Did Jeffrey Dahmer's Life Experiences Contribute To His Killer Status? Jeffrey Dahmer Case Analysis 

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@Trey Adams that was unnecessary

@Trey Adams Hella rude and presumptuous.

A good parent, who is trying their best, will always think they can or could have done better

@Trey Adams And how many can you have? You seem to know everything. By the way, what quantitative data are you using to reach your conclusion and judge somebody else?

That's what OCD is. Dahmer was unlucky that the pattern was associated with human organs.

@@_illuminandi if he had just stuck with taxidermy would have been fine

This is an excellent analysis.

But why kill people he didn’t know. Couldn’t he have an inner World without killing them? Maybe write stories or other types of inner world experiences than killing.

@@sunnypie2 Given that there were a lot of things wrong with Dahmer from the start, over time I think he started to realise how different he was from people, especially the gregarious and active young people he consistently chose for his victims (people who bore no similarity to himself). Dancers, bodybuilders, models with great bodies - the "Chippendale Type" he so admired. Some were fathers of families - people engaged strongly in life in general. Dahmer on the other hand, from a very young age, flunked out of almost everything - only barely graduated from High School, left College in the first semester due to low GPA, was kicked out of the military, failed to set himself up in Miami where he slept on the beach, and could not establish a good career or lasting relationship. It was clear he actually had little interest in career, relationships or even hobbies (his humble aquarium was like a major turning point for him and his only normal interest). I think eventually he wanted to try to fully possess and control these people who were so different to him, and the ultimate way was to make them even more lifeless than himself. Then they would never remind him of what he never had - their fate would be worse than even his own. This lateral transference of lifelessness from himself into others, especially those with active lives, was the power and control he often spoke of seeking and achieving fulfillment from. If your main sexual interest is intercourse with dead people (necrophilia), you clearly have issues with the living - they remind you of something you don't have - a spark of life.

@@ReturnOfTheJ.D. Omg, this is the far best explanation and sums up Dahmer's personality the best, bravo. I think there are lot of factors , his DNA, upbringing, he was alone all the time and developed his twisted fantasies even more... But the main question what caused him to kill them.. He was jealous of people around him because they had everything he didn't, he was just empty shell and scary part he knew that , and he probably thought hey my life doesn't worth a thing so l will take other's life too .. He had nothing to live for and nothing to lose, so scary. He grew up without any friends detached from humans....

@@Lilly-hh9es I came to the conclusion when I realised that Dahmer was always a ne'er-do-well, a down-and-outer with complete apathy towards life, while all his victims were (strangely) young, fit and clean (no drug addicts) with big futures ahead. Dahmer was threatened by those people more than any other type of person he came across - they reminded him of everything he never had and never could have, and he eventually resolved that dilemma by killing them. It would bring them down to his level, and even the score of their lot in life compared to his. Then they'd be no more alive than him, and even more dead than him, which must have been appealing to someone of his nature. The life he had to endure, one of emptiness and nothingness, would be theirs also, and through these both literal and symbolic sacrifices, those bright stars would blind him no more.

Our system is truly broken. I hear you.

What are your problems do you have friends why are you going to a psychiatrist I'm speaking as a pure novice no offense

You are so right! I had to switch insurance with a new job. The new one only pays for 30 minute sessions. I can barely warm up to someone in 30 minutes. It feels like the clock is always ticking. The mental health system is definitely broken. 😢😱

My one & only experience with a psychiatrist ,took me 35 minutes to fill out a questionnaire, the first 4-5 minutes, the Dr shushed me, saying I was ADHD or ADD ,wanted me to try high anxiety meds ,come back in a month.. Who isn't anxious or nervous about a Dr. wanting to prescribe in the first few minutes..

you are 100 pct correct. i worked at a clinic in administration position. you are RIGHT. there are thousands and thousands of therapists, the first one a person goes to is not necessarily the right one----i have seen people walk out within 15 minutes, absolutely knowing they will get nowhere with that specific therapist. I could go on and on.....always listen to your inner voice. P.S. the sessions, in my opinion are too short.

ALL parents have regrets. What about Chris Watts? What about that guy who ran off with, married, had a baby with, and then killed, his own daughter who had been given out for adoption? Steven Playdl I think his name was.

My mother and I had the same struggles. Especially when I became a teenager. Thankfully, we made amends a handful of years before she passed.

@@SY-ok2dq dude... orange and apples.

