Free Essay

Addiction to Horror

In:

Submitted By jabarron963
Words 564
Pages 3
Barron 1
Jason Barron
Professor Azul
English
20 April 2013 Addiction To Horror If people are inherently good, how would you explain people’s enjoyment in movies that are filled with murder and gore? A lot of times people do it for the thrill or adrenaline rush. People like thrills, and being scared during a horror movie provides that thrill while ensuring they are completely safe. Being thrilled is actually good for your body and mental health. It relieves stress and tension, and is a very underrated treatment for mild depression. If something scares us our body immediately releases dopamine, endorphins, norepinephrine. Cocaine, which has long been considered the most addictive substance on earth, does nothing more than flood the brain with dopamine. Norepinephrine, on the other hand, mimics the second most addictive drug on earth: which is speed. Our neuro-chemicals are not equal to these illicit drugs. In fact, they're significantly more powerful. The most common endorphin produced by the body is 100 times more powerful than morphine. We become addicted to our own neuro-chemicals; most especially what they cause us to feel. The chemical's natural purpose is for helping a person through a tough or emergency situation. They can provide powerful pain relief and a burst of energy. And it is not only the rush of adrenaline that we become addicted to, it is the wave of relief that

Barron 2 we experience one the threat has passed. Adrenaline addiction is a form of escapism just like every other addiction. It is a form of self medication. No one enjoys being really scared. They enjoy the side benefits of adrenaline and the euphoric relief after the fear has passed. The adrenaline induced high supersedes the memory of the negative feeling of cringing and shock, which causes people to say "I like to be scared". There are many points in a horror movie where a person in complete fear releases resistance, which is an intense experience by when the brains perceived threat has passed for example like when a character has reached safety at the end of the film. There are two more big reasons people enjoy horror flicks. The first is in this society, which is highly separated, our sense of community has gone away. This is a big source of disconnection and unhappiness. When you are screaming together with other audience members, you are sharing some very private emotions with strangers around you. It helps us feel connected to other people. The next reason is that Bravery adds to the self concept. For males in particular, part of what attracts them to horror movies, haunted houses and other unsettling experiences is the ability to conquer something that seems threatening, even though it poses no real harm. This gives a sense of success and internal satisfaction. The purpose of horror films is to entertain and thrill people. However, the idea of murder and torture as the means to accomplish this sense of thrill is disturbing at best. It is an indication of our lack of connection with life itself and with our true selves. This kind of entertainment belittles the worth of life and warps perceptions of what is tolerable. It fuels the very disconnection that we are all so affected by when it affects our physical reality and it will because anything you focus on, you get more of.

Similar Documents

Premium Essay

American Horror Story Hotel (AHS)

...American Horror Story, better known as AHS, is one show that has horror written all over it. After four seasons of terror, it was time to add the fifth season: American Horror Story Hotel. Season five began airing this fall, and just after the first few episodes people around the country were hooked. This season would keep people eager to watch every Wednesday night just to see what was going to happen next. This show provides all the right materials to fit a horror genre: scary scenes, violent and bloody scenes, scary atmosphere, a good story, unseen events, values at stake, a monster, and a hero. While watching an episode of AHS, viewers are warned about the scary and violent content of the show. This warning should not be taken lightly. From the very beginning of the season, every episode has had its own twist of horror and gore. The setting of AHS:Hotel is the Hotel Cortez located in Los Angeles. In the opening scene of episode one it features two swedish girls that find a creature hiding in the bed of their hotel room.This scene could make anyone want to stay up all night just to make sure there was not a monster underneath his or her covers. During...

