Should the Jeremy Kyle show be axed?

Having been told about this programme I watched it two or three times. It truly is the modern equivalent of poking those with mental problems with a stick, a jolly Victorian pastime. So much shouting, violence and aggression - how can it possibly benefit anyone apart from the TV company - and Jeremy Kyle. Sad people with presumably miserable lives who need help and see this as a chance to get some help and also be on TV. What a reflection of our times that it is so popular - or perhaps some people never change and programmes like this save them travelling to the local asylum and finding a stick. Makes you want to weep.

It should have never been allowed in the first place. Ii have seen it once or twice but i dont like it. I once worked with a group of undergraduate students and this was their favourite programme. They would sit in their jamies and giggle at the people on the show. I would have thought they would have more intelligence. It shows ordinary people in a bad light. However we had a neighbour who boasted of their time on the show. They were so impressed by being in a hotel and on tv it was probably the highlight of their lives. How sad. Axe it immediately

I agree with Sarah 65.. we are a cruel society

If I’ve ever lingered for a few minutes I am amazed by the anger and despair of some of the people who apply to go on it. It makes for very uncomfortable viewing for me. It’s toe curling!

In my opinion the people who go on it want confrontation with whoever has pissed them off. I don’t think the 15 minutes of fame is what they’re after. It’s not about washing their dirty linen in public. It’s about their opportunity to have an indignant rant.

If polygraph tests are inadmissible in UK Courts because they are extremely unreliable and inaccurate, how is he able to tell these people, often obviously not very bright and in a bad place, that these tests are 100% accurate, ruining lives and relationships for good? It's cruel entertainment. When people give accounts of their tragedies in other shows, there's an element of consent and awareness of what they are participating in. The poor folks JK gets on his show are mocked and ridiculed by JK infront of national audiences, often based on an often innacurate polygraph test. I did have an acquaintace go onto the show as an intervention for her sister, her sister's baby was stillborn and she was not coping well at all, JK organised for her to have a proper urn made rather than the standard cardboard one and allegedly helped her get support and therapy after. The only nice thing I can say about the man.

Having said that I DO find the news media to be highly predatory, my friend took his own life a while ago and as he was in Prince Harry's regiment, the media was all over it. They misreported and exploited a vulnerable mentally unwell girl for an interview about the terrible incident. 'Emotional leeches' my sister calls them.

I have never watched JK (or daytime TV for that matter) but I know of the format.

Did it really take a chap dying for people to realise that schadenfreude TV is really not the ticket? The vulgarity and prurience of the show has been obvious from the first and that viewers are pretending that they did not know they and others were all along dabbling in the misery of others is the most hilarious hypocrisy.

People watched because it might all end in tears. That was the point.

Of course it should its a load of rubbish. It's time someone took it off air. Most watch it to have a laugh. That is how insensitive it is when people are airing their personal issues and who really believes a lie detector is 100 percent getting it right. Sad but also a load if rubbish.

Unfortunately Mapleleaf even if this dire programme is cancelled another one very similar will soon appear.

Like many here, I've had the mis-fortune to catch snippets of this dreadful programme when channel hopping (then usually switching off again as often there's little else on that interests me either). The best thing to happen would be to end this vile programme and others like it that only seem intent on ridiculing people. Yes, I know, these people aren't forced to go on, but they really do want their 10 minutes of fame, and want to "wash their dirty linen" so to speak, in public. Many of them do live like that, too, forever shouting, arguing and generally being unpleasant to each other and to neighbours trying to mind their own business but being unfortunate to live near them. (If you're wondering how I know, my career involved home visiting to all parts of the neighbourhood I worked in).
Programmes such as this feed off this kind of behaviour and encourage it in order to make a profit and fat salaries, disguising it as "factual". In truth, the majority of us do not conduct our lives like this, but some do so they are exploited in the name of "entertainment", and passed off as representative of certain sectors of society, which is unfair. They are a minority. Sadly, there will also be people who relish watching these unfortunate people and as long as there are, these programmes continue. I hope, though, that what has happened will really bring this particular one to an end.

Years ago I watched an episode of this awful programme....I am not proud of this but it was about a paternity case and I was keen to see the results. Afterwards when I thought about what I had been watching I was not happy with myself and vowed to never watch it again...and I haven't.
So YES take it off for good....it serves no purpose other than to show how awful some peoples's lives are and to enable the awful Jeremy to feel powerful - backed by very large security men!

