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The ’90s were pure chaos, and nothing proves that more than the decade’s daytime talk show boom. These proto-reality shows gave us brief glimpses into strangers’ lives and sensationalized everything, blurring the line between reality and entertainment.
Talk shows were often referred to as “trash TV” and “sleaze,” but I — and millions of Americans at the time — just couldn’t look away. It seemed as if nothing was too taboo to talk about it. In fact, it seemed the more taboo, the better.
But looking back, yikes, some of the popular topics that were featured on these shows were unbelievably exploitative and insensitive to massive groups of people. So here are seven daytime talk show topics and trends that I can’t believe were even aired:
A few years deep into the Satanic Panic, network TV started airing these big specials — often touted as real news reports — about devil worshippers and ritualistic abuse. They were meant to scare parents into thinking that if their kid wore a little too much black or listened to Metallica, it was a definite 100% fact that they needed to be saved.
One of the many fallouts of this moral panic was parents dragging their teenage children who dressed a little ~differently~ on to talk shows to get them made over. In episodes of Maury like “Please Make Over My Freaky Teen” or The Jenny Jones Show‘s “Hey Punk, Lose the Funk!” kids — usually anywhere from 12 to late teens — were paraded on stage and got absolutely roasted by a constantly-booing studio audience full of judgmental ADULTS.
The majority of the time, the shows were centered around teen girls — girls who wore baggy clothes and hid their bodies, girls that dressed “too sexy,” and, of course, girls that dressed alternative. The episodes that featured “makeovers” for punk or goth-looking girls were super common, I assume due to our culture’s at-the-time obsession with promoting Christian values.
Members of the studio audience, probably too embarrassed to show themselves on TV, hurled disembodied insults like “loser” and “freak” from somewhere in the crowd. Those bold enough to insult a child on national TV, AND show their face, stood up from their seat, took the microphone from the host, and attacked the teen girls with horrendous comments about the way they looked.
After each “outrageous” teen was treated like an exhibition, the sad and desperate parents begged the hosts to “give [them] their little girl back” and posited how they wanted their child to dress.
Post-makeover, the majority of the teens marched back out onstage, shoulders slumped, usually shaking their heads. The parents cried and exclaimed things like, “She looks like a girl” and “This is what I’ve always wanted her to look like.”
2.
“I Have a Secret Crush”
Most talk shows in the ’90s were doing these “secret crush”-type episodes pretty regularly. I mean, the topic seemed innocent enough: Someone would anonymously bring their crush on the show and reveal their feelings to them. Sometimes, the reactions were cute, and a few have even ended in marriage.
But others were horrendously cringey to watch. In shows like Maury, for instance, a blindfold was used, and the people revealing their secret crush definitely overstepped their bounds. Guests usually touched or kissed their crush before the blindfold was taken off without knowing their identity yet. There were also A LOT of awkward reactions, which was definitely understandable since these people were being put on the spot…on national TV. Things were made even more uncomfortable when the hosts and/or friends of the guests pushed them to reveal even more.
The most well-known example of this “secret crush” trend actually led to a murder. In a never-aired 1995 episode of The Jenny Jones Show called “Secret Crushes on People of the Same Sex,” guest Scott revealed his crush to an acquaintance of his, John.
After the secret was revealed, John seemed embarrassed but said it was “flattering.”
A few days later, however, after Scott had left a suggestive note on John’s front door, John drove over to Scott’s house and shot him. He then called the police and said he shot Scott because he embarrassed him on TV. John was sentenced to 25–50 years for second-degree murder and was released in 2017.
Scott’s family sued The Jenny Jones Show and Warner Bros. and won. They were awarded over $25 million. However, the show and Warner Bros. appealed, and the whole thing was overturned.
Talk shows from this time period were rampant with anti-trans rhetoric, but nothing was as appalling as the episodes of Maury where he paraded people around the stage and then asked the studio audience to guess their gender.
These were usually set up in the style of beauty pageants — complete with a swimsuit segment. As each person came out on stage, Maury pointed the microphone at an audience member and asked things like, “What do you think it is?” and follow it up with, “How can you tell?” The audience proceeded to pick apart every inch of the person onstage — reducing them to their body parts — often pointing to their Adam’s apple, muscles, or shoulders as concrete evidence that “that’s a man, Maury!”
4.
“Step Right Up! Look At These People — Can You Believe They Exist?”
Talk shows often gave marginalized people a platform and exposed the country to different types of people, providing a much-needed source of representation. But, more often than not, that representation would veer into exploitation, as sex workers, teens who listened to metal, members of the LGBTQ+ community, and other people who the producers knew mainstream audiences wouldn’t understand were often maligned, laughed at, or made to be a sideshow. While presenting these types of guests, the hosts often spoke directly to parents in a very this-could-be-your-child kinda way, forcing the audience to align with them rather than the guests.
If you were a parent in the ’90s and struggled to understand your child’s behavior, a very real option was to bring them on a talk show, air your family’s dirty laundry, and have strangers hurl insults at your kid. Studio audience members often told the parents to “whoop” or “beat” their kids to solve their behavior problems, which got a massive endorsement from the crowd in the form of raucous applause. These episodes usually concluded with a therapist promoting their latest book and telling the families to take their children to therapy.
An even more extreme version of this came in the form of “boot camp” episodes. During these shows, screaming drill sergeants took the kids to prison and yelled at them until they cried, all under the guise of “tough love.”
6.
“Lie Detector Results Revealed”
Lie detector tests are not 100% accurate. But shows like Maury and The Jenny Jones Show really made it seem like a polygraph was THE final word in determining if someone was being truthful or not. The tests definitely made for some entertaining moments when used in more low-stakes episodes (ex. Jenny Jones‘s “You Say You’re the King Player Raisin’ the Roof, But You’re Lying & Here’s the Proof” used a lie detector to prove whether or not men who were bragging about being players were actually players).
But its use quickly became almost exclusively limited to talk show episodes involving people who suspected their partners were cheating. The accusers and the audience took the results of these tests as gospel, so these were always super emotional episodes that usually ended in hurt feelings, broken relationships, and A LOT of uncomfortable-to-watch physical altercations. And even if polygraphs were 100% accurate, it’s upsetting to see people at their lowest on national TV as a form of entertainment.
7.
And finally, “Help! My Teen’s Having Sex”
Other shows that sometimes featured lie detector tests involved teen girls’ sex lives and parents who wanted to know if, when, where, and how many times they had sex. Talk shows were obsessed with this topic, and there was no shortage of desperate mothers who brought their “wild” and “out-of-control” teen girls to appear on these shows.
Like other topics on this list, these episodes ended with an “expert” telling them they need therapy, the teens being sent to boot camp, or the host just simply telling the girls that their parents bringing them on the show was proof of how much they are loved. Sometimes, the shows got a little creative, especially when the girls were doing other “bad” things in addition to having sex, and forced the girls to do things like climb into a cardboard box under an underpass to show them what their future would be if they continued on their path.
What are some other daytime talk show topics that make you cringe? Let me know in the comments below!
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