[imagesource: Netflix]

The problem with the new Jeffrey Dahmer story on Netflix is not just that it is re-traumatising the victims’ families, as we initially covered when the backlash started picking up.

It turns out DAHMER – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story has been stirring a rather large, and incredibly disturbing pot on social media and the internet at large.

The show is massive right now, becoming one of Netflix’s most popular shows since its release on September 12, with its first week bigger than that of Squid Game.

On TikTok and Twitter, chatter about the show is pretty much unavoidable. People are chipping in to analyse the real Jeffrey Dahmer, his life, and his victims, as well as the fascinating portrayal of the serial killer by actor Evan Peter.

Unfortunately, Peter’s attractiveness has made people romanticise the man who murdered, dismembered, ate, and raped 17 people, who were predominantly Black and LGBTQ, over the span of 13 years.

All of this has gone viral beyond understanding, notes BuzzFeed News:

Despite its popularity, true crime as a genre is fundamentally fraught.

…the “true crime industrial complex” has increased demand for juicier and more shocking cases for public consumption, regardless of what the families of the victims want. It also happens in spite of the inevitably reductive discourse on social media that romanticizes and capitalizes on murder.

Content creators from all corners of the internet are using Dahmer-related content to get attention, capitalising on the killer’s crimes and “legacy” through childhood videos, interviews, and personal anecdotes:

@woahkae 😵‍💫 #dahmer #dahmerwasamonster #dahmernetflix #wisconsin #truecrime #jeffreydahmer #wisconsintruecrime ♬ original sound – 🎃

Some have gone so far as to romanticise the onscreen relationships between Dahmer and the people he kills:

people are making romance tiktok edits about a serial killer and his victim. they didn’t “go from people you know to people you don’t”, this is about a murderer and a man he killed. my heart goes out to the families of jeffrey dahmer’s victims pic.twitter.com/aoxV5xQbZC

— lilian (@liliandaisies) September 24, 2022

Most disturbingly, there are those who rue the fact that the series isn’t more gruesome and horrific:

there is a whole trend of white women on tiktok flexing how they were so “unbothered” and “unfazed” by the dahmer series on netflix. if you find the depiction heinous targeted murders of LGBT and black/brown people “not disturbing enough” then something is wrong with you pic.twitter.com/Jjv8Bg5gKL

— em 🍓 (@uhhmmily) September 30, 2022

Naturally, there’s also a stomach-churning trend taking hold of TikTok, which Indy100 reports on.

Police found truly horrifying Polaroid shots of Dahmer’s victim’s bodies around his home. Now TikTok users are looking up real-life images on the internet and making a competition out of who can find the most:

The so-called “Jeffrey Dahmer polaroid challenge” sees TikTokers searching for the pictures online and then filming and sharing their reactions to them.

The search terms “Jeffery Dahmer victim polaroids” have garnered 531.2 million views on the platform, to give some indication of the extent of people’s morbid fascination.

This is not okay:

People on tiktok are upset because they couldn’t find the Polaroids Dahmer took of his victims???? What tf is wrong with people? I’m actually sick to my stomach right now. pic.twitter.com/KuTUbM1U6k

— Cheyenne⁷ (@GingerNightwing) September 29, 2022

The tiktok’s r so shocked about the jeffery dahmer polaroids like Hello???? He ate People’s insides and kept their bleached Bones in his apartment what did u think the polaroids would be like

— joy (@ligayaparx) September 30, 2022

The dramatisation of Dahmer has left a few questions, which Seventeen covered, trying to sort through what was fact and what was fiction.

It covers what happened to the apartment building where many of the crimes occurred, lasering in on questions about Dahmer’s run-ins with his neighbours and all the myriad ways police negligence helped the sicko remain on the loose for all that time.

[sources:buzzfeednews&seventeen&indy100]