April 28, 2023, politician, journalist and broadcaster Jerry Springer died after a battle with pancreatic cancer, he was 79 years old. “Jerry, Jerry, Jerry.” Everyone has said or heard it at least once, it’s just what you scream when you witness some kind of confrontation - even a hit HBO show. Euphoria made a link. We all know what it means and we all know where it came from, the peak of tabloid thrash TV that ran from 1991 to 2018, over 5,000 episodes: Jerry Springer.
He moved from WWE The Simpsons, Austin Powers, his work was adapted into British opera (no, seriously), during the era of talk shows, he was one of the few that survived until the late 1990s and beyond. He was Oprah Winfrey controversy, he could even beat Oprah in the ratings at her peak, he saw no end to the protests of parents, religious figures and the Chicago City Council, and yet his show continued in all its dubious glory.
The Genesis of Jerry Springer
This fame is dubious, don’t get me wrong. Springer was considered by many to be in bad taste; his methods, and especially those of the producers, were considered exploitative and only added to the unreality of the reality show as they actively incited their guests to be physically violent. His show answered the question “how low can you go?” and then some. People came, flaunted their dirtiest underwear, infidelity, weird fetishes, family drama, got into fights, and literally got their fifteen minutes of fame. Springer didn’t seem to be ashamed of this, proudly declaring his show the worst of all time at the start of every episode.
However, this was not always the case. In the first three years of its existence Jerry Springer was a daytime talk show that was relatively formulaic, especially for the time, just another Phil Donahue lookalike. One could even call it boring, and the network certainly did just that, threatening to shut down Springer if things didn’t change. With an introduction Richard Dominik as an executive producer, the changes were absolutely made. They became more obscene, asking questions about sex, talking about sex addiction and infidelity, and by the late 1990s it was, unequivocally, the modern response to freak shows, including exploitation. A spectacle of violence and human humiliation, as described in the documentary series. Dark side of the 90sWhile many talk show hosts in the 1990s, including Winfrey, dabbled in debauchery before giving it up, Springer embraced it with open arms. First with freak show-style voyeurism, which then turned into a series of brawls that the public was free to taunt and interrupt.
On the one hand, the audience was absolutely there, lowest common denominator or not, it had ratings. On the other hand, this Jerry Springer, and even the earliest episodes do not fit modern notions of human compassion at all. But the genesis Jerry Springer was not only a response to the surrounding culture of the 90s, when the beginnings of tabloid television really began to take shape through events such as the capture and trial of OJ Simpson in 1994, but, dare I say, was inevitable, with or without a host. Springer was just the first to really tap into that nasty little instinct that so many of us try to suppress, and that success ushered in the era of television: we love watching people we consider inferior to ourselves make complete fools of ourselves.
The pervasive formula of tabloid television
Yes, we are. You, the person reading this article, me, the person writing it, everyone. Many of us reject this feeling, of course it’s morally abhorrent to make fun of the less fortunate, but we also all look down on someone. Parking lot fights, rich people on TV screaming and crying over nothing, people you know in your life, even yourself from the past. Trash TV exploits this tendency, while in the safety of our living rooms or in a live studio, we can point to someone and say, “Look at that idiot.” Blissfully unaware of the fact that if some things in our own lives went differently, we could easily be in their place. With that in mind, it’s no wonder what an incredible impact this show has had on television history.
Because for now Jerry Springer was the absolute answer to the nationwide attitude era that was the media culture of the 1990s, it also created that culture and then carried it into the next decade and the next. Springer started his career trying and failing to copy those around him, and when his own show became popular, he was copied. He did Maury Povich flip his talk show by giving him his own iconic quote from “You’re not the father!” Other presenters tried to update their own programs because they saw the ratings that Springer was getting on his own.
After that, of course, spiritual successors came, of which there are many. Dr. Phil aired in 2002, which is perhaps worse with the presenter, Phil McGrawmasking the same exploitation with a claim to be a well-intentioned advisor. TV presenter across the pond Jeremy Kyle creates The Jeremy Kyle Show in 2005, and finds his niche in the sharp personality a la Gordon Ramsay, often scolding his guests for what has been described as “human bear-baiting”. The source is the same, as is the lifespan: both shows ran for over a decade, with Dr. Phil valid for twenty years until its repeal. Trisha Goddard, Steve Wilkosan endless barrage of “courtroom” reality shows such as Paternity Court. Regardless of the ethics, which are dubious to say the least, the formula works and continues to work even today.
Antics Culture: Jerry Springer’s Spiritual Child
Jerry Springer was not a holdover from the 1990s, nor was his show. It lasted until 2018, and immediately after that, he began judge jerry, which lasted from 2019 to 2022. While audiences have fallen for him, what he has seized on, capitalized on, and made a career out of has remained the same, even picking up steam with the real advent of social media. Trash TV isn’t dead, it’s just called cringe culture now, and it could get even more insidious than Springer ever could. The Internet is such a vast landscape, and not a single corner of depravity is left untouched, and people can take days to maintain, choosing only one person whom they consider strange and depraved enough. YouTube compilations, Twitter feeds, just mindlessly scrolling through social media and you’ll see someone pointing and laughing at someone they think is beneath them. And you’ll think, at least my life isn’t that bad, at least I’m not that guy.
Maybe Springer saw it from the start, with his experience as an Emmy-winning news anchor, he probably didn’t see a shortage of political pundits swearing and dirtying each other. Rather, he watched as they broke into violent arguments more for the pleasure of the public than for the sake of journalism. Maybe he saw that everyone needs a villain to oppose him, everyone yearns for a goal to feel stronger, more correct. However, I am far from speculating. That’s what junk TV, tabloid TV, and even villainous edits of reality TV in general are, a parade of villains and targets. Maybe this is wrong, although sometimes it may seem right to some, and this is absolutely exploitative behavior. But in the era Jerry Springer and what’s more, it certainly worked.
Source: Collider
I have worked as a journalist for over 7 years and have written for many different publications. I currently work as an author at Daily News Hack, where I mostly cover entertainment news. I have a great deal of experience in the industry and am always looking to learn more. I am a highly motivated individual who is always looking to improve my skills. I am also a very friendly and personable person, which makes me easy to work with.