Words: 1204 - Pages: 5

Premium Essay

Horror

...Horror Movies Krystal Brown South University Horror films have been around for over 100 years. They have made many appearances in movie theaters and on television sets, but only the cinema made depiction of fear as real and graphical as to make people actually see it. Over the course of the century horror movies of all kinds, from crudely primitive to rather intellectual have been extremely popular; But why? The first horror movie was made in 1896 and was called Le Manoir du Diable. It was directed by a pioneer of early cinema named Georges Melies. Since then, a countless number of horror movies have been made. Early horror movies were mostly about zombies and supernatural killers. For example, but later horror movies became more about bad things happening to real people. This made horror films even scarier because they were no longer about vampires and zombies; they were about real people that audiences could relate to. When I was a little girl I watched Nightmare on Elm Street. I was swallowed by fear and anticipation. I found myself entertained by quite a few parts of the movie that made me view myself differently for the moment. I wondered how cool it would be to enter a person dream for the mere thrill ride. The fear that I once felt had somehow taken another form, I felt emotionally stronger as I continued to watch the movie I did so with an open mind. Becoming move familiar with the next move of the movie, I was able to prepare myself for what appeared to...

Words: 653 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

Horror Films

...A Scary Addiction Since the early beginnings of modern film, horror movies have been a very popular genre in societies all around the world. Despite the fact that these types of films have caused many people countless sleepless nights, millions of people wait in line every weekend and pay to see and enjoy the newest horror movie. The immortal popularity of horror movies may be contributed to the fact that they cause their viewers excitation, pleasure and a set of feelings that are uncontrollable and at the same time enjoyable for horror movie fans. Some people enjoy voluntarily anguish, fear and suffering as long as it is not actually happening to them so when they watch these kinds of movies even when they mostly know what to expect during the film, the amount of suspense of how cruel and crude each scene could be, heightens the viewer’s feelings of fear and anxiety, and for many of us the more bloody and terrifying the movie is what makes it so exciting. Stephen King establishes in his writings that “we are all mentally ill.” I think that what they like is the feeling that they can experience strong emotions and fear with the certainty that no harm will come to them because it is the character in the movie that is facing the danger. Also, with this kind of film, they can let their imagination run free and put themselves in the place of the actors to look for a way to escape or trying to find some solutions so they harm will not come to them and in some situations...

Words: 904 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Stephen King Alcohol And Drugs

...Alcohol and Drugs Affect on Writers Many great novelists are addicts. For example, novels written by Dorothy Parker, Ernest Hemingway, Edgar Allan Poe, and, Charles Dickens were all written by people who battled addiction. Many of their books were written while under the influence of alcohol or drugs. Alcohol and drugs have enormous influence on a writer's writing style and ideas. For example, F Scott Fitzgerald and Stephen King who were notorious addicts often wrote under the influence or their addictions and often incorporated that into their writing or made connections with their characters with it. Authors who are addicts use their writing in many ways to reveal their thoughts and feelings of their addictions. Fitzgerald is an example...

Words: 921 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Jekyll and Hyde

...One Addiction, One Body, Two Minds. The novel Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson is a gothic mystery story based around addiction. By the title one would assume Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are two people, strangely this is not the case. Dr. Jekyll was a well-known doctor in London, England; Mr. Hyde was his evil alter ego. An anonymous narrator in a third person point of view tells the tale. Jekyll while in his laboratory creates a potion that is able to change him inside and out. This potion destroys his physical appearance and erases all sense of mental stability. As Jekyll, the man was a smart successful and popular doctor, as Hyde he was a murderer, criminal, and intolerable ugly man. Jekyll drinks the potion and is miraculously changed, but over time the transformations become uncontrollable. Stevenson shows the man’s life becoming more degrading as the addiction becomes more prominent and depended. This is a very problematic topic in the story. Robert Lewis Stevenson demonstrated in his novel Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde that any form of addiction can have catastrophic results such as becoming addicted to power, running away from reality, and temptation. The novel Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a story that deals with a prominent and well-respected person that acts in two completely different ways. The main character, Dr. Jekyll, from the story was a gifted doctor and a brilliant scientist. Whereas the alter ego, Mr. Hyde was a dark person...