@@yellowdiamonddoesntapprove6632 I think his point is that not 'All' parents have regrets. He's correct.

I don't think he actually wanted to do it. There's a reason he tried to supress it almost a decade after his first kill

So did Bundy, and also Nilson. Both were necrophiliacs, also.

He certainly has a high level of self awareness and never tried to excuse what he did. I found that interesting that he could objectively view what he did as monstrous and appeared to genuinely want to understand why he did what he did. Everything about this case is crazy and makes me appreciate my own, relatively normal and boring, life.

He never enjoyed the killing he just needed the corpse. He didn't want to hurt anyone it was just an unfortunate thing he had to do to get what he really wanted. To dominate and defile their corpse

@@jekw23 Right, reminded me of Kemper. He evaluated himself and was pretty intelligent, to the extent of becoming a drinking buddy of the police. The way they can discuss it without emotion - maybe they don't experience a full range of emotions, specifically... empathy - the one that makes us human.

After watching the series, I wonder if his lack of connection as a baby also made it difficult to know how to bond with people and how to trust . It must be devastating to have a mother not hold you or interact with you. That is the building blocks to our social skills and understanding of love. And this didn’t change as he grew. He was alone in elementary school and thought of as strange in high school. The longer you don’t know how to bond or make friends, the more foreign it would seem. To me, he was desperate to own someone so completely that they would never reject him. Dead things don’t leave. Add to that, he realized he was gay- which was not accepted at the time. It seemed like an explosive mixture of shame, yet still wanting to keep them. That’s just my feeling. He was ashamed of being gay so killing the men was like killing his own gayness. And yet he had no way of building a relationship, even if he wanted to, so all that was left was to own them and keep them.

YOU'RE DEAD WRONG! Jeff's mother was innocent and Lionel dahmer his dad was likely also a serial killer . The media brainwashed you to hate his mother too convenient and a scapegoat.

I had the same thought!

@@Mayfloweralways I wonder about the brother though. How did he turn out? He was raised by the mother. Haven't heard anything about him. Does anyone here know?

@@shirleysue228 as far as I’ve heard, David Dahmer (I believe he’s changed his name now) turned out just fine. He’s traumatized by what Jeffrey did, but otherwise he’s living a normal life. I think he did a handful of interviews back in the 90’s and hasn’t talked publicly about his brother’s crimes since. I think the difference with David is that he had both his father and Jeffrey looking out for him and encouraging him. Jeffrey was actually a decent big brother to him. For Jeffrey, the only person he really had was his dad, and even that relationship was a bit awkward. Plus, when their parents split, David went with their mom, and Jeffrey was left to fend for himself. I think that had a profound effect on Jeffrey.

The second worst. torture, murder and eat the corpse is the worst.

Still dealing with it 5 decades later.

Indeed

And, it's rampant. Emotional neglect is never discussed yet it's a serious issue.

There was actually a study conducted (before this type of research became illegal) where babies were put into isolation and only fed/ diapers changed as needed. So all “necessities for survival” were met but no human contact outside of that. Long story short, all the babies died.

You're right!

There are many explanations.

He was just born messed up and having messed up parents just made it worse.

I think the real explanation, as boring as it is, is the law of large numbers. Dahmer was a perfect storm, and a lot of his risk factors may have been causally independent from each other: 1) there are three hundred million people in the United States, 2) some subset of those people are on a biological path of least resistance to becoming sexually stimulated by viscera (there’s an evolutionary psychology explanation here: shininess and wetness signal readiness of the vagina for sex) 3) some subset of the general population is also prone to attachment issues because they were abandoned as children 4) some subset of genpop is prone to attachment issues because they are just “tragically socially awkward,” as Todd says. 5) some people are just high on dominance 6) some just feel infatuated with concepts of darkness and evil (Satan, movie villains…) 7) some people are extremely low on empathy for biological reasons 8) some people’s parents initiated them into the world of taxidermy hobbyism 9) some people’s mothers took teratogenic drugs during pregnancy Given enough opportunities, or a big enough general population, at least one person if not a few people will have *all* of these traits at the same time. It was just a perfect storm of genetic predispositions and environmental circumstances. For any one risk factor, you could always ask “but what about all the people who have that risk factor who don’t eat people?” But for every risk factor considered collectively, you can’t ask the same question.

@@jf41 Great explanation!

