Michael Jackson forgave his father Joseph just before he passed away in 2009.
Infamously, Joseph was physically and emotionally abusive to his children.
J. Randy Taraborrelli, author of the 1991 biography Michael Jackson—The Magic, the Madness, the Whole Story, told PEOPLE why Michael forgave his father.
“It’s really easy to paint Joseph Jackson as a villain because he gives you so much to work with. [But] as flawed as he was as a father, and Michael felt very strongly that he did many of the wrong things, [it was] for all the right reasons,” Taraborrelli said. “As he got older, Joseph was a very, very different person. Michael told me, ‘I totally, totally forgive him.’”
Taraborrelli believes Michael forgave his father when he became a dad to sons Prince and Bigi and daughter Paris.
“[Forgiveness] was not easy to come to. But once Michael had children of his own, that’s when he really began to understand Joseph,” Taraborrelli explained. “It was when he had his own kids, and he realized that there was nothing that he wouldn’t do for his kids. There were no obstacles that he would not overcome if it meant protecting his children. And once he realized that about himself, that’s when he really came to understand his father.”
Taraborrelli also acknowledged that Joseph was the biggest fan of Michael and the rest of the Jackson clan. He launched the Jackson 5 to keep his boys away from negative influences.
“Joe loved all of his children, and he loved the Jackson 5,” he says. “A big part of the reason for the Jackson 5 was to keep them off the streets. And it just so happened that they were good.”
In the 2003 documentary Living with Michael Jackson, Michael said that he “totally” forgave Joseph for everything. But the physical abuse he suffered influenced the parent he would be.
“To this day, I won’t lay a finger on my children. I don’t want them to ever feel that way about me,” Michael said. “He didn’t allow us to call him Daddy, and I wanted to call him Daddy so bad. He said, ‘I’m not Daddy, I’m Joseph to you.’”