This is Why Social Media Users are Romanticizing Jeffrey Dahmer in the Recently Released Netflix Series, Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story
This show has received a large amount of attention on social media which has led to frightening reactions from fans.
When Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story was first released on September 21st of this year, it received enormous amounts of attention, becoming Netflix’s second most popular English series, behind the fourth season of Stranger Things. In the week of October 3–9, it received 205.33 million hours of watch time and in total, has reached 701.37 million hours since its release. This massive watch time has led the show to be one of the trendiest topics in pop culture.
This ten-episode series follows the real-life story of the notorious serial killer, Jeffrey Dahmer, who murdered seventeen males between the years 1978–1991. This story dives into how Dahmer, played by Evan Peters, killed, raped, dismembered, and cannibalized his victims, after luring them to his apartment or in some cases, a hotel room.
During the unraveling of the show, the backstory of Dahmer’s childhood is shown to give the audience an inside look into his weird habits as a child to help depict how he developed into a monster. The audience is captivated by the first episode because the structure of the series works in a backward fashion, starting with Dahmer being caught by the police in his apartment after Tracy Edwards escaped and flagged them down. This show does nothing less than send a shiver down your spine while watching the gruesome and truly horrific crimes this killer committed through this short series.
People are making thirst traps for another serial killer
With the popularity surrounding Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, the show has blown up on all social media platforms but specifically on TikTok and Twitter. Many of the fans have been making comments about how “hot” Jeffrey Dahmer is but they are actually directing it at the actor, Evan Peters. In some other cases, fans have taken the disturbing route and begun “romanticizing” the real Jeffrey Dahmer.
These tweets are not the only platform that is idealizing the serial killer. Many TikTokers have created “thirst traps” for him, by putting multiple short clips or pictures in a TikTok with a seductive song in the background, usually with words in front of the images, trying to make him seem attractive.
These are only a few examples of TikTok and Twitter users romanticizing Jeffrey Dahmer. However, these TikToks and Tweets have received enormous amounts of backlash from other accounts, highlighting how disgusting it is for people to create glorifying videos and make comments about a monster who committed heinous crimes.
How can someone be attracted to a serial killer?
With social media running rampant with TikToks and Tweets romanticizing the serial killer, Jeffrey Dahmer, this is actually diagnosable as a mental disorder called hybristophilia.
According to the American Psychological Association, hybristophilia is “sexual interest in and attraction to those who commit crimes. In some cases, this may be directed toward people in prison for various types of criminal activities.”
This mental disorder is considered a paraphilia, which is defined by Merriam-Webster as, “a pattern of recurring sexually arousing mental imagery of behavior that involves unusual and especially socially unacceptable sexual practices.” Some examples of different types of paraphilia are zoophilia, necrophilia, and pedophilia.
Jeffrey Dahmer in Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story is not the first serial killer to be romanticized in a TV series. Another example includes Ted Bundy, played by Zac Efron, in Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil, and Vile, another Netflix series that was released in 2019. After this show was released, many fans began to post on social media about how “attractive” he was, continuing the romanticizing of criminals. Ted Bundy, in real-life, actually ended up marrying his girlfriend, Carole Ann Boone, in the courtroom where he was on trial which is a prime example of hybristophilia. This mental disorder was also seen when criminals such as Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, and Richard Ramirez were incarcerated because they all received many love letters, gifts, and even money.
What causes hybristophilia?
The causes of hybristophilia have been widely speculated because there haven’t been any known studies on this condition. Psychologists do have theories about what causes this mental disorder.
For example, Katherine Ramsland, a professor of forensic psychology at DeSales University, states that many of the women who dated or married male serial killers exhibited traits such as, “some believe they can change a man as cruel and powerful as a serial killer,” “others ‘see’ the little boy that the killer once was and seek to nurture him,” and “they have low self-esteem and the lack of a father figure.” These explanations are only guesses as to why someone could feel attracted to a serial killer or even go to the extent of trying to pursue them.
For everyone who watched Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, we get it, Evan Peters is hot, there is no denying that and it is okay to be attracted to him. However, there needs to be a line drawn, between Peters and the real-life Dahmer. So the next time you think a serial killer is hot from a Netflix series, ask yourself is it just the actor I’m attracted to, or am I considered a hybristophiliac?