The difference between serial killers and people with heavy trauma is in the genes. Many people have the "tendency" to be serial killers but it never gets "activated" for many reasons. I'm glad you are doing better. Ignore people and their opinions about your choice of not having kids. You have a great heart despite the trauma. 🫂

There’s more to the story than any of us know

I did get married and have kids after having a shit childhood and leaving at 16. Im now 57 i can see how others would not do what i did,but im glad i did,im still married after 31years and my 5 kids are good people,so we just dont know,thank god! Be boring if we did! I also have 6 dogs! 😂

Same thing with my mom never flet her presence eventhough she was around me 24 7 ,she used to think her duty is to just cook in time and watch TV if she like goes shopping rest things doesn't matter

Oh no!

I had heard the name, didn't know who he was or what he did until I saw the netflix series.

Interesting. Makes me wonder if part of him felt he was better off being in prison, so he could not kill again. And of course, no drinking. He was probably pretty lonely too and glad for even just someone waving at him. It's a shame he didn't get the help he needed when he was young. Maybe what he did could have been avoided.

@@wolfe6220 I completely agree with what you said. I believe that if he got positive reinforcement by both of his parents regardless of what they were going through, I think he may have turned out differently. I believe that his father and mother both are somewhat to blame. His dad fed into his obsession with dead animals and such, and didn't teach him that was wrong when he was a child. His mother basically neglected him and left with his brother. I think what he truly wanted was someone that wouldn't leave his life. His parents did, and basically everyone around him did as well because he was seen as odd. He wanted that romantic partner but I also think he wanted to be in control. Lots of childhood trauma can have an effect on someone's adulthood. In a sense I feel bad for his life as a child, but he just spiraled out of control as he became an adult. I don't feel sorry for him at all after him knowing it's wrong as an adult, but he continued to do it over and over.

Wisconsin is basically Canada 🇨🇦 don’t cha know ay? Would not happen in New Jersey

He's crazy hard working

hes amazing!

Maybe it was with Stone Phillips?

Right, who does that? How could they not know he was troubled? They had serious problems, all around sad situation.

No one is stating the obvious, his brain just wasn't fully wired from the start, anything happened after his birth is incidental

The drinking doesn't help, especially at an early age.

@@chuckrobinson599 Really? there should be a lot more cannibalistic, necrophiliac, serial killers if that is the cause

I blame my parents for all my problems too

It's true. Although histrionic isn't cluster B, cluster B is probably the most destructive.

@@badxradxandy we're all sure you do, what are your real ways of acting out? I'm betting your a drunk.

Yes! There’s an interview in which JDevil said that the reason his father moved to the motel was because it was court ordered! So what did the father do to be ordered out of the home. There’s another interview where the father said he found squirrel bones in the drainage and knew it was JD. Then in another interview he changes that to bones in a bucket that made a type of musical tune when JD dropped them in. I’m sorry. The dad was also a sicko!!! Covering stuff up interview after interview.

@@chuckrobinson599 Problems from childhood aren't just acting out. One example of a problem could just be an obedience to authority and the inability to say "no." Quite sad when kids are made to walk on eggshells around their parents. Ends up passing down mental illnesses and creating such polarizing personalities in the world. It's a shame some ppl even have kids, it's never an obligation.

If you notice, we never really study any serial killer. We didn't study Bundy either.

Dr. Grande is not going to diagnose anyone in this video, just speculating on Jeffrey Dahmer or any situation like it.

I studied him: He is a sick creature. It’s all his parents fault, the professors’ fault, the boyfriends’s fault... yes, he genuinely was interested in his own case, because it turned him on. He wasn’t intelligent because he was driven by similar behaviors found in flies (attracted to cadavers, preferring only non moving bodies…).

This movie wasn't based off any psychiatric study, which are confidential. This movie was based off Dahmer's statements to detectives & other witnesses, which are reliable only to a point. There were plenty of psychiatrists who thoroughly studied & evaluated those other serial psychos. But that's all confidential patient info. Most of the other serial psychos never give either a full confession or a truthful one. Dahmer pretty much truthfully confessed, so that's the basis for this movie. Dennis Rader (BTK) also spilled the beans truthfully to detectives, but no director with any conscience, or production company, would want to make a movie about him since there were small children who were the victims of Raders evil crimes. Any potential movie about that maniac would stir up much deserved anger and condemnation. Edit: As for Bundy, there was EXTENSIVE study on him probably more so than any other since he was so willing to talk to anyone after the murders, but his statements are totally unreliable because that psychopath is considered to be the most manipulative of them all. He was a con man & nearly all of the psychiatrists who have evaluated & studied him as well as the detectives who interrogated him said he is not to be trusted because any attempts at him showing remorse are just another part of his MANY manipulation schemes.

