Paris Jackson Explains Why She no Longer Feels Obligated to Discuss Dad Michael Jackson
- Kris Avalon
- 1 hour ago
- 3 min read
Paris Jackson is opening up about the state of her relationship with her late father Michael Jackson.
via: EW
The 28-year-old opened up about why she's taken a firm stance against sharing details about her relationship with the King of Pop — who died in 2009 — during Tuesday's episode of Jack Osbourne's Trying Not To Die podcast. When asked by Osbourne whether she struggles with figuring out how public she wants her life to be, Paris said that she used to feel like she "owed it to people" to "share everything," because she was given the impression that the life she led was thanks to fans of her famous family.
"That has drastically changed in the last few years, because I don't really feel like any of us owe anyone anything," Paris, the eldest of Jackson's three children, told Osbourne. "And the way I express myself now, I don't want it to feel performative."
Paris briefly recalled making headlines in the past for responding to criticism after she didn't publicly acknowledge her father's birthday, "death day," or Father's Day.
"This idea of, like, you need to go on social media... and you need to basically mimic how a fan would express their love. But for me, I had a personal relationship, not a parasocial relationship," Jackson said.
"I'm now learning I can have my own personal relationship, and I'm allowed to be private about it, and I'm now, like, my relationship [with my dad] is the most beautiful relationship ever," she added.
"I'm in a very beautiful spot with my dad, and I love that and it's no one's business and I don't have to share that with anybody," Jackson continued. "There's a lot of freedom in that, which is really cool. I'm not going to express my love in a copycat way, copying someone that didn't know him. Because I did. That was my best friend"
Jack, son of the late Ozzy Osbourne and Sharon Osbourne, said he understood Paris' sentiment, sharing that he's gone through a similar process since his father died at 76 in 2025.
"When my dad passed, I had this realization that out of all the people that he'd met, that knew him [or] that knew of him, whatever, the millions of people, there were only five people on the planet that had the relationship that I had with him," Osbourne said. "And it's me and my siblings. That is really unique and people can't understand that."
Osbourne reasoned that most people are unable to realize that the children of celebrities have normal relationships with their parents, quipping that he often gets asked, "'What was it like to have Ozzy as your dad?' I'm like, 'I don't know, it's just my dad. He, you know, took me to school, he taught me things, and did what dads do.'"
The pair shared that having the support of others in the "dead dad club" who also have famous parents relieves some of the pressure they feel.
"I'm relatively new in that club, [I have so much] gratitude for it," Osbourne said. "And not in, like, an elitist way, just, like, he was something to so many people, but he was my dad to me, and I'm so grateful for that."
Paris added, "And that's yours. And you don't owe that to anybody. You get to just have that and hold it and keep it and it's like, 'Okay, this is mine.'"
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