'That was the first sign': Ryan Murphy slammed for claiming none of Jeffrey Dahmer's victims' families responded to him
The controversies revolving around Netflix’s ‘Monster: The Jeffery Dahmer Story’ just keep getting worse and worse with each passing week. Since its debut on the world's leading streaming platform, the show has been one of the most popular, despite the fact that the families of the victims have repeatedly stated that the series is "retraumatizing" them by showing how the notorious serial killer murdered someone they loved so much.
Apart from that, family members of Dahmer’s victims have also noted that they were never truly approached by the creators of the show, and watching the series felt like “reliving” the horror all over again. Such statements made people all across furious and they criticized Netflix and creator Ryan Murphy for committing such a shameful act. However, Murphy replied to all these allegations and quashed all rumors about not reaching out to the families of the victims.
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While attending an event for the show at the DGA Theater in Los Angeles (via The Hollywood Reporter), Murphy revealed that he and his team reached out to 20 victims’ families and friends while researching for the project, but sadly, nobody responded to them.
“It's something that we researched for a very long time and we, over the course of the three, three and a half years when we were really writing it, working on it, we reached out to 20, around 20 of the victims' families and friends trying to get input, trying to talk to people and not a single person responded to us in that process. So we relied very, very heavily on our incredible group of researchers who… I don't even know how they found a lot of this stuff,” Murphy said.
Murphy’s comments spread like a wildfire on social media and forced users to share their opinion on the matter. Fans slammed the show’s creator for making such a series and noted that receiving no answer from the victims’ families was a sign that they didn’t want to relive those horrifying moments again.
One of the users said, “Maybe that was the first sign to yk, not make it.” Another social media user wrote, “It should have been obvious why they didn’t respond.” Another social media user tweeted, “I wonder why they wouldn’t respond… maybe they don’t want to relive and have their family members trauma dug up.”
Maybe that was the first sign to yk, not make it, lmfao...
— spooky sZn 🧟♂️ (@SnapzEnt) October 28, 2022
I wonder why they wouldn’t respond… maybe they don’t want to relive and have their family members trauma dug up
— Spooky AJ & Smitty Fan Account (@SubaruSmitty6) October 28, 2022
“Netflix should’ve never released this series,” another social media user wrote. “How disrespectful to reach out to victims and families and be like ‘hey, remember that incredible tragic and traumatic thing that happened to you? Tell me all about it, I want to make money off of this!’ how about just not using these stories for your own benefit?” another user wrote. “Imagine a family that is still grieving or finally at some level of peace and here goes this guy reaching out, talking about doing a show about your relative's killer,” said another one.
How disrespectful to reach out to victims and families and be like „hey, remember that incredible tragic and traumatic thing that happened to you? Tell me all about it, I want to make money off of this!“ how about just not using these stories for your own benefit?
— 💕call me baby idk🌸 (@BlushPinknBows) October 28, 2022
Imagine a family that is still grieving or finally at some level of peace and here goes this guy reaching out, talking about doing a show about your relative's killer. 😑
— Goof'n Around (@Paynen_Sahrow) October 28, 2022
Even after so many complaints and criticisms, the Netflix series continues to shatter viewership records. The show went on to become the number-one show on Netflix in its first week and claimed the numero uno position in more than 90 countries. On the other hand, the true-crime show was watched for over 496 million hours in the first two weeks of its release, making it the second-most watched English-language series in a week.
Meanwhile, Nielsen reported that the Netflix series was watched for 3.7 billion minutes in its first week and became the number one show from Sept. 19 to Sept. 25. However, the second week turned out to be even bigger for the show and it beat its own record to rake in record-breaking numbers. According to the latest numbers, ‘Dahmer’ took the lead for the second week in a row on Nielsen's Top 10 streaming chart, with 4.4 billion minutes.
The series continues to enjoy success even after facing a lot of backlashes and the trend shows that it might top Nielsen for a third straight week.
