My Surprisingly Fond Farewell to Jerry Springer
Some television hosts might hang their heads in shame if their show was dubbed “Worst TV show in history.”
Jerry Springer wore it like a badge of honor.
“It’s hard for anyone to get upset at our show today,” Springer said after receiving that dubious honor from TV Guide in 2002, “when you see the same stuff on social media.”
Indeed. What may have sounded like a sarcastic rationalization from Springer in those days sounds downright prophetic amid today’s Wild West of YouTube “influencers” and raw smartphone video footage.
Springer’s words came back to me last week following the news that he had died at age 79 in his home in north suburban Evanston.
I felt saddened by the news, yet also grateful to have lived long enough to appreciate what he had taught American TV viewers about themselves. He made many of us news consumers wonder whether we, as the title of a classic book by media theorist Neil Postman declared in the 1980s, were “Amusing Ourselves to Death.”
As a magnet for curious eyeballs, Springer’s Chicago-based show was a runaway hit in the ratings, offering a demolition derby of social dysfunction onstage. Yet it was also a source of raging anxiety for many of us who cared about the future of journalism — and civilization.
The one-time Cincinnati mayor and news anchor seemed to offer a three-ring circus of tabloid-TV topics in a race to the cultural bottom against the success of Chicago-based Phil Donahue and Oprah Winfrey.
Known for raucous arguments that occasionally broke into hair-pulling, chair-throwing and bleep-filled arguments, the daytime talk show was a favorite American guilty pleasure — or forbidden fruit — from 1991 to 2018.
Its most memorable topics included “Stripper Sex Turned Me Straight,” “Fighting for My Cheating, Stripper-Obsessed Man!” “Stop Pimping My Twin Sister” “Hooking Up with My Therapist,” and “Worshiping the Lord with Snakes!”
...continued
(c) 2023 CLARENCE PAGE DISTRIBUTED BY TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.