Words: 1357 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

Movie Review: Requiem for a Dream

...Drug addiction can be compared to a complicated love story. In the beginning the drug is an escape, that satisfies a craving in the human mind that otherwise is not being fulfilled, just as love satisfies a certain void that simply cannot be quelled by one’s self. This desire to experience this feeling intensifies and soon enough this love story turns into a heart wrenching breakup, that leaves the mind broken only searching for the feeling it once experienced. Requiem for a Dream is a story that follows four Coney Island individuals risking everything they have to follow their dreams. These dreams are soon shattered and consumed by drug addiction. The portrayal of this film is very realistic because, even though extreme, it shows how the moment someone becomes addicted to drugs, the addiction becomes the focal point of their life. The movie begins with introducing the main character, Harry Goldfarb, who is stealing a television set from his widowed mother to support his and his roommate’s heroin addiction. His mother, Sarah Goldfarb, knows what Harry is using the money for, but does not have the will to turn him in because he is the only one she has left after the death of her husband. Harry’s roommate and best friend, Tyrone, develops a plan to make money by selling heroin on the streets. They describe this as their “chance to make it big.” Harry mentions that with the money they make, he will help his girlfriend, Marion Silver, follow her dream of opening her own clothing...

Words: 700 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

Anth106 Essay

...CRITICAL ESSAY: Pleasure and pain: Representations of illegal drug consumption, addiction and trafficking in music, film and video It is a safe assumption that when the term ‘drug’ or ‘use’ is mentioned, many automatically associate this with something rather unpleasant, a negative experience. This is due to the fact that individuals throughout most of their lives are warned of the destructive, detrimental and the horrendous nature of drugs and the consequences that arise from one’s involvement with them. This message is conveyed through many platforms, one of them being the media/entertainment industry. It is the same media portrays the image of illegal drug consumption as highly pleasurable. In the article Pleasure and pain: Representations of illegal drug consumption, addiction and trafficking in music, film and video (Fraser, S and Moore, D, 2011), composer Susan Boyd thoroughly explores through qualitative research the role music, film and video playing in creating meanings and images of drug consumption, addiction and trafficking and- in doing so, shapes up our perspective on drug use. This essay will discuss ways within which music, film and video represents illegal drug consumption, addiction and trafficking and how this influences our perspective and understanding of drug use. Media in today’s contemporary society is viewed as a necessity, it is held on the same level of importance as food and clothing (Stoddart, T, 2014). Individuals are exposed to the media throughout...

Words: 607 - Pages: 3

Free Essay

The Evolution of Serial Killers in Popular Culture

...Amy Hankins LE300 capstone: serial killers as heroes in popular culture Final Project The Evolution of serial killers and societies fascination A serial killer is someone who is known as a friend, father, co-worker, politician, in fact a serial killer can be anybody. For centuries stories about serial killers have graced the covers of newspapers and magazines. Many famous stories have influenced a lot of films that have been produced and continue to be produced. There is an endless amount of questions as to how serial killers become serial killers, which falls under nature vs. nurture. “The causes of psychopaths remain a mystery. We don’t even have a satisfactory answer to the question of whether psychopath is a product of Mother Nature or a feature of upbringing (Brogaard & Marlow, 2012).” Nevertheless, due to the many serial killers that plague this country, they have come from a very unstable background mostly during the childhood years. Within this essay I would like to discuss not only what has been learned throughout the semester but also bring to light the possible reasons as to why serial killers kill and why society has such an enormous fascination with them. According to the dictionary a serial killers is a person who commits two or more murders at different times. Serial killers are extremely intelligent and some have most likely obtained a degree of some sort. This sort of intelligence is evident in Mr. Brooks, Dexter, silence of the lamb and perfume. All...

