Jeffrey Dahmer’s name didn’t always carry the terror it does today. This paper focuses on what exactly made him commit such horrendous acts of violence in the late 20th century. Through my research I have found that the criminology theory that best suits Jeffrey Dahmer is control theory.
Dahmer was a pretty normal, but very lonely kid. His loneliness followed him throughout the course of his life. Never having an intimate friendship or relationship, along with being consumed with confusion over his own sexuality eventually led him to become the household name he is today. From 1978 to 1991, Dahmer murdered 17 boys and men. Not only is he considered a murderer, but he committed (on several occasions) rape and dismemberment. After his later murders, he was found guilty of necrophilia, cannibalism, and permanent preservation of body parts. He is arguably the most well known, gruesome, and intriguing criminal in American history.
Dahmer was always an outcast. In his early years, he seemed fascinated with death and dead animals. This carried on throughout his childhood. At puberty, not only was he a heavy alcoholic (first noted at age 14), but he was realizing he was gay. He had fantasies of a completely subservient partner whom he could totally control. These fantasies were
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intertwined with dissection. Considering Dahmer’s lack of intimate or close relationships with others, no one ever knew. His parents’ seemingly didn’t care about him, and he lacked a true friend or partner. Jeffrey Dahmer’s loneliness has everything to do with the reason for his horrific crimes.
Control Theory focuses on the question, “why do people conform?”. This theory argues that it is easier to satisfy an individual’s needs and wants through crime, but most people still don’t commit illegal acts. The reason for this is because of the restraints placed on people that stop them from breaking the law. But obviously, some people’s restraints exist more than others’. Some people feel freer to engage on crime. There are three major things that stop people from participating in deviant criminal activities: direct control, stake in conformity, and internal control. Jeffrey Dahmer lacked all
three. The lack of a tight knit family, friendship, or relationship left Jeffrey Dahmer without a source of direct control. Direct control is like someone watching over you, making sure you do right by the law. There are three components to this: setting rules, monitoring behaviour, and sanctioning crime. As a child, Jeffrey lacked a genuine and close relationship with his family. He recalls a childhood filled with tension in the home due to his parents constant arguing. From my research it seems that his parents really didn’t pay too much close attention to him and never saw his hobbies or actions (like dissecting dogs and cats) as strange. Jeffrey’s father, Lionel Dahmer, never thought anything of these habits that slowly evolved into sexual obsessions. He never seemed to have made it clear to Jeffrey that such habits were kind of grotesque. Lionel and Jeffrey’s mother, Joyce, seemed to almost neglect their son, leaving him at home for long periods of time by himself and ignoring (or not even noticing) his alcoholism that started at fourteen years old. Neither of his parents seemed to really monitor his behaviour at all. They also never sanctioned Jeffrey for the deviant activities he would participate in, instead they seemingly just ignored it or considered it “innocent curiosity”. Jeffrey Dahmer’s family lacked a close relationship with him and due to their troubled home never knew what was going through his head, and seemingly did not care. Perhaps if Joyce and Lionel had set rules, monitored his behaviours, and sanctioned crime and deviance, seventeen lives could have been spared. Jeffrey Dahmer did not have a high stake in conformity that would have stopped him from committing these crimes. There was not really anyone he truly loved and cared enough about that he wouldn’t want to disappoint by engaging in crime. He did not have a large investment (actual or anticipated) in conventional society. Jeffrey lacked real friends or lovers which caused him to have pretty much no reason to feel as though he was jeopardizing any relationships by letting his obsession with sex and violence control him. His intense alcoholism left him with almost no aspirations, and having flunked out of university and the army he really had no attachments or goals in conventional society. These disassociations with the real world contributed to his inability to stop himself from killing. Because of these factors of control theory, Dahmer lacked a sense of internal control. Internal control is largely attributed to the lack of direct control and stake in conformity Jeffrey had. In an interview with Stone Phillips in 1994, three years after his last murder, Stone Phillips asks, “Did you ever tell yourself, “I have to stop doing this”?”