Plurality of adults don’t believe they should boycott ‘King of Pop’ over allegations
- 55% of adults said they had an unfavorable opinion of Michael Jackson after the “Leaving Neverland” documentary.
- 61% of avid music fans have not stopped listening to Jackson’s music in the wake of allegations, and 54% don’t think they should.
In recent weeks, the music industry has been dealing with a series of public allegations of sexual abuse and misconduct — some including minors — against artists such as R. Kelly, Ryan Adams and the late Michael Jackson. New polling finds that the public is more likely to feel it should not stop listening to the respective artist’s music rather than boycott it in the wake of these allegations.
The Morning Consult/The Hollywood Reporter survey of 1,952 U.S. adults split the sample so that one group was shown pictures of several artists who have faced allegations of some form of sexual misconduct, and one group was shown only the artists’ names. When given just the artist’s name, 46 percent of respondents had a favorable opinion of Michael Jackson, compared to 43 percent who found him unfavorable, while 13 percent had a favorable opinion of Kelly and 63 percent had an unfavorable opinion. Eleven percent had a favorable opinion of Ryan Adams, while 76 did not know or had no opinion of the Grammy-nominated artist.