@@flaccidego4291 the show was so disturbing to me because i can relate to his loneliness, drinking, and just wanting a connection, im not a sociopath though. I believe dahmer was telling the truth cuz when i got caught for my crime, i was completely honest, kind of like needing to talk to someone and be heard. I dont feel like that much anymore ever since i consistently go to the gym, but it scared me at how much i was able to relate to the show at points and understood what dahmer was saying.

I would guess it definitely would have. I think his main issues came from never having deep connections with people and poorly dealing with stressors. Unless he was born a nécropole, then that would be harder to treat

Many people are neglected, experience trauma and different forms of abuse throughout their childhood, including myself. Not all of us end up being deranged serial killers. I'm not good with relationships and I'm mostly alone in my life, a loner with different challenges (I do have a job and other things working for me), all similar to Dahmer, but I'm not about to kill anyone. I have gotten a lot of therapy though and still am, having several things to work on.

@@Jaksi-a , Good on you. 💝👍🏽🌎👍🏽💝

@@Jaksi-a I think his problems was definitely started in the womb and others are learned or caused by our parents.

It probably felt the same as his emotionally distant (dead) parents, it was something he was used to.

@@wolfe6220 yep exactly. We crave familiarity .

@@anshulmann I think that's why some people who have been abused when young tend to end up being abused in their romantic relationships. I think the abused person may have mannerisms that may be "attractive" to abusers (like they know they can dominate the party who was abused in childhood) so they swoop in and draw the less powerful party in. And once in and the abused party realizes what's truly happening, well, they are in a relationship like the one they were in when they were children. And they might regress to that totally submissive state like they experienced before.

@@wolfe6220 yeah True. That’s how we all keep reliving our trauma through our relationships until ofcourse we ultimately learn enough n break the loop consciously.

I was supposed to be an abortion and I definitely felt it if that makes sense. I don't blame my mom though I blame my father for beating her so much that she didn't want anymore kids with him and was trying to leave him. Back then it was still totally legal to beat your wife though so the police would tell my mom not to piss my dad off anymore like she deserved it. My mom finally left him in the 80s when domestic violence laws went into effect. She did her best.

He touched on it in his previous video on Jeffrey

So ballsy of him to still kill that boy even after that close call. Knowing he’d be missing. Then again maybe he felt there was no going back after he drilled a damn hole in his head. Out of all the prolific serial killers, this man will always confuse and fascinate me the most.

Crazy thing is that the 14 year old’s own BROTHER was targeted by Dahmer previously….imagine that *edit for which I believe Dahmer was arrested for. Similar to the Gacy and Bundy cases, there were so many missed chances by law enforcement

Dahmer moved into a poor neighborhood predominantly populated by people of color. I don't think the Milwaukee cops gave 2fux about that boy or any of the people living in that section of town.

The victim's name was Konerak Sinthasomphone. The police had some recorded conversations that were very discriminatory.

That would be a awesome brain to study

Lord where is the sympathy for the family? He was a crazy individual who killed children!

They wouldn't have found much of anything of real significance in his brain. This goes beyond the brain!

I agree with you completely 💯.

That's an interesting thought. I bet he's so pleased he didn't run that day!

Or maybe he would have kicked Dahmer's ass.

Wow DeShawn, good question. Never thought of that.

My father ran marathons and jogged past the Daumer house many times. He may have been the one Jeffery was after, but in the late 70s jogging was a popular fad.

I'm watching the Dahmer series on Netflix too; I was telling my friend about it, and she had no idea who Jeffrey Dahmer was! I said you'll know who he is when I tell you what he did, etc. etc. And she still had no idea! So maybe my friend resided in the same parallel universe you were in 😁 I think having a dog may have made a positive difference to Jeffrey's childhood, as you say he must have felt very isolated, but there is also the possibility that he could have shown extreme cruelty to it as his sadistic nature may have been wired into his brain as he formed in the womb. I suppose we will never know what made him like that.

Unfortunately people who display these types of things from an early age often torture animals. He had a thing about cutting up animals, I don't think it would have been a good idea to give him a pet!

