The true crime genre for stories and podcasts has risen in popularity over the last few years, intriguing audiences with the mystery behind the story. While these stories may be entertaining and provide some insight into the criminal justice system, there are many flaws behind this genre. Ethics are often shoved aside when producing this content, and the individuals involved in these stories are exploited for money and popularity on the internet.

One of the main problems of the true crime genre is privacy invasion. Many producers fail to obtain consent from the people involved in these crimes, so they go behind their backs and write stories that don’t accurately capture important details. Plus, doing stories on past traumatic events can bring up unnecessary stress for survivors and set back the healing progress that others have made. I think that many podcasters and story writers are insensitive to the fact that these are real events and have caused the devastating loss of many lives.

Furthermore, the widespread sensationalization of stories like these numbs consumers to such horrific events and blurs the line between entertainment and reality. I believe that such heavy topics should be considered news, not entertainment. If podcasters and other producers turn lethal crime into amusement for public consumption, the human cost of these crimes becomes overshadowed. In my opinion, finding entertainment from nonfictional brutal tragedies should not be normalized, especially when the deep-rooted problems behind these devastations aren’t addressed.

Another problem that I find especially alarming within the true crime community is the glorification of serial killers. There are many communities online that praise and look up to murderers, and I believe this is due to the way they’re portrayed in true crime media. Many podcast channels produce merchandise relating to the crimes they talk about which is absolutely beyond me. Not only is it directing the focus of these crimes on the perpetrator rather than the victim, but just imagine you are mourning the death of a family member who was brutally murdered and you see T-shirts with their killer on them in public. Profiting off of others’ experiences should not be considered acceptable, and I think social media platforms should do more to censor this content.

Violence has become glamorized on the internet, with many creators producing content that steers away from the original point entirely. For example, there is a TikTok account called “Cookies & Crime” that tells stories about violent crimes while making cookies related to the crime. I think that channels like this are entertainment gone wrong. If they were to talk about the deep-rooted problems associated with these crimes, I think the morality of the content would be less questionable, but making a profit off of stories that aren’t yours is in poor taste.

All in all, I think that while there are a few documentaries and podcasts that appropriately address crime stories, the vast majority miss the mark and harm people involved for some type of profit. We as consumers hold some sort of power over the media that is popularized, and I think we should consider the impact of the content we consume.