Why We Love Serial Killers

by Scott Bonn

  Many people are drawn to dangerous things and people such as serial killers because they create a sense of invigorating psychological and physical arousal. For some people, however, the euphoria over serial killers is accompanied by a feeling of anxiety, shame, or guilt. During my research for this book I had people tell me that serial killers are a “guilty pleasure” for them. I believe that the source of the guilt is the same as the source of the excitement—that is, a lack of understanding of the motives and behavior of serial killers. To a certain extent, society’s anxiety and guilt are neutralized by the media because, as previously discussed, the news and entertainment media routinely present narrative frames that provide overly simplified explanations for the actions of serial killers. Popular narrative frames of serial killers include childhood neglect and abuse, brain trauma, or mental illness. Interestingly, and paradoxically, these stereotypical narrative frames provide meaning to the actions of serial killers and, therefore, reduce society’s collective confusion, anxiety, and guilt concerning them. In other words, the overly simplified narrative frames of serial killers in the media serve to neutralize the feelings of shame or guilt experienced by some people over their morbid fascination with them.

  It is important to recognize that serial killer narratives allow society to engage in pleasurable fantasy entertainment. My research has revealed that the graphic serial killer images depicted in the popular culture offers a pleasurable mix of excitement, shock, and horror to enthusiastic fans. The key to such pleasure is that stylized serial killer images in the news and entertainment media enable the public to delve into the world of the macabre and sinister without actually coming into contact with a serial killer or being exposed to real danger. That is, mass media images of serial killers allow us to experience the excitement of danger, and the adrenaline rush of fear, but in a safe and controlled setting. As explained in chapter 10, I believe that this is a large part of the popular appeal of serial killers.

  We have seen that the single most common narrative framing of serial killers by law enforcement authorities and the news media involves the use of supernatural labels. Because the crimes of serial killers seem so unreal and cold-blooded, the perpetrators are typically framed by authorities and the news media as lacking human qualities or, more simply, as pure evil. Serial killers are often described as being dead or empty inside and as having “cold, dead eyes or a dead expression.” Fundamentally, the evil identity of the serial killer reflects society’s need to distinguish and distance itself from the incomprehensible actions of the perpetrator in order to feel safe. As such, the serial killer identity is not a natural human category. Rather, it is an unnatural one that is socially constructed with a specific purpose in mind—that is, to convince society that the serial killer is not one of us. That is why law enforcement authorities and the news media tell society that the serial killer is neither civilized nor human.

  The Social Construction of Evil Has Negative Consequences

  Labeling the serial killer as evil may help to create moral clarity for the public but it is very problematic because evil does not exist objectively in the world. Just like the concept of “good,” the concept of “evil” is a social construction and the labeling process is tautological. As explained in chapter 9, the social construction of evil involves circular reasoning. The social process goes something like this: How do we know that serial killers are evil? They are evil because they do evil things. Conversely, if serial killers do evil things, then they are evil. This circular reasoning maintains that the serial killer is not a product of the normal social fabric or moral code. According to law enforcement authorities and the news media, the serial killer has no morality. By stressing the evilness and monstrosity of the serial killer, the news media create a perception that he is not one of us. Instead, the media contend that he belongs to the realm of the inhuman “other.” On the contrary, the serial killer is indeed one of us if evil does not exist objectively in the world as a separate entity, and I believe it does not.

  By framing the serial killer as evil, society is able to make sense of the apparent meaninglessness of the crimes and crime scenes. This is done, however, at a cost to societal morality. Because the serial killer is viewed as an evil aberration or outsider, the members of society are relieved of their moral responsibility to comprehend his existence and motivations. If the serial killer is pure evil, then he need not be studied or understood—just eliminated—because there is no cure for evil and there is no way to predict or prevent evil behavior. Such conclusions by police authorities and the media reflect faulty, circular reasoning and they are simply not true. The motives and desires of serial killers are far more varied and complex than what is stereotypically portrayed in the news and entertainment media. The social construction of evil is dangerous because it supports biased and incorrect conclusions. In fact, the framing of any group as evil in society is dangerous because it can lead to a slippery slope. When the label of evil becomes a viable designation in society, who or what will be the next group to be deemed as such and targeted for elimination, rather than given thoughtful consideration and careful analysis?

  The Serial Killer Identity Blurs Fact and Fiction

  Another problem with the social construction of serial killers as evil is that it obscures the distinction between reality and fiction in the minds of the public. As demonstrated in chapter 10, the socially constructed identity of serial killers does not distinguish between real-life predators such as Ed Kemper or Jeffrey Dahmer and fictional killers such as Hannibal Lecter or John Doe in the movie Se7en. The blurring of reality and fiction by the media in this regard can be traced back to the 1950s case of Ed Gein, a multiple murderer and body snatcher known as “The Plainfield Ghoul.” Gein’s crimes, committed around his hometown in Wisconsin, generated widespread notoriety after authorities discovered that he had exhumed corpses from local graveyards and fashioned trophies and keepsakes from their bones and skin. Incredibly, Gein created masks from human faces and made clothing from human flesh that he wore. Following Gein’s capture, the news media sensationalized his crimes and transformed a mentally ill man into a cartoonish vampire and grave robber. Gein’s shocking case also influenced the creation of several iconic Hollywood characters, including Norman Bates of the movie Psycho, “Leatherface” of the cult film The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and “Buffalo Bill” of the film The Silence of the Lambs. As a result of tremendous hype and exaggeration of his crimes by the news and entertainment media, Ed Gein remains a ghoulish monster in the contemporary popular culture.