@@powderandpaint14 Found this in an article about serial killers who loved their pets - "As a young boy, serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer adored his dog, a Spaniel cross who he named Frisky, as being a shy, timid and lonely boy, Jeffrey's dog was often his “only friend” according to his father. And yet, Dahmer would happily impale the heads of other dogs he’d found as road-kill on a stick to scare the neighbours."

He had a dog and previously he had a cat which they had to leave behind because they moved.

No, he would've killed the dog. He had serious abandonment issues. He felt killing anything liked would keep them from "leaving"

I don't think you could learn much of relevance from stuff like scans. Much too reductionist.

His life experiences obviously contributed a lot more than genetics, or any sort of inborn peculiarity or defect. Scans may very well have shown a perfectly typical brain.

Their ego would love the attention

@Wicker 2 I was listening to a radio show this morning that was talking about childhood trauma and intergenerational trauma. The man being interviewed described it super well with a sports reference, he compared the traumatic event as a cross-check or a tackle, and the trauma response as a concussion. The internal response of an incident often plays more of a role in future health/well-being of a person than the incident itself. So perhaps although JD's may not have suffered the worst things to ever happen to someone, it's how his brain responded to the situation that made him into the monster he was. 🤷🏼‍♀️ Or not, but who knows. Definitely an interesting angle to consider.

Dahmer was cooperative in this regard and genuinely puzzled by himself - which is another thing that makes him an unusual serial killer. But he was murdered in prison quite quickly as we know.

In the Netflix series you can see a scene where a young Jeffrey comes home, and his little brother is hysterically crying, he looks at his brother and walks away. I thought then his mother reacted to Jeffrey that way. I think your comment is very correct, which I translate to, the mother always in bed and busy with herself must have meant, she hardly ever responded to Jeffrey when he needed it. Do this to a baby then toddler and this creates a fear and feeling of death/dying.

What does that word, "pekid", mean?

@@claudiamayordominguez7322 It means it looks as though one isn't feeling well or beginning a decline in health. I grew up in the south. It was a commonly used term.

@@claudiamayordominguez7322 A little pale or not feeling well.

Thanks! I just don't want to put myself through hearing all of that today.

I feel the same way.

I agree with you. He was abandoned and rejected by his mother even before he was born. She didn’t want him after he was born and his father tried but also abandoned him when he was having an affair. He was bullied and was just an outcast. I think that’s why it took him longer to murder the hearing impaired black man because he accepted him.

Well, Dahmer didn't really torture his victims. In that respect many serial killers were far worse than Dahmer (Gacy would brutally assault and taunt his victims long before they died). Dahmer basically wanted full ownership of a body relatively quickly, while guys like Gacy were motivated mainly by wanting to see their victims suffer.

This is really sick. The idolization of this man makes me cringe. He killed mostly Black men and dismembered their bodies severely. He drilled a hole in the heads of two kids! This romanization of a sick individual is traumatizing to the victims family members.

@@ryanjacobson2508 Jeffrey Dahmer was a rapist before he killed them he drugged them and was sexually assault them he was very violent

But that's the thing, many kids don't have that and don't murder people. Parental guidance or guidance of some sort is so important, as well as social wellbeing/having friends. Why is it that some kids that don't have these things figure life out and become successful, and others commit crime?

@@mereanawi6194 actually that's called individuality, where a person decides something, on what they want, themselves. They chosed not to, ... But here's the thing, some chose to but had people to help/motivate/support them made them change for those that are making bad decisions can be help and persuade to do good, we shouldn't let bad people do bad things and not do anything, that will rein chaos. People are not made equal, so some are good, some not. And those that are not good should be helped.

Yeah, I think Todd has a bit of a social- environmentalist bias because of his psychotherapy training. What about prenatal exposures? What about genetics?

Dahmer was the way he was. Even if he was brought up with love, he will end up in the same tragedy. Do you know why? Because of his curiosity to see what's inside and the urge to eat what's inside. It was not something grown out of a lack of love. Rather, he was either born with sexual paraphilias or stimulated by the hernia surgery he had to undergo when he was very young. His OCD was the main villain. Instead of the most common handwashing pattern, the unlucky guy had a gruesome pattern stimulated by that hernia surgery.

