Serial Killers and the Media

The thought that at any given moment there are men and women running the streets killing for often obscure reasons has long stirred the imaginations of Americans. Popular culture is rife with plotlines in which everyday citizenry is tormented and slaughtered by superhuman killers who do so for no other reason than that they can... and that they like too. From Countess Elizabeth Bathory in the 1600s to the recently apprehended Baseline Killer, serial killers have long been a source of fascination and entertainment for United States citizens. We thrive on the darker side of life; it sparks our imagination while filling us with fear. No entity is quite as good at giving us that thrill as American media outlets, be it for news or entertainment purposes. The impact serial killers have on the media is both vastly complex and oh so very simple. No other story is quite as sensational as those in which serial killers are on the loose. And no other story is quite as thought invoking as those that ponder the inner workings of serial killers. The bottom line is that serial killers sell, and sell incredibly well.

In the fall of 1888, Jack the Ripper brutally murdered five Whitechapel prostitutes and started a media frenzy not previously seen in such cases (Barbee, 2006). The murder of prostitutes simply wasn't deemed news worthy for so many reasons; they were considered as a subhuman group, society believed they set themselves up for being harmed, society had become desensitized to the killings of prostitutes... the list goes on. With a few taunting letters sent to newspapers, however, everything changed and the murdered prostitutes, possibly for the first time ever, became a London news sensation. Major newspapers gave front page coverage to the slayings and subsequent manhunt of Jack the Ripper. London society began to fear for their safety and the underbelly of London, or Whitechapel came under widespread serious consideration for the first time.

Jack the Ripper started a media tradition that quickly moved from London to sweep the United States; a tradition that has endured for over a century. Whether Jack the Ripper himself wrote the letters no one knows for sure, but it is evident that Jack the Ripper and his letters was the beginning to a long held tradition of extensive media coverage in the form of news stories, book, and more recently, movies, television shows and websites dedicated to serial killers. That coverage is increasingly evident on the Internet.

A search of news reports on serial killers, using Google News, finds multiple stories posted just today (2006). A search of the term "Serial Killer" pulls up 3,490,000 results in just a few short milliseconds (Google, 2006). And a blog listing of movies with a serial killer theme returns 88 movies added by the original author, with countless others suggested by readers over the course of a few short days (Bertie, 2004). A search of BestBookBuys for books, both fiction and true stories, returns 438 bestselling titles (2006). This is only the icing on the cake of the coverage serial killers have received in the U.S. media and the billion dollar industry that serial killing has become.

The problem with that relationship and the industry itself, however, is that much of the coverage serves to glorify serial killers without getting anywhere near the true heart of the matter. According to Steven Egger in The Killers Among Us (2002) six myths continue to dominate our thoughts on serial killers. Those myths are:

• All serial killers had terrible childhoods, were beaten by their parents, and were sexually abused.
• Serial killers are "mutants from hell," who do not resemble the average person in appearance and mannerisms.
• Serial killers prey on anyone who crosses their path and spend no time at all selecting their victims.
• Serial killers have an uncanny ability to elude the police for long periods of time.
• The serial killer fits the profile of a sex-starved man-beast, driven to kill because of a horrible childhood and the way society has treated him.
• The Federal Bureau of Investigation investigates all serial murderers because most of them cross state lines (p. 13).

Egger goes on to identify six lesser myths that the population frequently holds about serial killers (2002). Those are: 1) that serial killing is an epidemic, 2) that serial killers get their inspiration from pornography, 3) that they can be identified in advance, 4) that they are sexual sadists, 5) they select victims that resemble their mothers and 6) they want to get caught (Egger, 2002, p. 14).

All 12 of these beliefs are largely false, yet they continue to dominate the thinking of the American population, thanks in large part to the American media (Eggers, 2002). These myths "make understanding these killers and catching them all the more difficult," yet they continue to be perpetuated by the American media (Eggers, 2002. p. 14). Why? They sell. And they sell fast.

