I'm honestly not sure how I feel about his legacy. On the one hand, he seemed like a reasonably level headed individual who often seemed to help individuals and brought up some poignant ideas on...
I'm honestly not sure how I feel about his legacy. On the one hand, he seemed like a reasonably level headed individual who often seemed to help individuals and brought up some poignant ideas on his show. On the other hand, his show was definitely an example of something akin to poverty tourism. It did not paint minority individuals in a particularly positive light and probably contributed to creating or reinforcing some divisive and problematic viewpoints/thoughts. He certainly wasn't the only person to contribute to this kind of narrative, but he did wield a lot of influence in this space and helped contribute to a period of time where this kind of TV show became more popular.
My country has an equivalent talk show host called Jeremy Kyle. His show was cancelled four years ago after a participant was found dead days after appearing on the show and being humiliated....
Yeah as a non-American I was equally mystified, drawn and horrified when a saw his show for the first time many years ago. I was in my early teens but even then I could easily see that even if...
Yeah as a non-American I was equally mystified, drawn and horrified when a saw his show for the first time many years ago. I was in my early teens but even then I could easily see that even if this was obviously fake it didn't do anything good for American society or humans in general. Also I'm kinda bummed out that the reddit thread is almost entirely positive and talking about how "interesting" a person he was and it was all about the laughs so I'm going to say it here: Fuck him. He contributed to a lot of backwards thinking and made the epitome of trash TV that hurt more than we care to admit apparently. He might have grown and got a perspective later on with meta roles in movies where he made fun of himself but that's not whats he's remembered for.
I'm honestly not sure how I feel about his legacy. On the one hand, he seemed like a reasonably level headed individual who often seemed to help individuals and brought up some poignant ideas on his show. On the other hand, his show was definitely an example of something akin to poverty tourism. It did not paint minority individuals in a particularly positive light and probably contributed to creating or reinforcing some divisive and problematic viewpoints/thoughts. He certainly wasn't the only person to contribute to this kind of narrative, but he did wield a lot of influence in this space and helped contribute to a period of time where this kind of TV show became more popular.
My country has an equivalent talk show host called Jeremy Kyle. His show was cancelled four years ago after a participant was found dead days after appearing on the show and being humiliated.
Jeremy Kyle was the trashier and more problematic version of Jerry Springer, and his show was panned for being a form of bullying and bear-baiting.
Yeah as a non-American I was equally mystified, drawn and horrified when a saw his show for the first time many years ago. I was in my early teens but even then I could easily see that even if this was obviously fake it didn't do anything good for American society or humans in general. Also I'm kinda bummed out that the reddit thread is almost entirely positive and talking about how "interesting" a person he was and it was all about the laughs so I'm going to say it here: Fuck him. He contributed to a lot of backwards thinking and made the epitome of trash TV that hurt more than we care to admit apparently. He might have grown and got a perspective later on with meta roles in movies where he made fun of himself but that's not whats he's remembered for.
Pretty sure most of the wild stuff from his show was fake (at least partially). But it definitely was wild.