. Dahmer replies with, “Yes, but after the second time (murder), it seemed like the compulsion to do it was too strong and I didn’t even try to stop it after that… AFter the second time, which was unplanned, it felt like it was out of control”. This shows us that although Jeffrey Dahmer knew what he was doing was wrong, he totally and completely lacked the internal control to attempt to stop it. His crimes gradually got more horrendous and he needed more and more “deviant activities” to satisfy him. He had very low self- control due to a lack of closeness in his family home, and practically no stake in conformity. This lead his obsessions and fantasies or sex and dissection to take over. And later, necrophilia and cannibalism. In conclusion, it is clear to me that control theory explains why Jeffrey Dahmer committed such awful crimes. His story makes me more sad than many other murderer’s. It seems he knew that his obsessions were disgusting and wrong, but he simply couldn’t help himself. He felt he had no reason to stop what he was doing; no one and nothing to disappoint or leave behind. All his life he struggled with confusion over his sexuality and fantasies, and due to a lack of (mostly) direct control and stake in conformity, he felt he needed to live these wishes he had since his youth. All his life Jeffrey Dahmer felt he had no one to talk to, and maybe if he had that close relationship with his parents or anyone really, he and seventeen other boys and men could have been saved.
...nd Dahmer”, Jeff Dahmer would go to school noticeably under the influence, yet somehow go by “unnoticed”. If the teachers were aware of Dahmer’s state, they never took any form of action to discipline him, question him, or be worried with his condition at all. Not once throughout the entirety of the graphic novel does a teacher, student, or parent seem remotely concerned with Dahmer’s well-being. Dahmer fought off the urge to kill many times and did it with the help of no one and nothing other than his own twisted mind, so there is reason to believe any type of assistance from an adult could have been detrimental in the process of Dahmer overcoming his violent urges. Unlike Benjie, Dahmer had no one to look up to and admire. Benjie was eventually able to appreciate and respect Butler Craig as a man who cared enough about him to put Benjie’s life above his own.
The victim's name was Steven Hicks. Dahmer picked up Hicks hitchhiking and offered to take the hitchhiker to his house for some alcohol. After a while Hicks wanted to leave but Dahmer didn’t want him to leave, so Dahmer hit Hicks in the head with a dumbbell and strangled Hicks with the dumbbell. Dahmer then stripped the corpse of its clothes and masturbated over the corpse. He hid the corpse in the crawl space of his home and dissected the man. Dahmer dissolved Hicks flesh with acid in a toilet and crushed the bones with a sledge hammer. Dahmer scattered the remains outside his home. In 1981, Dahmer was charged with drunk and disorderly conduct. On August 7, 1982 Dahmer was arrested for indecent exposure, he exposed himself to a crowd of women and children. In 1985 Dahmer stated to frequent bathhouses for homosexual sex. Dahmer described his early experiences as frustrating because his sexual partners moved around and would not stay still. To combat his frustration Dahmer admitted sleeping pills to his partners and then he would rape their unconscious bodies. After this incident happening twelve times, the bathhouses banned Dahmer of their use. Dahmer also mentioned an attempt he made to unearth a eighteen year old corpse to use for sexual pleasure, but the soil was to hard to dig, so Dahmer didn’t go through with his plan.In 1986, Dahmer was arrested for masturbating in front of two twelve year old
Jeffrey Lincoln Dahmer also known as The Milwaukee Cannibal and The Milwaukee Monster was born May 21st, 1960 to his parents Joyce Annette and Lionel Herbert Dahmer. When Dahmer was six years old he had minor hernia surgery that afterwards changes in his behavior were reported. He went from a happy young boy to increasingly insecure and a loss in self-confidence, these changes seemed to coincide with the birth of his younger brother David Dahmer who was born seven years after him. At age eight Jeffrey and his family moved to Bath Ohio due to his father’s career as an analytical chemist. The move seemed to deepen his already increasing odd behavior and seclusion from society. By age fourteen he started to have impulsions to murder and perform necrophilia, these impulsions were amplified again when his parents ’marriage fell apart and they divorced in 1977.
