Jeffrey Dahmer’s Mental Illness
Fictional monsters have varying types in different cultures, but throughout time there has been an abundance of real monster that include serial killers. In the late 70s to early 90s, Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer was actively killing homosexual men almost as frequently as each week. He began killing soon after his parent’s divorce and custody battle over his younger brother. He targeted homosexual men that he picked up at bars or on the side of the road on the way to his home and buried him in the backyard. This was the first of many killings. His overall poor performance in school which led to him dropping out could be considered the catalyst of Dahmer’s murder spree. There had been many behaviors he displayed in his early years that were worrisome to people around him. Examples of these were killing animals, keeping roadkill to dismember it and becoming isolated at school. Although young jefferry was clearly troubled little to no attempts to reach out to him were made by peers, teachers and parents. In one incident a teacher brought up a concern to his parents, but it was written off as ‘just a phase’ or something of no concern. During his teen years Dahmer came to the realization that he was gay, His sexual orientation further distanced him from the societal norms of the era and increased his feelings of isolation. According to Jeffrey Jerome Cohen in his “Monster Culture (Seven Theses)” he talks about in his first thesis that ”The monster’s body quite literally incorporates fear, desire, anxiety, and fantasy (ataractic or incendiary), giving them life and an uncanny independence.” (68). Meaning a monster is a representation of a culture’s fear. Jeffrey Dahmer represents our cultural fear of recognizing mental illness and not keeping them in the dark along with fear of our identities being different from one another .
As shown in figure 1 there is a compilation of different angles inside of Dahmer’s apartment. It is quite obvious that it is a small apartment with the normal furnishings that a typical home would have at that time. Without the label of this being Dahmer’s apartment and assuming a person has not seen this photo before, this could be anyone’s apartment. There are very normal things, along with items that make it personalized such as the pieces of art hanging on his walls. This plays into the fact that he fit into society when he wasn’t in his apartment killing men. There are multiple testimonies to this from government workers to just police officers that he visited with, including in depth conversations that were meant to analyse his mental stability. All of which came to a similar conclusion when talking to Dahmer there was nothing screaming mental illness with just an initial conversation. The apartment set up doesn’t look as special or modified as it was to Dahmer without further explanation it looks like it’s been kept to its original ordinances. But in fact Dahmer had dedicated his living quarters to increase the efficiency and success of his murders, starting with drugging the men he picked up, all to keeping the human remains. The apartment had a high security system specifically used for keeping his victims from escaping. although he suffered from isolationism in school, when he grew into adulthood, he was able to get through the day without sticking out of the crowd. Many times when he was actively killing he was able to go undetected. An example of this would be after he had a criminal record, a victim of his had escaped onto the street later the police found him and then released him back into the care of Dahmer. This action by the police without checking Dahmer’s background resulted in the death of the boy which could have been prevented. On the outside Jeffrey Dahmer would look as what some might call a normal person but on the inside he was struggling with multiple mental illnesses. This is just like the picture of his apartment appearing as anyone else’s but yet is used like a tool by Dahmer to kill and hold human body remains.
During the trial in 1992 the charges against Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer were 15 counts of murder which he had plead guilty to. The debate between the counsels was if Dahmer was suffering from a mental or personality disorder. A possible diagnosis was antisocial personality disorder. Which is defined as a disregard for other people’s thoughts or feelings, along with not being able to tell right from wrong. There is not a single cause, but many life events and genetics play into the effects of a person developing this disorder. He showed many signs of this in his childhood and also in his killings. Once Dahmer attempted to make a zombie like person that would be unconscious and unresponsive but yet still breathing. All of this done to avoid the other person’s emotions or needs. All of these attempts on his victims were unsuccessful and ended in their deaths; which then made the killing continue so he could try to recreate the same thing again. He had many of the red flag signs in his early childhood which was later accompanied by a young teen drinking problem. There were little to no help for these problems at the time. During the 1970s there was a beginning movement of advocacy for mental ward patients, but with the past many so called treatments for people with mental health disordered ended up being tortuous and not helpful for curing or maintaining a healthy mindset. With this being of Dahmer’s time period even if someone had taken notice and put him in a mental ward there wouldn’t have been much done to help his problems. In the article “Distant Diagnosis” written by Katherine Ramsland carefully examines many aspects that contributed to where he ended up in his current state, starting from his childhood up until the trial. During the trial Dahmer was denied a plea of insanity with the testimony from many psychiatrists concluding that he planned these murders carefully and they simply weren’t impulses he couldn’t control.Ramsland uses a quote from the trial that Dahmer said “I don’t even know if I have the capacity for normal emotions or not because I haven’t cried for a long time” (44). They concluded that his lack of emotion is not from a mental disorder but from the shutdown he had after his parents divorce. In the end she states that there was a selectiveness in what was brought up in the psychological analysis of Dahmer which lead to the conclusion of not insane. This might have been swayed to try him as insane if further was done to include a nonbiased analysis of him. The previously mentioned behaviours from his childhood would, in this day and age, be more than enough to diagnose him with some sort of mental illness. it may not be conclusive to say he was completely insane, but it is clear that there were severe mental problems which could be to blame for these murders.