We've become so used to hearing these things laid out in the media that we tend to take them at face value and never question their validity. In fact, as a society we tend to spend more time on the movies that grossly misrepresent the truth of serial killing. The Silence of the Lambs, released in 1991, "has probably done more than any other single film, book, or television program to promote the mythology of serial murder" (Egger, 2002. p. 13). The Silence of the Lambs is the 196th top grossing film of all time in the United States, having brought in $130,727,000 at the box office (IMBd, 2006). That is quite an accomplishment and says much about the relationship between the media, serial killing and society.

While we like our serial killer entertainment, we aren't too worried about if they get the facts right. The reasoning behind that, I believe, is quite simple. We've become so used to seeing the misrepresentations and myths that we take those as truth, never realizing that we've all got it wrong and we're doing ourselves no favors. When we hear about a serial killer on the loose, we don't question why they haven't been caught. We simply cruise the knowledge we've gathered from the media and assume that they killer possesses an "uncanny ability to elude the police" (Eggers, 2002, p. 13). We never question that myth, nor do we question the realities of why so many serial killers are able to elude the police for such long periods of time. And that lack of thought is unfortunate. The FBI estimated that there were at least 175 serial killers on the loose between 1977 and 1992 (Eggers, 2002). How many of those killers could have been caught had the media stuck to the true facts?

While the media can be blamed for many of the roadblocks that exist in identifying and capturing serial killers, credit must also be given where credit is due. Thanks to the news media, citizens know when a serial killer is loose in their community and are able to take appropriate precautions to protect themselves. Likewise, citizens are more likely to report suspicious activity and persons when they know that a killer is on the loose (Glenn, 2006). The BTK killer, Dennis Rader, was supposedly caught when his daughter contacted police after the media published letters from the BTK in 2004 (Crime Library, 2005). The Beltway Snipers, John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo, were arrested after the police received tips from motorists (Wikipedia, 2006). The list of killers caught because of tips from the public goes on and is a great indication of the positive impact that exists in the relationship between serial killers and the media. Despite the negative impact serial killers have on the US media, we can't ignore the positive either.

Serial killers definitely have an impact on the media in the United States and that impact is complex and simple at the same time. Because we like the dark side of things, the media is able to successfully perpetuate myths about serial murderers. Society aids in that perpetuation by accepting the glorification of serial killers and never questioning the validity of the movies, the books and the television shows about serial killers that so dominate our society. At the same time, however, the media serves as a source of factual information about serial killers. Because of the media involvement in covering serial killers, citizens often know when a serial killer is on the loose and are able to take necessary precautions to protect themselves. In addition, citizens are able to assist in the capture of serial killers when the media keeps those stories in the limelight by reporting suspicious persons and activities. Nothing is black and white; including the impact of serial killers on the United States media. Be the impact positive or negative, it is most assuredly evident that serial killers do, indeed, have a vast impact on the United States media, and thus, on American society.

References

Barbee, L. S. (2006). Introduction to the case. In Jack the Ripper. Retrieved
December 12, 2006, from http://www.casebook.org/intro.html

Beltway sniper attacks. (2006). Wikipedia. Retrieved December 12, 2006, from
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. Web site: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Beltway_sniper_attacks

Bertie. (2004). An unfinished list of serial killer movies. Retrieved December 12, 2006, from http://www.listology.com/content_show.cfm/content_id.12787/Movies

The BTK story. (2005). Crime Library. Retrieved December 12, 2006, from Court TV
Web site: http://www.crimelibrary.com/serial_killers/unsolved/btk/17.html

Egger, S. A. (2002). The killers among us: An examination of serial murder and its investigation (2nd ed., pp. 13-14). New Jersey: Prentice Hall.(Original work published 1998)

Glenn, F. N. (2006, December 9). Is there value in the media's coverage of serial killers? Message posted to http://kucourses.com/ec/crs/default.learn?CourseID=2514252&Survey=1&47=3064314&ClientNodeID=404341&coursenav=2&bhcp=1

Google. (2006). Retrieved December 12, 2006, from http://www.google.com/
search?hl=en&lr=&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&q=serial+killer&btnG=Search

Google News. (2006). Retrieved December 12, 2006, from Google Inc Web site: http://news.google.com/news?q=news+serial+killer&hl=en&lr=&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&sa=X&oi=news&ct=title