Mr. Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer was born on May 21, 1960 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (wikipedia.org). Eight years later, his family moved to Bath, Ohio. He was a very shy young boy who often collected dead animals and showed signs of necrophilia at an early age. No one could have predicted that Jeffrey Dahmer would commit 17 murders during his lifetime which, in trial, were proven to have been driven by necrophilia and his own homosexuality.
The. He did not kill acquaintances or lovers as many murderers did. I have a lot When arrested in Milwaukee in 1991 Dahmer confessed to all 17 murders, and was sentenced to about 900 years in prison. Dahmer was eventually bludgeoned to death himself. in the prison of a s Obviously, as the media fed off these sick murders, so many asked how.
As children, our parents tell us that monsters do not exist. The truth is that they do exist and they live among us, masquerading as one of us. Two examples of these monsters are serial killers Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer. A serial killer is classified as a person who kills three or more people, in separate events, over a time frame of a month, with “cooling off” periods in between. While Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer both share a sick twisted mind and a penchant for killing, differences in their upbringing, personality, and preferences drastically set them apart.
Lionel and Joyce Dahmer gave birth to their first born, Jeffrey Dahmer, on May 21, 1960 in Milwaukee. Despite Joyce experiencing a difficult pregnancy, Dahmer was a healthy child who was wanted and adored by both his parents. However, his mother did start to become distant to him as she refused to breast feed him and started demonstrating unstable behavior along with substance abuse. Meanwhile, his father was pursuing his doctoral for chemistry in Iowa which limited the time Lionel had with his family. At age five, Dahmer’s little brother was born and that was when the feeling of neglect set in him. For the first time, the little attention provided from his parents had to be shared with his brother David. Dahmer began displaying extreme shyness but also severe tantrums. During the ages of six and seven, Dahmer “was regarded by other children as odd and bizarre (Martens, 2005).” Even though he did not show any interest in developing genuine social relations, Dahmer did demonstrate a fascination with bug and animal dissections. When Dahmer was six he had “undergone hernia surgery, when he woke up from the anesthesia he was worried someone could have cut his genitals, the pain lasted for one week and after a long recovery period his parents remember he turned to be very loner (Giannetakis, n.d.).” It is believed that at age eight Dahmer had been sexually abused by a boy in his neighborhood (Hickey, 2013). If this event did occur, it could explain why he developed destructive sexual fantasies at the young age of twelve. Despite him being aloof, it has been reported that he would seek attention by faking epileptic seizures at school and local shops. By his adolescent years, he developed compulsive masturbation which would eventually lead to legal trouble (Silva, 2002). At the age of fourteen, Dahmer turned to alcohol abuse in order to overcome his feeling of despair and compulsive thoughts of sexual violent acts.
“I started having obsessive thoughts of violence intermingled with sex and it just got worse and worse.” (biography.com) These are the words of one of the most notorious serial killers of the twentieth century; Jeffrey Dahmer. Jeffrey Dahmer committed crimes of murder, rape, necrophilia, dismemberment, and cannibalism. He committed seventeen murders over the course of thirteen years, which consisted of mostly young African American males. However, the people who knew Jeffrey Dahmer were entirely unaware of who he truly was. He fooled family, friends, and even law enforcement into thinking of him as just the guy next door. Attempting to understand Jeffrey Dahmer and the heinous crimes he committed involves understanding his childhood and developmental
...im. His first victim was Steven Hicks. Steven was 19 years old and a hitchhiker on the side of the road. Dahmer took Hicks back to his place where they got drunk and had sex. When Hicks tried to leave Dahmer, Dahmer killed him by hitting him in the back of the head with a barbell and then strangling him. The middle victim was David Thomas. David was 23 and was found at Oxford apartments on North 25th Street. Dahmer gave him a laced drink, containing sleeping pills then strangled him. The last victim was Joseph Bradehoft. Joseph was 25 years old, found at Oxford apartments. Dahmer had first lured him into his apartment promising money for nude photos but then strangled him.
