A Critique of the True Crime Genre
By: Mallory Johnson
Picture credit: Google
The true crime genre is very popular, especially in podcast or documentary format. The most recent addition to the genre, the fictionalized Netflix drama show about Jeffrey Dahmer, appropriately titled Dahmer, has raised debates regarding if the show went too far. I personally have not watched the show (yet), but I have heard a lot about it. Some people believe that the show is re-traumatizing victim’s families and survivors, which is a fair critique in my opinion. Some viewers believe that it is representing horrors that happened in history, which need to be shown to raise awareness of what happened.
Regarding the genre, sometimes the media sensationalizes victims and turns the horrors simply into entertainment instead of raising awareness. In a way, it fictionalizes true events and makes them feel false. Some true crime media is not there on behalf of the victim’s family and loved ones, they just want to make what happened a spectacle. Some media is insensitive, and the Scream horror movie franchise provided social commentary on this and made it look extreme and wrong. Some media is there only to unnecessarily scare people, using fear mongering tactics to make vulnerable people paranoid (although this paranoia may be lifesaving). I feel like this is most common in true crime podcasts, and it has become trendy to casually listen to horrifying events on your daily drives as if the content you are consuming is not horrific violence.
Movies like the Ted Bundy drama titled Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil, and Vile which stars the attractive Zac Efron results in some of the viewers romanticizing serial killers. During his reign, people found Ted Bundy attractive and charming, which is morbid to think about. However, in horror movies, attractive actors are chosen to be the villains which exacerbates this.
In conclusion, the true crime genre sensationalizes violence and tragically makes it more of a form of entertainment instead of a way to raise awareness for horrific violence.