RIP Jerry Springer. Full disclosure: I loved watching him continue what Donahue, Geraldo, Howard Stern, & Les Crane (1960′s) turned into a live-action tabloid art form. It was impossible to look away. Gimme that lurid sleaze, those profanity-laden fistfights, hurled chairs, all of it — our own American style of rough-and-ready sideshow performance, like watching grainy Kenneth Anger films live mixed with Harmony Korine…. Yeah, it was trashy (and probably partly scripted) and childishly ridiculous and definitely exploitative, but it was also reflective of people I knew and saw growing up….the 1970s-1980s were especially sleazy, gritty, and violent in my formative experience. I especially loved the episodes where people in the margins were given a voice, even if it was sensationalized by the form — maybe seeing Springer episodes like “I’m a witch” or “I like to cross-dress” that were considered so shocking back then helped set the stage for some level of normalization and equity that will eventually come. History will judge. But for sure, those episodes connected with the creative, emotive, sensitive, scared, and wilder parts of me that were rejected (often violently) by my peers — somehow I was not alone. And watching all the cro-magnon haters who Springer would bring on stage to create drama? Maybe seeing them helped steel us collectively to battle the ignorant haters still burning books and banning drag shows today.

Watch this clip of tabloid talker Les Crane in 1964 ask a male guest questions about a thing called “homosexuality.” This was ground-breaking for TV. And as archaic and weirdly quaint as this footage looks, one day people will look back on Jerry Springer episodes and probably feel the same about them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ev387WTquB8

*** UPDATE: I just heard back from The Smithsonian—apparently the museum does not want to include my #dicktemp thermometer in its American Art collection. Maybe next time! ;)

*** UPDATE #2: Dicktemp is complete! What a crazy 30 days! Catch all the action in my #dicktemp video logs:

Intro	Day 10	Day 20	Day 30

I might’ve gotten a little carried away on Day 20 with all of that amazing fannybag fashion…hahaha. Here’s the greenscreen supercut just for you!

postscript: i love the first comment this post got. but i dont see what the big deal is. we humans consume tons of animal products: ice cream, sausage, entrails, pig feet, brain, tongue, fish skin…looking at it that way, i would actually feel more comfortable eating my own jizz because i know where it came from, and what is/isn’t in it. your man-juice isn’t going to suddenly start containing mercury; if it is, you’ve already got way bigger problems. google it and you’ll see that spunk is harmless with 7% of your RDA potassium plus protein, with not enough of anything to kill you.  millions of swimming sperm? big deal. eat yogurt and you’re downing billions of probiotic bacteria in one sitting.  besides, lets get real: you dudes were all teenage boys at one time. and teenage boys are curious motherfuckers. who masterbate constantly. and will eat anything.  so, men—let’s not pretend like this cookbook is something that we don’t already all know about. right? hello? anyone still there?

From today’s Science Daily: “…sex workers studied in Nairobi, Kenya, appear resistant to HIV infection…evidence suggests that certain biological factors in their vaginal fluid may play a role in resistance…“

Gay guys wanting innoculation are going, “Uh-uh, hell no, I ain’t drinkin THAT!” Pucker up to the hairy snare, pretty boys! The first fluffer to send me a fabulous foto of him drinking a refreshing glass of Snatch(TM) wins a free t-shirt with the nipples cut out!!!

Um…maybe I have too much free time at work?