 "I
Watched A Wild Hog Eat My Baby!"
by Bill Sloan, 2001
For their long history,
tabloids have always been the whipping boy of the mainstream media. They
have been shunned, laughed at, and look upon with disdain, but their effect
on pop culture is undeniable. These ubiquitous elements of American supermarket
checkouts have had more of a bumpy history than most would think. Tabloids
started out of the late 19th century New York newspaper battles in an era
when terms like "muckraking" and "yellow journalism" came into being. These
competing newspapers were out to sell the most newspapers, and if playing
loose and fast with the facts did this, then so be it. This lesson was
not wasted on the later generation of tabloid publishers. "I Watched
A Wild Hog Eat My Baby!" is a historical account of the rise and
fall of the most notable (and infamous) of the tabloids printed in the
last 60 years, focusing on the undisputed "King of the Tabloids" the National
Enquirer. The book also tracks these papers from their early days of gore,
violence, and sex, to their modern preoccupation with the tragedy and triumph
of Hollywood's elite. Tabloids are one of the most important barometers
of pop culture out there. Unless the screaming headlines tap into something
that's currently on the minds of the American public, then it doesn't sell.
And if it doesn't sell, you have to find a story that does. Tabloids market
themselves on the old adage of giving the people what they want when they
want it. It's this bread and circus approach that created a gulf between
them and all other serious news outlets. But nowadays, the book argues,
that line between what the tabloids cover and what the TV news magazines
cover has started to blur. So tabloids might have won the battle, but they're
on the verge of losing the war. If the tabloids are being out-tabloided
by mainstream news outlets, then where do they have left to go?
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