He was a pretty happy child overall until he had to have a minor surgery to correct a double hernia when he was 6 years old. The surgery seemed to affect him. Dahmer’s father was very consumed in his own things and his mother also suffered with severe psychological problems. As his mother’s disease got worse the conflicts within his family escalated. He felt guilty of her sickness and thought that he was the main cause of all the problems in the family. When he was a teenager his parents’ divorce and the psychological stresses that came from it may have been the tipping point that turned his thoughts about necrophilia and murder into action. In his life he killed many males which involved drugging, raping, beating, dismembering, photographing, and eating
Jeffery Dahmer is arguably the most notorious serial killer -cannibal in history. Targeting men and boys, Dahmer‘s life of crime began with drinking and sex offending. His murders were exceptionally gruesome, often involving rape, torture, necrophilia, dismemberment, and cannibalism. The media often commented on how “normal” Dahmer appeared. Jeffrey Dahmer made everyone question how one develops into such a monster. By the time of his apprehension, Dahmer had sodomized, murdered, and cannibalized at least seventeen men, mostly black, Hispanic or Asian, in the Milwaukee area between the years of 1978 until his arrest in 1991 (Williams pg.1).
...sses ranging in the fields of forensics to human psychology. The mechanisms in his brain that allowed for such horrific crimes against humanity, and then his complete transparency in regards to the details of all of them, still puzzles and intrigues people. While Dahmer’s psyche can be explored from many theories, his own self-diagnosis proves quite profound: “maybe I felt I had no control as a child and a young adult, and that got mixed in with my sexuality, and doing what I did was my way of feeling in complete control, at least for that situation, creating my own little world where I had the final say” (“Confessions of a Serial Killer”). No matter how we choose to analyze him, from Freudian to modern DSM-recognized personality disorder thought, the mind of Jeffrey Dahmer will continue to remain a mystery to even those who knew him best, and to the victims of it.
During Dahmer’s psychiatric evaluation, Dr. Wahlstrom concluded, “Jeffrey was suffering from a mental illness never cured for” (FBI 1992). This leads me to perceive that Dahmer must have been displaying psychotic traits that went unnoticed and undocumented during his early lifetime. I can only speculate that this uncured mental illness lead Dahmer to develop and refine his inability to empathize with society; which in turn, lead him to engage in cruelty without mentally comprehending the victim’s suffering. Although the causes for psychopathy are unclear, some suggest that psychogenic aspects can outline abnormalities which may be present in psychopaths (Schmalleger 2014). When looking at Dahmer’s distant relationship with his parents early on in his childhood, I became conscious of the fact the lack of affection from his parents which may have lead him to develop twisted views on how one should display affection to others, thus prompting him to show psychotic behavior later on in life (The profile of Jeffrey Dahmer 1996). Even though the letter of the law fails to describe Dahmer and even if he was not fit to stand trial, I believe the court would have declared him fit for trial due to the brutality of the
“My consuming lust was to experience their bodies. I viewed them as objects, as strangers. It is hard for me to believe a human being could have done what I've done”(Dahmer). Jeffrey Dahmer is notably one of the most infamous serial killers in the United States. Along with seventeen murders under his belt, he was also a pedophile, cannibal and necrophiliac.
Social Control Theory presumes that people will naturally commit crime if there were left to their own devices (i.e. no laws in society) and people do not commit crimes because of certain controlling forces, such as social bonds that hold individuals back partaking on their anti social behavior (Bell, 2011). Examples of controlling forces are family, school, peers, and the law. Young people who are t... ... middle of paper ... ... nd delinquent are more likely to partake in committing criminal behavior (Shaefer and Haaland, 2011, p.155-156).