer’s birthday is to do nothing special at all.
“Back when he was alive he used to hate anybody acknowledging his birthday — wishing him happy birthday, celebrating it — nothing like that,” the 25-year-old singer said in an Instagram video Wednesday. “He actually didn’t want us [children] to even know when it was, because he didn’t want us to throw a party or anything like that.”
On what would have been her father’s 65th birthday, Jackson then lamented that “social media is apparently how people express their love and affection these days.”
She continued: “If you don’t wish somebody happy birthday via social media, it apparently means you don’t love them, you don’t care about them.”
In her video, Jackson slammed her father’s fans who allegedly shamed her for not commemorating his birthday on social media. “People lose their f— minds,” she said.
Paris claimed super fans harassed her on social media and “told me to kill myself.” In the years following her father’s unexpected death in 2009, Paris was hospitalized for suicide attempts and has been vocal about recovering and dealing with her mental health.
Suicide prevention and crisis counseling resources
If you or someone you know is struggling with suicidal thoughts, seek help from a professional and call 9-8-8. The United States’ first nationwide three-digit mental health crisis hotline 988 will connect callers with trained mental health counselors. Text “HOME” to 741741 in the U.S. and Canada to reach the Crisis Text Line.
“They’re basically measuring my love for my own father based off what I post on Instagram,” she said in her video. Paris echoed her sentiments in the caption, which read: “please don’t use a man you have never met as an excuse to abuse, manipulate, and harass his daughter (who you also have never met).”
Michael Jackson was born Aug. 29, 1958. The singer and his family were raised as Jehovah’s Witnesses, who do not traditionally celebrate birthdays. According to the Jehovah’s Witness website, members “believe that such celebrations displease God.”
The King of Pop “disassociated” himself from the religion in 1987.
To quiet critics on Wednesday, Paris shared a video of herself acknowledging her father’s birthday during a concert in Colorado.
“He put 50 years of blood, sweat, tears, love and passion into doing what he did so that I could stand up here on stage in front of you and scream into a microphone,” she told a crow of concertgoers in the second video. “I owe everything to him.”
Paris and brother Prince Jackson, 26, are the children of Michael Jackson and ex-wife Debbie Rowe. Jackson also fathered 21-year-old Bigi Jackson.
The “Hit Your Knees” singer, who recently performed with Incubus and Badflower, ended her Instagram video telling her father’s fans how they could indirectly celebrate the iconic, yet often embattled singer’s birthday. She encouraged followers to raise awareness for climate change, take action for animal rights activism and more.
“These were the things he loved,” Paris said. “I’m sure he would have loved that.”
This story originally appeared on LA Times