Oh wow! It probably was him

that seems highly likely

Yeah, thinking back,she told me she'd had something like a sensory smell reaction to his image on the news, Olfactory (smell)is supposedly the strongest trigger for memory recall. Given she was the visual type as well, it all pieced together for her She regretted not reporting it but had seen so many "oddities" working the booths. Did she encounter him or didn't she .I believe it was him

I don't know, but I really dislike it when people say, "I went through the same kinds of things in childhood but I didn't let it get to *me*." You didn't go through the same kind of childhood. You have no idea what his childhood felt like, what he experienced in the womb, what his food tasted like to him, how he experienced the sound of his mother's voice. We all only know our own experience. I say this as someone who witnessed horrific things in my family as a child (and now also as an adult). I can't speak for anyone's experience except my own. I can't say anyone was dealt the same cards as anyone else.

@@ifoundthewords I went through my own life and everybody is different. I lived on the street at 15, went hungry a lot, never knew if I would have food on any given day, and that was life. That was life after my garbage childhood described above. I really don't give a flip what you think. My point was that it was never in my mind to take my despair out on anybody else, and that I cannot accept the notion of environment alone. There is something else. Save your "knowledge" for somebody stupid , thinks like you or both.

Mk mind control

@@Dzanarika1 Hell I wouldn't be surprised if it was actually demonic related and I'm someone who doesn't really believe in demons. During one of the murders he apparently blacked out during one of them and didn't remember doing it.

@@doublestarships646 Blackouts can be explained by an adrenaline rush, that would be my first assumption in that situation. It's definitely an interesting subject to study the backgrounds of these people, a predisposition to mental illness and then environmental factors like neglect or abuse can be a deadly combination. A psychology professor of mine once said that ultimately this kind of behavior is illogical and we can't use logic to explain it in a way that feels satisfactory to most people and that has really stuck with me when it comes to learning about serial killers and other acts of violence.

@@doublestarships646 it’s called psychosis.

@@OrNaurItsKat Yeah but none of that results to being fascinated by dead things lolol. A lot of people go through that sort of stuff and are mildly effected. Even his dad didn't understand it.

I dont know if he has a dedicated video on it but he often touches upon that topic, when talking about notorious killers that are or were alive in prison.

hybristiphilia

Some men are too including the doc.

@@derstoffausdemderjoghurtis right, but a video with his POV would be awesome!!

They’re mentally sick themselves just in a different way

i agree, also correct administration can cause problems too !

Nothing to do with anaesthesia. Rather the operation stimulated the young brain to develop a curiosity to see what's inside. The curiosity slowly turned into fascination. Fascination turned into behaviour. Later on when he was all by himself, it became his routine.

Yes. Same

Respect?

Taking responsibility? He got caught lol and went on a spree till he got caught… This type of admiration that is going on for this man trying to “understand” his actions is just 🤦🏽‍♀️

@@jazminegarcia2081 yes, after he was caught. I'm using the term respect relative to killers. have you seen the way other killers have acted after getting caught? like Ted Bundy as one example. I'm not talking respect by objective standards of regular decency lol this is contextual and I'm sorry if I didn't make that clear 🙂 my point is that, considering how sick he was, he didn't make excuses for himself (blame others) or torment victims' families further by refusing to give information, making false confessions, or other power plays. I think he took it pretty seriously in terms of taking as much responsibility as he was capable of. he certainly seemed to understand that treating it with a sober and direct attitude was important for minimizing how much more damage he did. that doesn't excuse his crimes, like I said. read my entire comment because I made it clear the victims and their families matter most. that's why I have some respect for him, it's actually for their sake. hopefully you're aware of how horribly many killers behave when they're caught. at least Dahmer facilitated closure. even if it's not much, there are many victims' families out there who would give anything to have that. so it does matter how a killer conducts themself after getting caught, imo. I don't think Dahmer had the capacity for affective empathy but expressed a kind of remorse of his own. none of us have a clue what it was like to be him although it's easy to judge him by our standards of conduct. how is that helpful? he was very honest in a way that provided valuable insight into his problems when he didn't have to be. that is helpful for learning to make the world a better place. something went wrong and the best way to save future victims is by studying people like him. most killers won't even give you trustworthy information about themselves towards that end. we'll never understand people like him without recognizing their humanity first. I'm not complimenting him for his own sake but because I appreciate how potentially helpful his attitude was, compared to the vast majority of killers. it matters because of the victims.

