Glamorization of Serial Killing in Popular Culture

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Glamorization of Serial Killing in Popular Culture Name College/University Course Date Glamorization of Serial Killing in Popular Culture Serial killing is huge. Today, the Internet Movie Database (imdb.com) contains more than 1000 films featuring serial killers (Jarvis, 2007). Popular culture is filled with fictional books, biographies, video games and television shows devoted to serial killing. It is also on this basis that ‘murderabilia’ has taken root defined as a “. . . general fan desire to invest in, know more about, and get closer to the famous killer” and involves collecting items such as serial killer art, crime scene materials, action figures of stars like Ted Bundy and even body parts of perceived victims (Jarvis, 2007, p. 326; Kass-Gergi, 2012, p. 9). The glamorization of serial killing is however fanned by a mainstream media obsessed with serial killing, and a culture intent on immortalizing societal deviants and creating celebrities. For instance, Jarvis (2007) observes that when Jeffrey Dahmer’s house of carnage was found in Milwaukee in 1991, television rights to his story were being negotiated within the hour (p. 328). However, the societal obsession with serial killing could be symptomatic of a society living in an era of lowered moral standards. Kass-Gergi (2012) argues that contemporary fame is morally neutral and serial killing “. . . may be no more than shortcuts to fame . . . and . . . more efficient uses of the machinery of fame.” (p. 14). Thus, fame is not determined by commendable actions, rather visibility brought on by media attention is what creates fame. Therefore, it is evident that pop culture glamorizes serial killing through the influences of media scrutiny and this has ultimately made violence a consumable product. The introduction of printing, one of the first mass media in society, was

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