If you want to save the world, save yourself first.

Damn, I haven’t been writing for 2 days now because I genuinely didn’t have anything to write about. I tried to write on the blank pages of the Google Docs, but my mind was eerily empty and silent. Hence why I haven’t been publishing anything for 2 days. But then, today I finally have something I want to write about, after watching an infamous true crime show on Netflix—'Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story' by Ryan Murphy.

I had known about this case for a while, but I was never interested to educate myself on this case until today. Although I was quite intrigued, I skipped most of the episodes and just watched the first and the last three episodes of the show because I couldn’t bear how chilling and daunting the case was. It really creeps me out to the bone, I’m not even exaggerating. I watched a couple of the defense court on YouTube, also watched an interview with Jeffrey himself, as well as a video by a criminal psychologist explaining how a human could be so desensitized to the point where he became a necrophiliac and a cannibal serial killer.

What makes this case more horror is how aware and calm the perpetrator is with all of it.

Jeffrey knew what he was doing, yet he couldn’t stop his compulsive urges. On the day he was sentenced in court, he calmly stated how he understood the tremendous pain of his victims’ family, how he wished no leniency of his sentence, and how he wished death for himself.

I am in so much distress, terror, and wrath of the sickening acts Jeffrey has done to his victims. After listening to Dr. Eric Hickey, a criminal psychologist who untangles the twisted mind of Jeffrey Dahmer, I can see and understand better what was going on. Jeffrey Dahmer was a corrupted soul. He was so corrupted that the only thing that could stop him was death.

His corrupted soul is caused by many variables, all tangled up. Here’s what I could list up from several sources:

1. He was sexually abused by his neighbor when he was just 8.

2. Since he was a kid, he had to witness his parents’ physical and verbal abuse.

3. Both of his parents struggled with depression and eventually got divorced.

4. When his parents got divorced, they fought for his brother’s custody (David Dahmer), but never really him.

5. During his parents’ divorce, his father moved out and his mother left with his brother, leaving him alone and neglected in the house with no money, no food, and a broken refrigerator.

6. His father disapproved of his sexuality—him being gay.

7. He started to have a fantasy about being necrophilia but has no one to talk to and turn to.

Sources: 

Jeffrey Dahmer Had A Traumatic Childhood. Did It Turn Him Into A Serial Killer?

Murder in Milwaukee: Experts Struggle to Explain Dahmer’s Compulsion : Crime: His behavior was always on the edge, childhood acquaintances say. But no one intervened to help him, and his problems escalated.

Criminal Psychologist Explains The Twisted Mind Of Jeffrey Dahmer

WI v. Jeffrey Dahmer (1992): The Sentencing

What I understand from this case is that, he felt so damn neglected and powerless due to his childhood, that he would be okay to do anything as long as he could fulfill his deep yearning for human connection without a chance of any bit of neglect and rejection from people, also wanting to dominate and have power over them too. He lured his victims to his apartment and only killed them when they tried to leave him. He could only have sexual contact when they were dead. He did not want any of his victims to be away from him, therefore he felt the need to consume some parts of his victims and kept their skeletons to feel like they would be with him forever. That’s how corrupted Jeffrey Dahmer was—he committed a tragic holocaust.

This case was disgusting, creepy, eerie, nauseating, spine-chilling, and appalling… but most of all, it is truly painful and saddening at heart. The victims absolutely do not deserve this, but so is childhood Jeffrey.

What I would like to say in this post is that, crime will always happen no matter how many times the appointed forces try to catch them and sentence them to a horrible stance. We can’t stop the crime that is happening all over the world. We can’t save the world from it, we just can’t. This kind of thing is just beyond our locus of control. What we can do instead, is to look around and see our closest surroundings, starting from ourselves—our souls and our beings. Everyone has some heavy weights within their beings. These heavy weights are energies, manifested from every unpleasant shits from your past. Somehow, it has become a part of you, but please do not neglect it. Please see your soul and ask what it needs from you.

What do you truly need?

What do you truly want?

Quoting Dr. Eric Hickey, “Nature loads the gun, nurture pulls the trigger.” — Yes, some things are encoded in our DNA the moment we are born, but the environment we are in decides whether we follow the coding or not. It is always easier said than done. But the moment we create a healthy and safe environment for ourselves, no matter how loaded the gun is or in other words, no matter how many pathological codes in our DNA that could potentially be harmful, it wouldn’t matter. What I’m saying is, yes, your parents might give you generational trauma and possibly an encoded DNA that is mentally pathological, but once it ends with you, the butterfly effect is no joke. You are slowly but steadily saving the world, by saving yourself first.

Do you get what I mean now? I hope you do.

What I learn from these kinds of crimes is when you experienced childhood scars and/or generational trauma, you’d have four different outputs in life:

1. You’d only hurt others — easiest

2. You’d only hurt yourself — mid-level

3. You’d hurt others and yourself both — mid-level

4. You’d break the cycle — hardest

You choose.

A reminder to you and me: This is difficult but it is not impossible.

You are worthy.

—Later, love!