The Discovery Channel, who is known for bringing interesting, scientific information to the forefront of entertainment media, has reached an all time low.

The channel that brought us “Shark Week” was trying to reel us in to gawk at the loss of human life. The United Kingdom’s Discovery Channel shot, edited and produced a reenactment of Michael Jackson’s autopsy, calling it, “Michael Jackson’s Autopsy: What Really Killed Michael Jackson.”

The advertisement for this special showed a frail, lifeless form underneath a white sheet on a steel table, with the iconic white gloved hand sticking out of. This tasteless, cheesy preview gave Jackson’s family, friends and fans enough to be upset about.

Thankfully, Jackson’s family arranged legal proceedings to follow if Discovery Channel aired the special, who is confirmed it will not be airing it at all.

In a public statement, Discovery Channel representatives told New York Magazine that out of respect for Jackson’s primary care physician, Dr. Conrad Murray’s upcoming trial, the special has been “postponed indefinitely.”

Without a doubt, the price of fame is having every move watched, every decision criticized, and the complete forfeit of privacy. Even after a celebrity dies, do they really “die” to the media?

In cases of extreme fame, such as Michael Jackson, Marilyn Monroe or John Lennon, I would say no. These dead celebrities still generate more money in revenue every year than a lot of living famous people. In 2009, Michael Jackson was the highest selling artist of the year. In 2006, Forbes Magazine reported that John Lennon made over $20 million.

Often, drug overdoses and suicides of every day people are not reported, yet somehow an exception is made for celebrities. Anna Nicole Smith, Michael Jackson, Alexander McQueen and the recent suicide of Prince Ali Reza Pahlavi, son of the former shah of Iran are just a few examples of such incidences within the last decade.

What doesn’t make sense is that although these people seem more important than everyone else, they aren’t – they’re just people, and like all others, should be treated with a sense of reverence after they have died.

When human life is degraded by reporting, re-reporting and exploiting the lives of dead celebrities, the general public becomes more callous, and the threshold for the level of absurdity ready to be seen rises. With all of the Michael Jackson reports, footage and documentaries made over the last two years, Discovery Channel was only following suit with what they perceived the people wanted.

I wouldn’t really hold it against most network television programming, but because Discovery Channel is known for being an informative, educational channel, I more or less envisioned this to be the work of E!.

Is it really fair to exploit human life this way, even if these people exploited themselves when they were alive? I don’t think so. No matter who we’re talking about here, making money off of a person’s misery and death violates the basic principles of human rights and dignity.