How would you like to purchase the Unabomber’s typewriter or Charles Manson’s lock of hair? These are items that are available for sale through murderabilia websites. Murderabilia are collectible items related to murders and serial killer’s life available for purchase. Serial killers often profit from their crimes and receive notoriety and fame through the sale of murderabilia items. Families suffer enough through their loved ones death and the pain of never being able to see them again, yet some serial killers are able to profit and become famous off their crimes. It is morally and unethical for serial killers to profit off the sale of murderabilia items.
Indeed, Direct Julian P. Hobbs connects serial killing and consumerism saying
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Consumers who are looking to purchase these items are known as “collectors”. These collectors will pay thousands of dollars for a half-eaten bag of candy from Charles Manson or John Wayne Gacy’s clown paintings. The serial killers are known as artists. Selling such items as hair, paintings, letters, clothing and even finger nail clippings and foot scrapings. The serial killer would not be an “artist” without the victims. Indeed, the issue here is that society condemns the murder of the victims but glorifies them by purchasing their “art”. The interesting piece is that society does not want embrace or admire the serial killer or his actions but wants a piece of the serial killer to feel a connection and understand. People want to actually collect things once touched by or owned by serial killers because they feel a connection in some way with the murderer. It is human nature to feel interest and try to understand what occurred. Society has an overwhelming urge to dehumanize them and set them apart from the rest of society. Interest in serial killers have moved to a new level. There are movies and television shows that depict serial killers lives and show murders. Serial killers have become a large market in the news and entertainment industry. Movies are being made about real life serial killers, such as Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer. The interest in serial killers is one where the public appears to want to identify or empathize with serial killers and is a large market. At what cost does the public interest cause the victims of these murders? Kahan states “the sale of murderabilia glorifies violent crime and causes the loves ones of victim’s undue pain”
The motives and backgrounds of serial killers is a vexing topic. Not two people are the same, so therefore their motives differ. The different types of serial killers are: hedonistic, power seekers, gain, mission oriented, visionary, psychopathic, comfort, medical, organized, and disorganized. Motives of these murderers range from fear of being rejected, to “getting rid of what they deem bad,” or even to get sexual satisfaction from the suffering of their victims.
Bundy himself described violent pornography as an addiction, one that led him to act out criminally merely for the “thrill” of the crime, as opposed to for any kind of instrumental gain. Katz’s article “The Seductions of Crime” describes similar motivators of criminal activity. In the article, Katz notes that John Allen chose to engage in “stickup” crimes merely for the “thrill” of it, despite the fact stickup crime was more dangerous and less rewarding than other kinds of criminal activity (Frank, 1989). Additionally, Katz notes that rational choice was not a significant element in crime, being that burglary and robbery are risky and relatively unrewarding (Frank, 1989). Despite this, Allen was jailed many times, even shot and crippled, and still committed one more robbery (Frank, 1989). Based on this information Katz makes the claim that senseless crimes can exert strong sensual attraction, though crime can make sense still from a materialistic standpoint (Frank, 1989). In the case of Ted Bundy, his crimes ostensibly were senseless and without reward, however, through violent pornography it is clear he was seduced into committing the violence he perpetrated, and that his materialistic reward, though not monetary, was merely the thrill of perpetrating his violent fantasies upon others. In this manner, the “Seductions of
The article Serial killers: II. Development, dynamics, and forensics by Lawrence Miller dives in into the many aspects that encompass the psychological, neurological, and sociocultural elements that underline the average serial murderer. The elements involve childhood upbringing, types of aggression, typical neurochemistry, and subcultural theories. The article manages to include descriptions of the statistical patterns that involve the demographics, and motives that follow serial killers. It also discusses the validity and rationality of the insanity defense in prosecuting these extraordinarily vicious offenders. Serial murderers are an atypical occurrence in the criminal justice system. The uncommon and horrific nature of these crimes are
Taking the life of another person is one of the worst infractions of the law to commit. The Bureau of Justice defines serial killing as “[involving] the killing of several victims in three or more separate events” (“Michigan” 1). Serial killers often commit extremely violent crimes; they usually become infamous for these crimes. The first recorded serial killers are probably Jack the Ripper in 1888 and Fritz Haarmann in 1924 (“Michigan” 1). Jack the Ripper is also one of the most well-known criminals, almost everyone knows who he is or has at least heard of him. Most people know what he is famous for and associate him with being a bad person. Serial killers are typically sadistic and sociopathic, meaning that they are unable to feel empathy for people who are suffering (“Michigan” 1). Whimsical sociopaths who have sadistic tendencies are very dangerous. They inflict pain because they do not care that someone else is suffering, they only care that it makes t...
