‘Stay Sexy and Don’t Get Murdered’: Depictions of Female Victimhood in Post-Me Too True Crime

This article draws on data from 18 semi-structured interviews with women which explore their relations with true crime television. Complicating popular and academic arguments that such relations operate pedagogically (that true crime offers a form of ‘safety advice’ for women), the data attests to the participants’ reflexive negotiation of ethics as a frame through which viewing investments are presented, regulated and articulated. Both contributing to and questioning feminist work which has explored the potential ‘reimagining’ of true crime within a post #MeToo context, the data offers insight into how these female viewers negotiate what they see as ‘ethical viewing’ of the genre and its relationship with questions of ‘witnessing’ and responsibility.

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‘True Crime and…’: The Hybridisation of True Crime Narratives on YouTube

Hobbs

Hoffman

2022

Crime Fiction Studies

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Digital platforms have heralded a renaissance in true crime production and engagement, providing previously marginalised voices with opportunities to challenge longstanding – and often problematic – genre conventions. Whilst significant consideration has been given to professional streaming platforms and aural user-generated mediums such as podcasts, few studies have explored visual user-generated content such as that appearing on YouTube. In order to explore these new but increasingly popular forms, we focus on the videos of Stephanie Soo, Samantha Taylor and Bailey Sarian, who combine true crime narratives with the popular YouTube staples of Mukbang, ASMR and makeup tutorial videos. Our work examines the repercussions of true crime becoming a unique selling point within these YouTube subgenres and considers the ethical consequences of using the true crime genre’s paradigms to bring greater attention, likes and subscribers to established YouTube channels. We observe that these videos are contradictory documents which provide a potentially empowering outlet for female-led true crime while simultaneously replicating the troubling trends that have marked the genre as a space in which the bodies of victims are often exploited as entertainment.

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‘Stay Sexy and Don’t Get Murdered’: Depictions of Female Victimhood in Post-Me Too True Crime

Cited by 4 publications

References 9 publications

Mortality, moral regulation, and (im)moral entrepreneurship in My Favorite Murder

Mortality, moral regulation, and (im)moral entrepreneurship in My Favorite Murder

Female audiences for true crime television: Popular discourse, feminism and the politics of ‘ethical viewing’

‘True Crime and…’: The Hybridisation of True Crime Narratives on YouTube

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