In Dahmer’s early teen years he came out as homosexual. In the late 1970s homosexuality wasn’t as accepted as it started to be in the late 90s to present. In “World of Criminal Justice” written by Ed Shirelle Phelps he states that Dahmer’s killings could have been out of hate and contempt for homosexuals. Dahmer suffered from being an outcast in school and him coming out as a homosexual added onto the things that set him apart from everyone else. This caused a low self esteem and lack of motivation for himself. With Dahmer looking for someone or something to blamed that thing could have been homosexuality. He loathed himself for being a homosexual thus resulting in him going to gay bars and picking up people that were like himself. Dahmer’s hate killings were a metaphor for killing his own monster of homosexualilty. His first killing would not be included in this theory because the likely motive for it was the stress around his parents separation and the tension of him failing out of college made the first killing more out of the moment. There wasn’t careful planning to it because there just happened to be a hitchhiker with not so much luck in who he chose for a ride home. With the 16 other killings to continue they were planned down to a T with his whole living situation there to aid in his killings.
Apartment 213 has a notorious name because it was set up specifically for the confinement of his victims, which ended in dismemberment of bodies following preserving some part of the flesh and/or bones. All of these were discovered by police law enforcement inside of his fridge along with polaroid pictures Dahmer had kept for himself. One theory that has been discussed about that changed his strive and means of living was from a child he had a surgical procedure done, after his recovery many people noticed drastic changes in his behavior, but quoted by his father Lionel, he “ desperately hoped to see his son in an optimistic light” (44 Ramsland). Meaning his father knew about his son’s many troubles but neglected them and simply hoped for things to change for the better.Including an encounter with a teacher and Dahmer in the school parking lot he was heavily intoxicated and the teacher neglected to tell anyone because Dahmer said he had home problems and that he’d talk to the school counselor. Many moments in his life there were times for people to step in and change things but also this could have been inevitable, but the fact that no one took the time and effort to at least attempt to make a difference.
Some may argue that Dahmer had no mental illness that contributed to the murders. He was tried as a sane person in the trial because he had been trained so well by himself to blend in and had the appearance of normality to other civilians. Many physicians had concluded he had multiple personality disorders and mental problems along with alcoholism that lead to the killings. He was able to in a way control or manipulate his disorders switching back and forth from killing to then acting completely normal around others when he needed to. Ramsland concluded he had borderline personality disorder and Schizotypal personality disorder that was what allowed him to continue doing this without flaws. Borderline personality disorder is defined as a unstably emotional person that affects their relationships and self image.Without these problems present throughout his childhood and adult life there would be a lack of motive for the killings thus making him likely to have not committed these crimes.
Jeffrey Dahmer isn’t just a single moment in our history that is gone since he died. He is represented through other killers just like him in the past and possible future. Cohen states ”No monster tastes of death but once.The anxiety that condenses like green vapor into the form of the vampire can be dispersed temporarily, but the revenant by definition returns” this meaning that monsters continue to reappear slightly changing to caters to that culture’s fear in that time period (69). He also breaks the binaries in our society by cannibalizing his victims, this is the aspect that sets him far away from the rest of what’s socially acceptable. He is human which is the part we relate but his actions don’t match with he is said suppose to be doing through a typical life time. Some could also argue that cannibalism is considered a social norm depending on where a person is from which may be true, but Dahmer did not resort to cannibalism for survival needs or for ritual practices that were common in his community. He would be classified as a necro-cannibalistic and did this out of sexual satisfaction for himself because he chose victims that one could say he adored so that is a reason he consumed and/or kept their body after death. Mental illness in our current society has come a long way and is seen in early on stages. There is always room for improvement in the system we use for treatment but we are currently evolving to work towards a common goal of maintaining a healthy mindset emotionally throughout.