Words: 1984 - Pages: 8

Premium Essay

The Effects of Anime Addiction to Students

...EFFECTS OF ANIME ADDICTION TO STUDENTS Thesis Statement: There are negative and positive effects that may result from Anime addiction. Introduction Anime is a style of animation in Japan which it can lead into addiction. Nowadays, anime addiction is very rampant especially among students. People with obsessive interest in anime are called otaku. I. Anime II. The negative effects of Anime Addiction to students A. Academic B. Health C. Behavior III. The positive effects of Anime Addiction to students A. Increased Social Interaction B. Interest in arts C. Interest in Japanese Language and Culture D. Relieves Problem E. Influence their English Vocabulary Conclusion Anime Addiction is affecting the academic, health, and behavior of the students. Their parents don’t like their child watching anime, because they can’t focus in their studies. But it depends on the child that he will balance his study and the anime or not. References INTRODUCTION Anime is a style of animation in Japan, heavily influenced by the Manga (Japan comic) and typically featuring characters with large eyes, big hair, exaggerated facial expression and it is classified according to its genre. Nowadays, anime addiction is very rampant especially among students. People with obsessive interest in anime are called, otaku (Ninai, 2011). This study aims to answer this following question: 1. Why is anime addiction? 2. What are the negative effects of anime addiction to students...

Words: 3895 - Pages: 16

Premium Essay

Heyman Addiction

...will cut themselves off from society, because their addiction becomes greater than fear. The addict is left living a life of isolation rather than community. While someone who isn't suffering gains protection. The Ill no matter their diagnoses should receive the same remedy. Addiction isn’t a choice and they’re constantly growing. Researcher Gene Heyman illustrates in his journal that “A normal choice process can lead to addiction, arguing that people do not choose to be addicts, but that normal choice dynamics can lead them to that condition. He points to a variety of factors that keep most from becoming addicted”(Heyman). These individuals are just trying to live with their mental disability and not be abandoned. People with addictions do have the same right to be free from discrimination as anyone else with a disability or...

Words: 1178 - Pages: 5

Premium Essay

Phobias and Addictions

...Phobias and Addictions Justin Flores PSY/300 Dianne Smith Phobias and addictions have been very common in many human beings. Phobia is a persistent, irrational fear of a specific object, activity, or situation that leads to a compelling desire to avoid it (Dictionary, 2014). When thinking of the word phobia, a person might think of their own fears that make a person scared or distraught. Take for example, someone who had a bad experience with almost drowning in water as a child may develop a phobia of water in their later years as an adult. Or maybe a person has seen a bad horror movie with clowns that make the person hate them later in life. Another interesting occurrence in humans is addictions. Addiction the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming, as narcotics, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma (Dictionary, 2014). When presenting the word addiction, a person might think of something that a person needs and stresses about. For example, a person who smokes may be addicted to cigarettes. Both phobia and addiction are very common in humans. This paper will discuss how phobias can be developed through classical conditioning, how addictions can be developed through operant conditioning, the difference between classical and operate conditioning, and finally what extinction means and how it is achieved in both classical and operant conditioning. First, we will discuss how...

Words: 923 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Phobias and Addictions Paper Psy300

...Phobias and Addictions Paper Osvaldo L Mercado University of Phoenix Classical Conditioning refers to a procedure by which a previously neutral stimulus comes to elicit a response after it is paired with a stimulus that automatically elicits that response.” (Kowalski & Westen, 2011) The unconditioned stimulus or ‘US”, is an occurrence which causes an innate, involuntary response or reaction. When someone smells a favorite food cooking they most oftentimes begin to feel hungry; in this scenario the unconditioned stimulus, is the aroma of the food. The feeling of hunger in relation to the aroma of the food is referred to as the unconditioned response or “UR”; once again, the term unconditioned means that this is a naturally occurring reaction which has not been learned by the individual who experiences the feelings of hunger. In regards to phobias, theories of classical conditioning can be applied due to the fact that most irrational fears are learned by association and with the introduction of a stimulus which would otherwise not cause a reaction i.e. a neutral stimulus. There are thousands of documented phobias from the world, most are believed to have developed due to a response from a negative environment that the individual encountered at one point in life. According to the American Psychiatric Association (2012). Symptoms of a phobia include the following: * Recognition that the fear goes beyond normal boundaries and the actual threat of danger * Reactions...