In a Google search of “serial killer memorabilia”, approximately 135,000 results would appear. While the U.S. produces over eighty-five percent of the world’s serial killers (“Why do Americans Idolize Serial Killers?” 11), Americans still tend to treat these murderers as icons and celebrities. As defined by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, a serial killer is expressed as the unlawful killing of two or more victims by the same offender(s), in separate events. While it is no secret that serial killers have a different mindset than that of a normal person, do these murderers have genetically different minds? Although there is no exact answer as to what causes certain people to have the urge to kill, studies from the “Minnesota Study of Twins
“We serial killers are your sons, we are your husbands, we are everywhere. And there will be more of your children dead tomorrow.” These were the terrifying words of one of America’s most infamous serial killers, Ted Bundy, after he confessed to coldly slaughtering thirty women. Every year Hollywood writers go after serial killers like Bundy for their gruesome and bewildering stories; in turn, these writers have created a serial killer stereotype. They cover their faces with masks and stalk their prey in the cover of night’s darkness. They are unknown outsiders, and sometimes even invincible. These faceless murderers horrify masses of people around America. But who are the real killers, the individuals walking around freely in the sunlight without a disguise?
Pedro Alonso Lopez, “The Monster of the Andes,” is a serial killer accused of raping and killing over 300 girls. His technique was to lure susceptible young girls into isolated areas or buildings where he would then rape each of them before killing them. Using a variety of cruel and ruthless methods, he killed the girls, strangulation being most popular. Serial murders have become a fascination of the public due to the unimaginable bizarreness that is reality. “Normal” people question how and why a human being could be so brutally vicious toward another human; psychologists have been researching that exact question for years. There is much speculation about how serial killers come to be serial killers. What
Each of a serial killer’s killings temporary gratifies whatever provokes the killer’s actions, and each subsequent killing terminates a separate sequence of behaviors. They are all motivated to for different reasons; some kill to gain or exert power over the victims, entertainment or mission. Some kill because they believe they have the responsibility to they society to do so (Julietta Leung N.D.) Frequently, homosexuals, prostitutes, and the homeless are viewed by serial killers because they might believe they are devalued in society or they view as being beneath humanity. They believe those kind of p...
Introduction: On the spectrum of criminal activity, serial killers are rather rare. Rarer still is a serial killer like Ted Bundy. Bundy confessed to killing 28 women in the 1970s in ghastly fashion and some believe he may have killed far more. It is hard to imagine what could cause any person to cross the mental boundary into such macabre behavior as Bundy perpetrated. Nevertheless, it is important to try to understand that behavior because only though such an understanding would society be able to identify and deter mass murderers in order to save lives.
By definition, a serial killer is one who has murdered three or more people with extended periods of time in between each victim, oftentimes with increasing frequency. Serial killers do not normally know who their victims are, so that they are complete strangers who fit their “ideal” type. More often than not, these victims are women because they are physically and mentally easier to manipulate than men. Through their smooth words and welcoming appearance, serial killers are able to lure their victims into their control (Schlesinger, 2000). There are various, grotesque ways that they go about murdering their victims, but they usually leave a trademark pattern. These patterns vary from how they leave the crime scenes, what “trophies” they take, the profile of their victims, and many other distinguishable factors (Zeigler, 2009).
A serial killer is a person who murders three or more people over a period of more than 30 days, with a "cooling off" period between each murder, and whose motivation for killing is largely based on psychological gratification. Most people do not understand what can make a person want to kill multiple people for no reason other than own satisfactional gain. In actuality serial killers have been studied for over hundreds of years, and the information that has been documented continues to grow. The research that I have gathered about serial killers focuses on their childhood development, the differences and similarities between men and female serial kills, and finally general information on how their brains operate and their motives for committing such harmful acts.
Serial killers are the byproduct of many different things: trauma, death of loved ones, abuse, neglect, adoption, and even witnessing abuse (Are Serial). Serial killers have had to endure a massive amount of something such as trauma or abuse to an unimaginable extent to become what they are; the extent of the abuse, the trauma, the psychological damage they endure is incomprehensible to many. The destruction of one’s innocence can occur at any given time in his or her life, but he or she is more impressionable in his or her youth by the negativism of someone else’s actions (Scott, Shirley L. What Makes Serial Killers Tick ~ Childhood Event). People are susceptible to what they endure in their adolescence, and cruel upbringings, such as that of a serial killer’s, are possibly the determinant of their future.
'Serial murder'; has long been a term used to describe those human beings that repeatedly commit heinous crimes. It is rare that the average person probes the mind of a serial killer without bias. However, what lies behind the eyes of a serial killer deserves more than the cold hard look that society so often gives (Aaronson, Inter...
Mass Murderers and Serial Killers are nothing new to today’s society. These vicious killers are all violent, brutal monsters and have an abnormal urge to kill. What gives people these urges to kill? What motivates them to keep killing? Do these killers get satisfaction from killing? Is there a difference between mass murderers and serial killers or are they the same. How do they choose their victims and what are some of their characteristics? These questions and many more are reasons why I was eager to write my paper on mass murderers and serial killers. However, the most interesting and sought after questions are the ones that have always been controversial. One example is; what goes on inside the mind of a killer? In this paper I will try to develop a better understanding of these driven killers and their motives.
The term “serial killer” was created in the mid-1970s by a man named Robert Ressler, a former director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Violent Criminal Apprehension Program. “He chose "serial" because the police in England called these types of murders "crimes in a series" and because of the serial films that he grew up watching.”(Freeman). Before this term was created these murders were known as mass murders crimes. Serial killers can be act-focused, who kill quickly or process-focused, who kill slowly and torture their victims.