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I recently watched two documentary series that unpacked slices of zeitgeist from the 1990s and 2000s. One was "Girls Gone Wild: The Untold Story," the other, "Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action."

Both series illuminated an era rife with cartoonish sexcapades and violent, Roman arena-style fighting. I lived through it, of course, and at the time did not blink twice at the idea of a man making out with a horse onstage at Springer. That was just 2 a.m. TV. Most college dudes had a "Girls Gone Wild" tape lying around, and cool girls with cool low-rise jeans and cool spray tans had to be cool with it, too. We told ourselves this content celebrated sexual freedom rather than exploiting it. We surfed the gossip blog of Perez Hilton, who drew crude phalluses on photos of celebs. We tried to get as skinny as his namesake, Paris Hilton. And, yes, we watched future President Donald Trump's gilded reality TV reign every Thursday at 9 p.m.

With the benefit of time, both the Springer and Joe Francis "Girls" empires seem irresponsible at best and irredeemable at worst. They did not account for the lifelong impact on participants who were often too desperate, too young or too intoxicated to see clearly. They skated the outer bounds of consent, offering hollow dopamine blasts that kept viewers coming back for another hit.

After watching both documentaries, I couldn't help but think: Oh, right. We were and are a deeply bored people, now with endless scrolls of microfootage at the tips of our fingers. We have become so addicted to drama that we struggle to process life without dysfunction. Our lust for unrest is both a learned behavior and a biochemical response.

And addictions only intensify. The moment grotesque, oiled fistfights over infidelity and paternity became normalized on TV, the oeuvre was no longer novel. This sort of rapid-fire, episodic messiness had nowhere to go but into the public policy sphere. Into our state political chambers. Into the White House, where an early aughts game show host now tests the outer bounds of the Constitution and calls the shots between actual life and death.

Americans are rounding out the longest month -- cue the "Lemon, it's Wednesday" meme. In Washington, Congress grilled hopeful health secretary Robert F. Kennedy, who denied saying things he said while allegations that he once put animals in a blender added a horrific new layer. Trump spiked heart rates by pausing essential federal funds to the country, then pausing the pause -- kind of. At this point, anyone would be forgiven for forgetting that Elon Musk issued what looked like a clear Nazi salute just weeks ago, sparking another round of chair-throwing over if he did what it looked like he did, or if he really did something else. This is how far we've collapsed into the cortisol arousal cycle.

And here in my state of Florida, elected leaders have gone full Bravo. Floridians are struggling, awaiting aid and direction from those entrusted to give it. There's the condominium issue, with untenable fees crushing many seniors. There's the unfinished wreckage of hurricane recovery. There's the albatross of homeowner's insurance.

Instead of prioritizing these less flashy but crucial issues, Gov. Ron DeSantis and his dissident legislature are viciously dueling over immigration, enacting a scene more dramatic than when Teresa Giudice flipped a table on "The Real Housewives of New Jersey." They are name-calling and trading barbs on X and fighting in the press, all for what? To prove who loves Trump the most via their methods to deport human beings.

The proverbial ratings are through the roof, though. We are the live studio audience at a perpetual episode of "Springer," sitting in the stands, pumping our fists, chanting for more. Even those of us begging for a reprieve from the drama must admit we get a surge from the anger, from being anti, from the exasperated certitude that we are above it all. Hit, hit, hit. Release, release, release.

I don't know how this ends, or rather, how the amorphous blob of melodrama continues to feed on our basest desires. Probably the answer is it doesn't end. But if our two case studies offer any insight, cultural spectacles start to disintegrate when those involved question who they're working so hard to benefit.

The late Jerry Springer famously declared he would never watch his own show. But in the documentary, it's the insight of former producer Toby Yoshimura that proves most unsettling in this political hour.

"You had to reach into their brain and tap on the thing that would make them laugh, cry, scream or fight," he says. "You rev them up to tornado level, and then you send them out on stage."

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Stephanie Hayes is a columnist at the Tampa Bay Times in Florida. Follow her at @stephhayes on X or @stephrhayes on Instagram.

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