Words: 866 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Discuss the Cycle of Trauma and Addiction and Its Impact Upon the Individual Family

...traumatic incident is where a person experiences, witnesses, hears about a (real or perceived) threat to the physical and/or psychological integrity of self, or others whereby the person's response involves great fear, horror and/or helplessness.(APA 2002) Examples of a traumatic incident could be a threat, an accident, a form of abuse, of the death of a loved one to name only a few. Dependency can be described as the state of relying on or being controlled by someone or something else. The world health organisation in the 1960’s recommended that the term addiction be replace with dependence- as dependence can have varying degrees of severity as opposed to the ‘all or nothing’ concept behind addiction. Dependence can be seen as a compulsive need for and use of a habit forming substances, characterized by tolerance and well defined physiological symptoms upon withdrawal. Drug dependency is a common problem amongst all ethnic groups and social classes worldwide. Drugs can be taken for a number of reasons and not everyone who consumes them will become dependent. It has been suggest that drugs are taken for one of two reasons Pleasure or relieve symptoms of suffering. There are a number of contributing factors why people develop addictions. However trauma and addictions are very closely linked. Never the less this does not mean that ever addict has experienced trauma or that ever person who has experienced trauma will turn into an addict. A traumatic event is very individual the same...

Words: 1093 - Pages: 5

Premium Essay

Drug Abuse

...Drug abuse is one of the biggest issues in today’s generation. It may lead to many lives, shreds families to separate and allows to steal publics’ purse each year. As the drug addiction causes great suffering to the society, the people are going to be helpless and there will be horror everywhere, and may lead to dreadful consequences. Drug abusers are chain smokers who not only destroy their own health but also damage the health of people moving around them. Drug abusers also include alcohol drinkers who threat their family and damage their personal careers with addiction to alcohol. And street kids who rely on drugs are also the convicts. They do this because of homelessness. Some Youngsters also rely on this through boredom, displeasure, irritation, dissatisfaction, or may be problems at home. Drug abuse may lead to improper functioning of the brain. It is quite obvious that most of the people make decision to take drugs repeatedly and constantly once addicted. This can affect a person's will to make good decisions and lose self-control. To avoid these problems, we need to face the War on Drugs. Simply banning this thing would not stop people to get off it and especially to youngsters, this thing makes much desirable. Most of the specialized people who have a decent knowledge about drugs wish that governments should take a step to educate, prevent and cure the people who are addicted rather than concentrating on the stalking and imprisonment of drug users. We need to...

Words: 327 - Pages: 2

Premium Essay

Fandom

...used for a variety of both medical and non-medical purposes, some of which may lead to harms such as overdose, injury, infectious disease (such as HIV or hepatitis C), or addiction. 1. The shock/ scare approach- the use of anti-drug videos, government tv and even on billboards focus on the horrors of drugs use. ➢ In this approach, the use of media is helpful to people to convey the harmful effects of taking drugs excessively. The made commercials on tv, radios, billboards and even educational movies to scare the people showing the side effects of drugs to us and to the people around us. The information approach- young people are given the facts about drugs on the assumption that if they knew the facts they would not use drugs. ➢ When we are informed about the facts of drugs we may come into realization that this thing may really harm us. They say that the truth hurts. So by knowing the truth about drugs we may know the effects of drugs and the possibility that it may hurt us physically and emotionally. The attitudes/value approach- to promote a “drug free lifestyle”, “personal responsibility”and “strong moral beliefs” to avoid drugs. ➢ It is clear to us that this approaches helps us avoid drugs. So in this approach are attitudes and values are being lifted and enhanced so remind us that drug addiction may lead us into a stressed and harmful life. The refusal skills approach- “Say No To Drugs” ➢ “Say No To Drugs, But Yes to God”. We are all familiar with this saying...

Words: 565 - Pages: 3