  The author E. L. Doctorow argued that “there is no longer any such thing as fiction or nonfiction, there is only narrative.” This statement is certainly true of the way the news media handled the infamous case of Jeffrey Dahmer. As mentioned in chapter 10, the news media seized upon the cannibalism theme of the Dahmer case in 1991 and created a connection with the fictional Hannibal Lecter from the highly popular film The Silence of the Lambs. By linking him to Hannibal Lecter, the news media turned Dahmer into a super villain with enduring consumer appeal. Author and academic scholar Joseph Grixti commented on the social construction of Jeffrey Dahmer’s public identity and its powerful impact on society when he said:

  Jeffrey Dahmer’s elevation to the rank of ambiguous monster-hero in the iconology of contemporary culture . . . is not restricted to readers of popular “true crime” paperbacks . . . Accounts involving such figures are very frequent and prominent in the mass media—in news and . . . a range of popular entertainment. In a sense, such celebrations usher figures like Dahmer into a hall of fame where historical murderers acquire mythical proportions . . . like Jack the Ripper . . . There they rub shoulders with a long line of fictional figures created over the centuries in variously loaded attempts to come to cognitive terms with evil by visualizing and personifying its threats and horrors in reassuringly recognizable forms. Within the popular cultural domains that underlie the construction of this chamber of horrors, boundaries betwe
en fact and fiction often tend to become blurred.128

  The very important point being made by Grixti in the above statement is that Jeffrey Dahmer has become an entertainment commodity in modern society. There is more than ample evidence to support this conclusion. According to a former neighbor of Dahmer’s in Wisconsin, for example, there are people willing to pay $50 each to sit on a couch that the serial killer gave her and are also willing to pay just to hold a glass that he once drank water from.

  Such obsession can have very negative consequences for society. My research suggests that it does not matter to the average person whether a serial killer depicted in the mass media is a real-life predator or a fictional one. They are equally frightening and entertaining for the public to behold because of the exaggerated serial killer identity that is well established in the popular culture. However, the blending of fact and fiction in the social construction of the serial killer has obscured the reality of serial homicide by turning actual criminals into cartoonish ghouls like Freddy Krueger or Michael Myers in the Halloween film series. Jeffrey Dahmer has become a source of popcorn entertainment in contemporary culture just like Hannibal Lecter, and the two are now interchangeable in the minds of the public.

  The Serial Killer Identity Desensitizes the Public

  Tragically, due to the blurring of fact and fiction in the mass media, the harsh reality of serial homicide is comprehended by individuals only if or when a loved one is unfortunate enough to fall victim to a psychopathic predator like Jeffrey Dahmer. The social construction of celebrity monsters desensitizes the public to the actual horrors endured by the victims of serial killers and their loved ones. As astutely noted by Andy Kahan, the victim rights advocate and opponent of murderabilia based in Houston, everyone knows the names of notorious serial killers such as Jeffrey Dahmer and Ted Bundy but no one remembers the names of their victims. By turning serial killers into celebrity folk devils, the news and entertainment media do a disservice to the victims’ families who have been deeply harmed and should not be re-victimized for the selfish purposes of commercial entertainment and financial profit.

  Ironically, while attempting to eliminate its fear over the incomprehensible nature of the serial killer, society inadvertently constructed a super villain that fuels that very same fear. As stated, the social construction of evil is an unending, circular process. Frequently, all the public knows about an unidentified serial killer is what he leaves at his crimes scenes. Therefore, the crime scenes become the basis for constructing the identity of the killer. The more gruesome the crime scenes are to behold, the more frightening the public identity of the unknown killer will be. Dr. Alexandra Warwick explains how the crime scenes of serial killers come to objectify the perpetrator when she says, “The scene of the crime is the scene of the continuing invention of the serial killer, who is the necessary figure that is imagined to stabilize such confusion, even when confusion is the very condition from which he is created.”129 Dr. Warwick correctly observes that the serial killer is constructed in an effort to make sense of a seemingly meaningless crime and crime scene but, ironically, it is the meaninglessness of the crimes and the resulting sense of confusion and fear that inspires society to create the frightening serial killer identity. In its attempt to explain the actions of the serial killer and reduce its collective anxiety, society reifies the serial killer as a larger-than-life monster. The social construction of the serial killer as evil is a self-fulfilling prophecy of fear. Or to paraphrase W. I. Thomas, if you believe your worst nightmares will come true, then they will.

