This ‘Family Feud’ Response Still Has Fans Suffering from Secondhand Embarrassment
For most of us regular folks, the allure of the bright lights of Hollywood is something we will never touch.
We watch stars on our television screens and know that we’ll never taste that moment of fame, but for decades, reality TV such as game shows have given regular people the chance to have their 15 minutes of fame.
Sure, every once in a while a game show will host a celebrity episode that brings stars into the fold, but most of the time, it’s everyday people in the spotlight.
Unfortunately, sometimes that 15 minutes of fame goes on much longer than expected and for all the wrong reasons. That’s what happened to one Family Feud participant who gave what’s perhaps the worst answer in the show’s history.
‘Family Feud’ has been on the air for decades
Family Feud is considered a classic game show because of how long it has been on the air. It originally aired in 1976 and was produced by Mark Goodson, the same man who brought the world other classic game shows like The Price is Right and Match Game.
From its inception until 1986, it was hosted by Richard Dawson. He would later marry a contestant that he met on the show, which made for an adorable television meet-cute.
After Dawson left the show, host Ray Combs stepped in from 1988 until 1994, at which point Goodson returned as host for a single season.
In 1999, the show was reprised with host Louie Anderson at the helm. By this point, there was an established pattern of choosing a standup comedian for the role (Dawson had also been a well-known comic). Richard Karn, famous for his role on Home Improvement, took over the duties in 2002.
In 2006, the hosting duties were handed over to John O’Hurley, who was famous not as a comic but as a soap opera star. When O’Hurley left the position in 2010, it was taken over by funnyman Steve Harvey, who is now closing in on Richard Dawson’s streak as longest-running host.
Contestants have provided many laughs
Part of the draw of Family Feud is its absurdity. The premise is that two families compete against one another to try to guess the most popular answers — based on a poll of 100 random people — to questions about everyday scenarios.
The need to think quickly and avoid giving a repeat answer means that people are often pushed into quick responses, and that leads to hilarious results.
These unexpected answers have been a feature of the show since its earliest days. Richard Dawson completely lost it when a contestant answered “mutual friends” to the question “what do you talk about with a stranger?” It had him so riled up that he couldn’t even compose himself as the show moved on to the next round.
Once a woman said “September” when asked: “During what month of pregnancy does a woman begin to look pregnant?”
It’s moments like these that keep the show popular and have left its format mostly unchanged over decades.
One ‘Family Feud’ contestant totally embarrassed himself
There have been plenty of embarrassing answers on the show, but fans just cannot get over one particular response. It’s so bad that a Reddit user thought it deserved an entire thread to discuss the secondhand embarrassment viewers feel when they see it.
In a rare moment, there was only one possible answer on the board. Only answers receiving a certain percentage of the total vote make the cut, and this question didn’t get a lot of variation. The question was “On what day of the week do most people get fired?”
The quick-moving contestant rung in first, and he answered just as quickly: “July 8.” Of course, the answer was “Friday,” but the gales of laughter threatened to drown out the other participant who gave the correct response. Sure, the other guy won, but no one remembers him. It’s the hilariously wrong answer that keeps people talking.
