Days of Horror

YOU ARE FASCINATED, AREN’T YOU?

There’s a peculiar comfort in the chill of a ghost story, a murder mystery, or a documentary that recounts the brutal end of a stranger’s life. Late at night, behind locked doors, countless people around the world lean in toward their screens or speakers, drawn not to tales of love or joy, but to bloodstains, motive, and madness. They aren’t sick. They aren’t broken. They’re just… curious.

But what is it, exactly, that pulls us toward the morbid? Why does true crime have such an unshakable grip on the modern imagination?

The answer is not simple. It’s knotted in emotion, biology, and culture—and it has far more to do with our need for understanding than our capacity for cruelty.

A Safe Glimpse Into Chaos

At the heart of this fascination lies a paradox. We fear death. We fear violence. We cross the street to avoid danger. Yet when danger is framed behind the safety of a screen or the pages of a book, it becomes magnetic.

True crime offers us a window into the storm—real, brutal, and unpredictable—while we remain dry, untouched, and safe on the other side. It lets us examine the unthinkable from a distance. The murderer becomes a subject of analysis. The crime scene a grim puzzle. The victim, a fleeting echo of someone we could have been.

It’s no different from watching lightning dance on the horizon. You don’t want to be struck, but you can’t look away.

Order in the Midst of Disorder

There’s structure to true crime. A timeline. A chain of events. A cause and effect.

In an increasingly chaotic world, where injustice often goes unpunished and life offers no guarantees, crime stories sometimes give us what reality cannot: closure. Even in tales where the killer escapes justice or the case remains unsolved, the story itself usually adheres to a form—a beginning, middle, and end.

We crave that order. It offers a sense of control over what is otherwise incomprehensible. In learning how something terrible happened, we convince ourselves—perhaps naively—that we can prevent it from happening to us.

The Dark Mirror of Humanity

When people commit acts of monstrous cruelty, we look for answers. What broke in them? What shaped their violence? Was it trauma? Mental illness? A lifetime of being ignored, tormented, twisted?

By asking these questions, we attempt to draw lines—between us and them, good and evil, sanity and madness. But more often than not, the answers are murky. Killers have jobs, families, hobbies. They walk among us. They are, terrifyingly, ordinary.

This is perhaps the most haunting revelation of all: the worst atrocities are not committed by demons, but by people who once laughed, once loved, once lived just like anyone else. And that realization—the thin veil separating us from them—keeps us returning, again and again, to the scene of the crime.

The Victims Speak Through Us

While the spotlight often falls on the killer, it’s the victims that many listeners and readers truly connect with. The teenager walking home from school. The woman who never made it to her car. The child who simply vanished.

Telling these stories, even years after the blood has dried, is a form of remembrance. A way to say: We haven’t forgotten you.

In that sense, true crime can be more than entertainment—it can be a kind of vigil. For many, consuming these stories isn’t about voyeurism. It’s about empathy. About understanding the consequences of evil. About honoring the lives that were stolen, and sometimes, demanding the justice they never received.

A Manual for Survival

There’s a reason why many true crime fans are women. It’s not about enjoying the horror—it’s about preparing for it. Listening to how someone was followed, manipulated, or attacked isn’t just morbid detail—it’s information.

Some call it “survival training in disguise.” Learning to spot warning signs. Recognizing patterns of behavior. Trusting instincts. In a world that often gaslights women’s fear, true crime says: You’re right to be cautious. Here’s why.

It’s grim, yes. But it’s also empowering.

The Forbidden Door

There’s something inherently transgressive about exploring death, cruelty, and the darker aspects of human nature. From the earliest days of civilization, we’ve been told not to dwell on such things. Don’t stare at corpses. Don’t speak of murder at the dinner table. Don’t ask what happened behind the police tape.

And yet, we always have.

Public executions once drew crowds. Penny dreadfuls flew off shelves. Victorian newspapers printed every lurid detail of the latest domestic horror. Today, our rituals have changed—but the instinct remains.

We’re drawn to the forbidden not because we relish the horror, but because it’s part of understanding life itself. You can’t appreciate light if you’ve never stepped into the dark.

Conclusion: More Than Just Morbid

To some, true crime is a guilty pleasure. To others, it’s a lifeline, a lesson, or even a mission. But no matter how we engage with it, the truth remains: these stories reveal us.

Not just the killers. Not just the victims. Us—as a society. As people who live with fear, with curiosity, and with the need to know.

There is no shame in looking into the abyss—only in pretending it doesn’t exist.

Because when we face the darkness, we learn to cherish the light.