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CRIME | SOCIETY
True Crime Is Big Business But We Shouldn’t Glorify Serial Killers
Why are we so fascinated with murder?
True crime is all the rage. Podcasts, documentaries, movies, books and an entire cable channel are dedicated to the topic. We can’t get enough of it, especially women.
I was no exception and my interest began in the 1970s. When Mom took me to the local bookstore, I purchased magazine and couldn’t wait to get home to read it.
Headlines such as Missouri’s Riddle of the Vanished Blonde Beauty and Why 11 Red Roses for a Murdered Lover drew me like a moth to the flame. My insatiable curiosity needed to know. I’d pore over every detail of the story while lying on my canopy bed. Forget about homework, I had cases to solve.
Mom interrupted my sleuthing, telling me it was time to turn out the lights and go to bed. The wait to find out “whodunit” was excruciating. Would the cops catch the killer?
My heroes were sleuths
In addition to True Detective, I read Sherlock Holmes and religiously watched The Hardy Boys. As a child, I parked myself in front of our Zenith every Saturday morning with my Cap’n Crunch to tune in to my favorite cartoon, Scooby-Doo.