  The Serial Killer Serves a Function in Society

  In the final pages of this book, I present an argument that serial killers actually serve a purpose in society. I recognize that this statement seems incredible at face value but, according to the functionalist sociological tradition I refer to in this book, everyone in society has a role and a purpose. From a functionalist perspective, all types of behavior, whether good or bad, are to be expected. That includes serial murder. Emile Durkheim believed that crime and deviance are inevitable in any society and, in limited amounts, are actually functional and necessary. He claimed that some crime is necessary because it promotes clarification of the moral boundaries that define a society and establish its social order. According to Durkheim, the bonds that unite a society are strengthened when moral boundaries are clarified and reinforced. Esteemed sociologist Kai Erikson discussed the importance of protecting moral boundaries in society and explained how the process works when he wrote:

  On the whole, members of a community inform one another about the placement of their boundaries by participating in the confrontations which occur when persons who venture out to the edges of the group are met by policing agents whose special business it is to guard the cultural integrity of the community . . . [T]he confrontations . . . act as boundary maintaining devices in the sense that they demonstrate to whatever audience is concerned where the line is drawn between behavior that belongs in the special universe of the group and behavior that does not. In general, this kind of information is not easily relayed by the straightforward use of language.130

  Typically, language is insufficient to frame the problematic behavior of those who are considered to be deviant, so society by way of its policing agents constructs symbols and images to demonstrate the dangers allegedly posed by the “other” to the community.

  From a functionalist perspective, the social construction of the serial killer identity is symbolic and it helps to clarify the moral boundary that separates good and evil in society. It defines the actions of the serial killer as inhuman and beyond reason. By accepting the framing of serial killers as evil, the public is given moral clarity. Such clarity can be both reassuring and comforting. By framing the serial killer as evil, the public has an explanation for the actions of the criminal and it also has a reason to feel better about itself. Why? The serial killer identity provides the public with a reference point for judging the acceptability of its own behavior. The actions of the serial killer clearly set the bar for acceptable behavior very low, so it is easy for the public to minimize its own moral failings by comparison. For example, a person might think, “I may not be a saint but at least I don’t kill or eat people!” In addition to providing moral clarity, the framing of serial killers as evil is functional because it provides the public with a point of reference and a way to put its own negative behavior in perspective. It suggests that despite all of our faults, compared to serial killers, the rest of us are not so bad.

  Serial killers do horrible things to innocent people. Ted Bundy and Ed Kemper, for example, raped, tortured, and killed their victims, and then engaged in necrophilia and dismembered the corpses. I would argue that such actions do establish the outer limits of human depravity. Is there anything worse one person can do to another than what Bundy, Kemper, Ramirez, and their ilk do to their victims? As stated throughout this book, when the crimes of serial killers are reported by the news media, they are typically framed as the inhuman acts of vampires or monsters. The killers are almost always depicted as being pure evil in order to distinguish them from decent people. From a functionalist perspective, such media framing suggests that if you want to know what evil is and what evil does, then you need to look no further than Ted Bundy and other serial killers.

  The Serial Killer Is One of Us

  In the social construction of serial killers, law enforcement authorities and the news media compare the actions of the perpetrator to the average person in society. Because the so-called “normal” person is the point of reference in the social construction process, the serial killer identity can be seen as a reflection of the public. The serial killer identity is like a mirror that permits society to consider how the perpetrator is both different from and similar to itself. The mirror reveals that the serial killer is different from the public in many ways, but it also reveals that the serial killer is very much like the public in certain ways. The serial killer identity contains many human
characteristics that are valued such as drive, fortitude, persistence, and reliability. As a result, I believe that the serial killer identity blurs the boundary between good and evil. Moreover, it sends a subliminal message that the public may not be that different from the serial killer after all.

  Society’s attempt to understand and explain what created the serial killer leads to the possibility that something within the human condition—that is, something from within the world we do understand—created the serial killer. As argued by Dr. Warwick:

  Far from their actions being beyond explanation, serial killers are offered as actually being the key to the understanding of the whole of the human condition. What makes them? The answer, undeniably, is that they are we. We are they . . . [Ironically, by labeling the individual who has violated the norms], society collapses the boundary between the normal and the abnormal while simultaneously offering absolute assurance of that boundary’s real existence.131

  If evil comes from within the human world and not outside it, then the boundary between normal and abnormal is far more ambiguous than suggested by the stark black-and-white images presented in the news and entertainment media. If evil is created from something within the human condition, then even so-called normal people in society—those considered good—are not entirely immune to its influence. If the serial killer was not born that way, then the distance between the killer and the normal person is much shorter than we thought. To the extent that evil emerges from within society, we are all closer to the serial killer than we might imagine and more capable of abnormality than we would like to think. From a functionalist perspective, therefore, the horrors perpetrated by the serial killer enable society to consider both the source and limitations of its own violent tendencies.