With the sudden passing of cable television star Jerry Springer it is important to reflect and give his life some context. It may seem that on the surface he was merely a shock jock style television host disconnected from any political project, but that is furthest from the truth. Springer is a member of the political class and a man well ahead of time crafting a television program to exploit working class trauma and grief. Allegedly Springer’s earliest memory as a child was watching John F. Kennedy on television and later Springer would go on to serve as a political adviser for Bobby Kenney’s run for president in 1968. Springer earned a Juris Doctor, worked at law firms and was even elected mayor of Cincinnati for one term.
In the early day’s Springer was no different than any other political figure with a JD but cracks emerged. Springer drew from the gonzo politics of Hunter S Thompson , spending nights in jail and even staging “stealing” a city bus to drive around for a stunt. This peaked when Springer was asked to leave the Cincinnati City Council in 1974 for soliciting a prostitute and did so. The unexpected part was not Springer resigning, but being able win the seat back the following year and go on to be mayor in 1979. When Springer ran and lost his attempt to be the Democratic runner for governor in 1982, he leaned into his mistakes by airing commercials with the check he wrote to a sex worker.
After his run Springer would move into journalism doing mainstream TV news in Ohio, rising from a low rated show to a leading voice in Ohio political commentary. During this time Jerry coined the phrase “Take care of yourself, and each other.” and this phrase would carry over when he launched what would become the defining trash TV program of the 1990s The Jerry Springer Show. Ironically when asked about this phrase in the 2000s, Jerry would link it to liberalism and generational politics.
“I anchored the evening news in Cincinnati for 10 years before I started the talk show. It was the early ’80s, the ‘Me Generation,’ and everyone was saying ‘take care of yourself.’ Being an unreconstructed liberal, I thought it wouldn’t hurt if we also cared and helped take care of each other, so I decided to end each of my newscasts with that line.” 1
When The Jerry Springer show launched in 1991 its first format was not really outside the normal format of talk shows mostly focusing on political topics and with famous political guests. By season two that facade is fading, leading to well known trash topics including transphobia , talking about breast size and audience violence. No one in America or likely the globe with access to television was spared of knowledge from his program. Merely moralizing against his show is cheap and easy, the real mistake is not connecting this to trends of working America and understanding the show was no coincidence.
With workforce participation rates fading and the movement of many jobs overseas vast segments of society in America become barely employed at best. Fordism is long gone with neither capitalist party having any ability to reconstruct it. To make maters worse both parties have worked to ensure America’s social safety nets are only bare minimum . Exploitation by the capital takes many shapes and having Springer and his production team selling shocking stories peppered with violence and sexuality was the ticket for more growth in the media sector. From well off people to folks barely scraping by in America, the show was a hit and offered cheap laughs. Springer as a trained politician knew the mask he wore , knew America and was willing to be the carnival leader.
“As we proceed to develop our investigation, we shall find, in general, that the economic character masks of persons [Charaktermasken der Personen] are only the personifications of economic relations; it is as bearers [Träger] of the latter that they confront one another” Introduction to Capital Volume 1 Karl Marx 2
The amount of people being employed productively in America started falling off the cliff, but that does not preclude them from being confronted and exploited in other ways. A personal conversation of pain and controversy will not move the economic needles, but put it on television with commercial backing and the system can valorize the misfortunes. Towards the end of the show Jerry could look at the camera and magically proclaim he wants people to take care of each other, the ultimate cop out of neoliberalism asking the public to figure it out themselves. Not only did Springer become the king of this style of show, he foreshadowed the modern internet with its endless personal stories of pain, exploitation by various online media outlets and a vague conservative outrage rooted in arguments around seemingly absurd online behavior. The content of the online poster or past guests on The Jerry Springer Show is all that matters under our current conditions, humanity in and of itself is ignored. This is nothing more than expansion of capital, endlessly looking for new markets to exploit. When JFK proclaimed “My fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country” did this include Americans embracing themselves on national TV or online to grow capital? Did Springer deep down truly want people to take care of themselves and others? God only knows the answers to those questions but undeniably a much darker political project has emerged and haunts society.