Does media coverage of male serial killers differ from that of female serial killers?

[critresearch]

Hi, I am doing a project for an exam and i've chosen to look into the reporting of serial killers. I want to find out if female serial killers are looked at in a more sympathetic way. If anyone has an opinion please write.

[rose_child]

I think they differ according to their choice of victims, and what they did to them.(i.e. just murder, ritualistic killings, etc.) i may be wrong but that's what i believe.

[diamond d]

Here is the link

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/female_serial_killer_has_to_work

[Leana76]

It seems to me that the males get more coverage than the females. I hear about some females just got executed and I had never heard of them. But the males, who get executed, you remember hearing about them. Males get more publicity.

[Kimmy]

I think that males definately get more coverage, watching a program recently about woman on death row was a real eye opener.

[HeavenCries]

But there really aren't many known female serial killers other than the Wuornos case, who insisted she wasn't a serial killer.:confused:

[lisaznola]

I think that the media does play down female serial killers, but I think that may be, in part, because they are a harder 'sell' to the general public. In general people seem to accept the abuse history excuse easier from females than from men. It seems like the general public doesn't want to read about women being serial killers. Maybe it is just harder for us to think of our mothers and sisters, who we are raised to think of as nuturers and as the people we need to protect, as vicious killers without remorse, rhyme and reason. ?
Look at the Manson case (not really serial killers, but valid in the male/female prospective.) Charles Manson was made a 'superstar' by the press but the females that actually helped kill the victims were kind of flash in the pan paper sellers at best. Charles Manson's face sold the papers not the girls' faces. Sade was a seller at first because she was willing to talk, but the focus quickly went to Manson.
Even now the females get a few seconds on a news brief when they come up for parole, when Manson comes up it is a media circus even if he doesn't show up.
I think that the media focuses on what they can sell, and male serial killers are just easier to get the public to buy.

[bakerboy]

As this is a historical section of the forum I will stick to true historical female serial killers. Really, there was only one... Elizabeth Bathory. See my thread here:

http://boards.library.trutv.com/showthread.php?t=291330

I do not believe that women in general do much of serial killing because they lack one component required, that being testosterone. Also, most male serial killers kill for "sexual kicks" ( "read testosterone"), whereas if women kill in multiples it is usually for money,emotions or other "non" sexual motives. Elizabeth Bathory ( well educated for her time and very feminine looking) differs from all other multiple killing women... she killed for sexual kicks. In this, she is unique in history.

[TheSkwerl]

I don't think that there's that many female "serial killers", but I think what gets the media coverage is the brutality level that men can impose on a victim. Females (at least a majority of them) who kill lack the brutality level because of the "maternal instinct". I think that females are less predatory and tend to hurt or kill the people closest to them (i.e. children, family members).

[jamin86]

I think female killers get more notoriety, if the killings are sexual in nature. How many people know the names Hindley and Homolka, compared to Brady and Bernado? Men seem much more capable of sex murder than women in the public mind, which is why in cases like the above the female counterparts stick out much more than the males.