Abstract
In an iconic scene from the 1995 movie Copycat, criminal psychologist Helen Hudson (played by Sigourney Weaver) is giving a lecture on serial killing. She first requests all males in the room to stand up, explaining that serial killing is principally a male trait. Then, she asks all African American and Asian males to sit down. Those who remain, the white men, become the iconic image of serial killers. The popular misconception or media fallacy that arises from this cinematic depiction is that all serial killings are done by white males.
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Ronald M. Holmes and Stephen T. Holmes Red Dragon (1981)
Anthony Hopkins’s Silence of the Lambs (1991)
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© 2012 Caroline Joan S. Picart and John Edgar Browning
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Picart, C.J.S. (2012). Race and Serial Killing in the Media: The Case of Wayne Williams. In: Picart, C.J.S., Browning, J.E. (eds) Speaking of Monsters. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137101495_18
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137101495_18
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, New York
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