Mass Shooters, Fandom, and Sincerity

How we seek to create meaning through evil in a mediated world

Photo by Mika Baumeister on Unsplash

Author’s Note: I am so grateful for the outpouring of support I’ve received since the beginning of summer. I am only four paid subscriptions away from 200. This money goes directly to justify my time to my family as well as funding books, subscriptions, and other resources so I can produce better writing. Thanks for everything, y’all. You’re the best.

Today I read a fascinating, troubling longform article by the wonderfully insightful internet reporter and interpreter

Katherine Dee

titled “Adam Lanza Fan Art” published in Tablet Magazine. In it she explores the subversive and transversive True Crime Community online, sometimes jokingly referred to as the True Cringe Community. A group that hangs out on Tumblr, Instagram, YouTube, and other platforms exploring the lives and legacies of famous mass shooters. Very often the line is crossed between “exploring” and glorifying. Fan art is made. Fan videos with edits from the shooters’ own YouTube videos are used to create touching tributes. In other words, it’s fandom for mass shooters. As troubling as the article is, I think it’s worth a read, as most of Dee’s work is. But it’s her conclusion and its implications that I want to focus on today: that these young people (this fandom is almost entirely made up of minors from what I can tell) are compelled by a sense of sincerity in violence, belonging in a community of rebels, and meaning through fame.