Was it more educational or exploitation when the old talk shows like Maury Povich had kids with progeria and other conditions on to talk about their conditions?

Holy shit, never knew Jack was based on a legit condition.

Maury Povich seemed exploitative in general whenever I watched it, though from what I heard Maury say an interview a lot of people used his show as they couldn’t afford the paternity tests.

Post Springer all of the talks shows seemed very exploitative.

Exploitative by their very nature. Maury used to be a guilty pleasure in my early teens I hate to admit; coming home from school it's usually what I'd watch before something good came on ESPN. Not my proudest moment in terms of viewing, but not gonna lie - I stopped watching entirely after the progeria episodes.

Similar but different subject, has anyone watched the "Trial By Media" series on Netflix? There's a case detailed where a man was brought onto the Jenny Jones show where he was told that he would be meeting his secret admirer, which turned out to be his gay male friend. I'll leave out most of the other details, but spoiler - he killed the guy. Whether or not you feel like the show was responsible for the death or not is an entirely different set of questions and potential debate, but back on topic, yes, there is no doubt they try to exploit people for ratings.

... Also, are trash talk shows even still a thing? Seems to me like they've died the way Westerns did in Hollywood, unless I haven't been paying attention. Reality TV I guess you could say was the natural successor to that kind of "entertainment".

rad, I watched that series. I was torn on it. I get the fact they were telling the stories to fit the theme of the series but I wished they told more of the stories as well. I guess I have too much of a penchant for true crime.