"There is a learning quality in all of our shows"
About this Quote
"There is a learning quality in all of our shows" is the kind of line that does double duty: it’s a brand shield and a moral alibi. Trisha Goddard, a daytime-TV fixture whose format has often leaned on conflict, confession, and catharsis, isn’t just describing content. She’s staking a claim that spectacle can be socially useful.
The intent is defensive but savvy. Talk shows built on personal turmoil have long been accused of turning pain into programming. By foregrounding "learning", Goddard reframes the transaction: viewers aren’t rubbernecking, they’re being educated. That single word upgrades the audience’s role from consumer to student, and it upgrades the host from ringmaster to facilitator.
The subtext is how television tries to reconcile empathy with entertainment economics. "All of our shows" is a sweeping assurance that feels less like a measurable promise than a values statement: don’t isolate the messy episodes, don’t call them exploitative, because the series as a whole carries a civic function. It’s also a subtle appeal to legitimacy in a media ecosystem that ranks "serious" programming above popular formats. If a show can be read as instructive, it’s harder to dismiss as trash.
Context matters: Goddard’s era of broadcast and tabloid talk thrived on public vulnerability, but also on the idea that naming dysfunction - addiction, infidelity, family fracture - could model boundaries, consequences, and survival. The genius of the line is its ambiguity: learning for whom, and at whose expense? That unresolved tension is exactly what keeps the genre culturally combustible.
The intent is defensive but savvy. Talk shows built on personal turmoil have long been accused of turning pain into programming. By foregrounding "learning", Goddard reframes the transaction: viewers aren’t rubbernecking, they’re being educated. That single word upgrades the audience’s role from consumer to student, and it upgrades the host from ringmaster to facilitator.
The subtext is how television tries to reconcile empathy with entertainment economics. "All of our shows" is a sweeping assurance that feels less like a measurable promise than a values statement: don’t isolate the messy episodes, don’t call them exploitative, because the series as a whole carries a civic function. It’s also a subtle appeal to legitimacy in a media ecosystem that ranks "serious" programming above popular formats. If a show can be read as instructive, it’s harder to dismiss as trash.
Context matters: Goddard’s era of broadcast and tabloid talk thrived on public vulnerability, but also on the idea that naming dysfunction - addiction, infidelity, family fracture - could model boundaries, consequences, and survival. The genius of the line is its ambiguity: learning for whom, and at whose expense? That unresolved tension is exactly what keeps the genre culturally combustible.
Quote Details
| Topic | Learning |
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