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Television in the 2000’s and early 2010’s had ‘iconic’ shows like The Jermey Kyle Show and Fat Families, but were these truly a reflection of social transformation by Third Way politics?
Older Gen Z or ‘Zillennials’ may remember watching daytime television on their old boxy TV’s, enjoying classics like The Story of Tracy Beaker and The Catherine Tate Show.
Some may also remember more dramatic shows like The Jermey Kyle Show, Fat Families and Can’t Pay? We’ll Take it Away. They were funny, chaotic, and very meme-able.
Many in the UK deem this period as the prime of comedy within the last millennium, having sarcasm and dark humour that can often be seen as problematic in recent years.
Younger Gen Z’s mostly encounter these shows from viral snippets on TikTok and Instagram, watching the shouting matches, lie detector reveals, and bailiffs knocking on doors.
But behind the chaotic entertainment lies a deeper question:
@thomasm150 This show had some great moments 😂. #fyp #funny #jeremykyle #tv #uk #foryou
Why were so many British TV shows focused on portraying working-class dysfunction?
These shows weren’t just forms of entertainment; they emerged during a political movement where poverty was increasingly framed as a problem of personal responsibility.
The rise of ‘poverty TV’
Shows like The Jeremy Kyle Show, Fat Families, and Can’t Pay? We’ll Take it Away have a strong commonality, in that they’re all heavily centred around debt, addiction, unemployment, and family breakdowns.
The other ever-present was the focus on working-class people documented or put in reality television settings to discuss topics like eating addictions, cheating, and indebtedness.
Arguably, the shows did really shine light on growing problems that their primary audiences could relate to, especially after the great recession in 2007. For some families, topics surrounding money problems and debt were becoming all too real.
Nonetheless, the shows overwhelmingly featured working-class people being placed under public scrutiny with lie detectors, confrontations, or lifestyle interventions.
Critics call this ‘poverty porn’ which is any type of media, be it written, photographed, or filmed, which exploits underprivileged people.
The overwhelming air of negativity from constant yelling, fighting, poor hygiene, and financial management highlighted on these shows socially constructed vilification against the working class – or so many believe.
As Tiktoker i_r_t_e_z_a1 put it, this made the working class look like the ‘fallen behind victims’.
It’s clear that these programmes turned structural issues like poverty into personal spectacles, making the working class the British media’s faithful jester. Ricky Gervais once called it ‘wheeling out the bewildered to be sniggered at by multimillionaires’ as Andy Millman on Extras.
