Tuesday, September 02, 2008

Springer Nation

Enjoying a day off here in Labor Day. I had nothing planned. Cleaning up the apartment and trying to get Verizon out here for the third try to look at the static coming through my phone line. Living in the hood with lowly dial-up means I am cut off from the web until it gets fixed.

Since I am home on a weekday I saw things in TV I don’t normally see. For example, I watched the last ten minutes of the Jerry Springer Show.

Some interesting trivia: Thirty years ago Jerry Springer was the mayor of Cincinnati, OH. This was after checks he had written to prostitutes turned up in a police investigation. (Whorism & Politics, together again).

Also, over the years I’ve heard Jerry Springer being interviewed on talk radio, and he thinks his own show is a joke.


Today’s episode involved a guy who left is wife for her aunt. The audience makes no pretense about taking these people seriously. These were rural people (isn’t it always) and when the aunt’s accent got a little deep the crowd started chanting, “Speak English!” The show ended with the audience dancing on stage to Cotton-Eyed Joe.

Throw in the ads for Maury, featuring an oldie but goodie: a young girl awaiting the results of a paternity test to determine which of the three guys on stage is the father of her child.

My question is, why would someone degrade themselves like this? Is the money that good? Or maybe these people are actors? If I had these troubles the last thing I would do would be to display my miseries before a TV audience.

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