@@MithraSemiramis ur insight is ahead (..or behind, pre-1850, I quote, shall we say?) of the time we're in, in this increasingly left-hemisphere dominated world.

Especially seeing as doctors now suspect he was on the spectrum, it's easy to see how something like that could become a fixation

Good point. However, lots of respectable people are in auto accidents and/or are hit in the head ( by flying baseballs, at football practice, by their abusive spouses who beat the woman’s head into the kitchen floor, etc. ) and they don’t murder people.

You have to be born with an abnormal frontal lobe and other parts of the brain can be abnormal as well like the amygdala that let's people show empathy etc...so lack of empathy signifies brain defect...

​@@kellyyork3898 Not all brain damage is the same. It can vary hugely, depending on which part of the brain is damaged and how serious it is. nevertheless, science is increasingly coming to the view that for people to end up like Dahmer, it often takes two components. The First is physical. whether it's specific types of brain damage, genetic (things like "the warrior gene"), and even exposure to very high levels of testosterone in the womb, it can make people much more emotionally unstable and aggressive, and lacking in empathy. The second factor is trauma. It supercharges the underlying physical / genetic problems. They say that "nature loads the gun but nurture pulls the trigger". I heard an interview once with the prison psychologist who dealt with Robert Maudsley case in the UK. Maudsley is said to have been the inspiration for Hannibal Lecter. The psychologist said that in his view, many serial killers have suffered some form of deep trauma and abuse in childhood and they cannot escape from it. In their mind, the abuse didn't happen thirty years ago, it is happening NOW, and they are using their victims as a proxy for their parents. The violence is often a kind of self defence mechanism against those underlying emotions. He said part of the therapy with Maudsley was literally to get him to look into a mirror and see that he was a grown man, and not a child anymore. His abusive parents could no longer hurt him. Maudsley eventually said that his life would have been simpler and happier if he had simply killed his parents. We can speculate that part of Dahmer's crimes were similar in that he was still reacting to the deep feelings of abandonment from his childhood, mixed in with some form of physical / genetic problem that his reactions much more extreme.

"Nature loads the gun, nurture pulls the trigger."

@@lewasil Well said.

@CreativeHandle my best friend suffered neglect in his childhood, you could not make it clearer than by saying it leaves holes in the mind. He tries very hard to understand emotions but he doesn't have a line in the sand, he has a trip wire and if it's tripped he will lash out violently. He's defending himself against an imagined threat, however whereas I would focus my defense on the threat and leave other people/things intact, he hands it out unconditionally. I understand him/empathise with him to a point because I have bpd, so I understand no sense of self, emotional turmoil, but I can only understand so far, then our paths split. Thanks for your response, I was thinking of him when I posted originally.

Also, neglect is invisible and the child might believe even as an adult they were not abused. With physical abuse it´s clear.

That happens to all men.

Not sure how relevant.

and the Dad having similar thoughts as Jeffrey...

Oh my good lord. 16 victims tortured and desecrated and you feel sympathy for Dahmer. Maybe if these were white straight female victims it would be a different story 😒

I feel similar.

Don't feel sorry... he was very manipulative and gets you to feel sorry for him but he still killed his victims, boiled them, drilled into their heads. Feel sorry for the poor families and victims, this man was pure evil. No murderer deserves sympathy.

@@yellowdiamonddoesntapprove6632 I'm not trying to excuse what he had done and neither is he so in what way is he manipulative? And fyi I havent started feeling sorry for him based on any interview he had but after reading his full life story because I can see where his behaviour comes from PS: Evil is Ramirez who lights up like a xmas tree when asked about his victims

@@M-ikaela I'm not saying you are excusing them, but imagine you were the parents of one of the victims. Would you feel sorry for him then? Many people grow up in abusive/ neglectful homes, they don't make human soup because of it. He was narcissistic and absolutely mad. Evil. He even said if he didn't get caught, he'd keep doing it.

No thank you.

Dahmer was the way he was. Even if he was brought up with love, he will end up in the same tragedy. Do you know why? Because of his curiosity to see inside and the urge to eat what's inside. It was not something grown out of a lack of love. Rather the hernia surgery he had to undergo at that young age formed the OCD pattern.

Not actually . It was the OCD that was the real villain. Hernia surgery was the trigger. Obsession to see what's inside and the compulsion to eat it began from that surgery. Or it can be taken in another way as he was born with sexual paraphilias, which was triggered by the hernia surgery.