Yes, it's true that there weren't any evidences of impersonators in the pre-bad era. And honestly i don't know why. Just an assumption, maybe there weren't people who looked more or less like MJ to fool people. But it doesn't mean that MJ didn't try to fool people; he used a mannequin in the Jacksons video "Torture". If MJ was keen to use an impersonator, he sure would have found a way.
I also feel that during thriller and thriller/bad (which i call thrad era), it was quite hard to impersonate him. But by the time it was Bad era, impersonators started to make their presence felt. MJ probably started using impersonators to avoid something he was reluctant (or too busy) to do. I think E-casanova was the most famous impersonator at that time (I'm not sure, but he does look like bad era MJ). But you can easily distinguish between MJ and E-cas(any impersonator, for that matter) because of the teeth pattern. (which is the reason why MJ wouldn't use an impersonator in his official videos,"Who Is It" being an exception). The 'surgical mask' is a way of covering the mouth so that any fan won't be able to figure out whether it is the real MJ, and in that way he can escape the crowd. MJ did use surgical mask in bad era :
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So we will never really know if that
was MJ. In "Who Is It", that impersonator never opened his mouth, and was also put under special 'lighting' (with shadows and all to give a
MJ like effect) and parts where the singing took place, it was the real MJ.
BUT the O2 episode may prove my explanation wrong (MJ look-a-like making public announcement without any surgical masks) which makes me wonder if the picture we saw of MJ with curly hair behind red curtains was a photoshop, to give out the impression of a double on stage? TBH I never was able to decide who the guy on that stage was. I think I tend to believe it was MJ not looking like MJ (for whatever reason).
I thought this discussion might be off-topic, and that's what I meant by "another" discussion, but if it's not then I'm more than ready to continue.