The 2022 Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story series brings light to the disturbing reality of Hollywood’s glorification of serial killers.

Oftentimes people forget that Dahmer’s victims were real people and that their families are still grieving for their lost loved one. For those who haven’t been affected by the deaths, it can be easy to lack empathy and see these people only as their characters.

But they should not be capitalized upon. Some viewers agree.

“It’s kind of unacceptable,” junior Lilly Tille said.

An abhorrent trend of creating thirst traps about the actor for Dahmer, Evan Peters, and his conventionally attractive features has started taking over social media. It completely denotes that human lives were ended because of a psychotic killer and his methods of slaughter. There is a level of absolute unmitigated ignorance involved in jokes about attraction to a murderer. Family members of the victims have internet access, like everyone else, and can see the ridiculous excuse for content that people post.

“It was weird because some episodes you really wanted him to be the bad guy, and some episodes you were rooting for him,” said Tille.

Peters recently won the Golden Globe Award for Best Performance By An Actor in a Miniseries or Motion Picture Made for Television. 

In an interview with The Guardian, Shirley Hughes, mother of Dahmer’s sixth victim, Anthony Hughes, says, “I don’t see how they can do that. I don’t see how they can use our names and put stuff out like that out there.”

The only attempt made to honor the victims was showing pictures of them in the credits. This was not an honorable act. It did not show respect, it only added to the non-consensual exploitation of tragedy. 

“I feel like the victims deserve more justice with their story,” freshman Dakota Kennedy said.

These deaths are more than just amusement and should be treated with the respect owed to them.

Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story is not the only example of horrible glorification of killers in the media. Conversations With a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes and the Conversations With a Killer: The John Wayne Gacy Tapes have the same repulsing factor;  disregard for human lives in exchange for low quality forms of entertainment. 

Unfortunately the cycle will continue, and murderers’ victims will continue to be exploited for the media’s gain. Every known murderer will get a show, and all respect for the victims will be disregarded.  

“The popularization of this kind of thing is concerning because this is a real thing that happened with real victims. And it just seems disrespectful to be treating it as if it were a fictional story,” sophomore Amber Springer said.