Just been discussed on radio 4, I have to admit, I’ve never seen more than a few minutes here and there, but from what I’m listening to this morning, I’m amazed this program was ever approved in the first place
Says something very sad about us, if this is what we call entertainment

Hope it's axed forever.

I have on one or two occasions in the past lingered on it for a nano second when trying to find Matthew Wright's programme. The audience seemed to comprise of a baying mob whilst the hapless victims laid bare their mistakes, and what should be private aspects of their lives for scrutiny to an audience that passed judgement on them, no doubt to feel good about themselves for not possessing such human frailties. Can't help feeling there was a bogus argument that the show was there to help, but really all it did was provide titillation in vulnerable people's misery.

Yes awful! human form of bear baiting.

I've just looked up the meaning of dross. I don't agree with that description. These are vulnerable people being taken advantage of. They are treated very cruelly by Jeremy who is a horrible person. I'm surprised no one has hit him on stage. The programme should have been axed long ago.

I have watched about half a programme. I felt so uncomfortable and thought the whole thing smacked of voyeurism.

It is the Victorian equivalent off showground entertainment where individuals are laughed at for their inadequacies.

Quie, quite dreadful.

I think it's a vile programme that exploits people and sets them against each other for the delectation of viewers who appear to enjoy watching conflict situations being stirred up.

How dreadful that this is called "entertainment" and that so many people enjoy watching the unhappiness and sheer ineptitude of others.

I am not surprised that this goading and ridiculing has brought about a personal tragedy. I am only surprised that it hasn't happened before.

Well well, have we found a topic that GNers can agree on? That's an achievement we should be happy about!

I'm another one who has never watched the show, but the clips on Channel 4 News tonight left me in no doubt that axing is the least that should happen.

He was trying to be another Jerry Springer. .
Morning TV is in the background while making my breakfast and have caught the odd episode of basically shouting and arguing. I used to watch Heir Hunters on BBC1 .......wish they will bring that back

Well put Lily. I'm pleased the ban has been asked for.
I've seen small parts of this by mistake, even last week when visiting someone in an old age home here.
But must admit to often watching the Jerry Springer show in years gone by.
Which I think was the precursor to this one.
In shock and sad disbelief that people could set themselves up for such degredation.

Bear baiting for the 21st century. Kyle's team whip them up into a frenzy and provide booze. Disgusting.

Flexiblefriend, you say without this programme, you wouldn’t know people like this existed. Ask any doctor, nurse, midwife, social worker, mental health or police officer, they meet “these people” throughout their working lives. The vulnerable, the depressed, anxious, personality disordered, people with learning issues who struggle eith day to day life. You see those people as knowing what they’re getting into ?
Mick Philpott, the man serving life for setting fire to his house, resulting in the feat of six of his children was a ‘guest’ on the vile programme.
Yes it should be stopped, it gives nothing positive and exploits vulnerable peopke

FlexibleFriend There are stories in the newspapers today saying the production team wind people up before the show in order to make them lose their cool - lets face it the show wouldn't attract the voyeurs it does if everyone was calm and polite to each other

I still find it really hard to understand how they find anyone to appear on the show at all
Is it really all about their five minutes of fame? Do they really want the world and his wife seeing their humiliation and degradation?
I absolutely think it should go, but as someone said, they’ll undoubtedly replace it with something just as bad

Sorry Gonegirl but you can't blame Jeremy Kyle for making the people look stupid they manage that all on their own. Stupidity isn't the half of it, I've probably only seen bits of a show maybe a dozen times when channel hopping and something gobsmacking rivets you to the screen. I think the production treat them with more respect than the guests show themselves or each other.
Like I said I wouldn't miss it but it's been educational.

Yes, more shows like the Detectorists please! Normal people getting by, and generally being nice to one another

Agree Sara65, that's why I love the programmes that show people being generous and friendly in the hopes that what is shown on screen rubs of on people. They are few and far between but I enjoy The Repair shop, The Sewing Bee and Money for Nothing. Then there was The Detectorists and even The Big Bang Theory shows us disparate and annoying people learning to get along. People being nice just does not make news.....bit I like it!