To wonder what is wrong with these women who write to and then want to marry serial killers?

[AlternativePerspective]

Story here:
Levi Bellfield: Serial killer applies to marry in prison www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-61418262
Now, face to face it’s potentially easy to get drawn in by someone who turns out to be abusive. But this man is a convicted murderer, and this woman presumably deliberately started writing to him, and now wants to marry him?

We all know he’s lowlife, but wtf is wrong with her?

For me this is even worse than someone who stands by a family member who has committed a hideous crime. The friendship would be over the instant they even started writing to him, and if it was a family member I would be going immediately NC>.

God knows. I thought the exact same when I saw this story.
Attention seeking?
You’d have to be really sick to want to associate with a child rapist/ murderer.
like you if it was someone I knew I wouldn’t want anything to do with them.

Mind you can you imagine the wedding thread? “AIBU that people aren’t happy for me that I’m getting married? Finally I’ve met someone lovely and we’ve been together for a while, two years ago he proposed to me and I said yes. I couldn’t be happier, but my family and friends have been nothing but horrible about him. I just want them to be happy for me.” I’ve even lost friends over it.

Followed by posters asking what reason they’ve given for being so disapproving, along with which obviously would say to ignore them, and then the respons:

“well, they’re not happy because the man I’m marrying is Levi Bellfield. “.

i personally would never write to someone who had murdered a child and definatly not a serial killer , im sure they think somehow they can redeem these men

however there are plenty of people who do write to prisoners and i once was a penpal quite a few years ago now to someone who was in for murder ,

i didnt fancy him , i never believed or wanted to be with him in any way although that would have been difficult as he was in the states , he was released and we never wrote to each other again once he was free . however i did know the circumstances of his crime . the fact is alot of these women write to these men because they are in love with them which is sick really

It's fasciniating. I think it's some combination of:
A deep desire in some people to save and rescue someone. I'm sure most of us have known people (not to this extreme though) who wanted to be The One to save a person and pursued relationships with toxic or abusive partners because of this.
These might be vulnerable women who have suffered trauma at the hands of men, and "taming" the most extreme of them will make them feel safe and give them a feeling of control.
A fear of intimacy, where the person can play out romantic fantasies of being destined to be together with the knowledge that it will never be in real life, but only played out via letter and visits behind glass.

I also think true crime really glamourises a lot of these cases/men. Makes them seem troubled souls instead of cold hearted killers and takes away the real impact these men had on the victims

It must be so upsetting for the victims' families to have this bastard cropping up in the press again. Regardless of the woman's motives (thinks she can redeem him, attention seeking, whatever) it feels really disrespectful to them. YANBU at all.

It's attention seeking

I don't know what's wrong with them but add a VERY into that. Maybe they have a saviour complex and think they're the special one who can redeem the worst? And/or flog a few stories to the tabloids along the lines of 'I married a Monster'. Completely bewildering and utterly repellent.

It's fascinating.

This guy has 11 kids with 5 different women, has murdered people...and another woman wants to marry him.

So confusing.

I think there are women who love the fantasy of being ‘the one’ to tame a violent man - he treats other women and girls abusively but I’m special/different enough to be loved and cherished by him. He could never do to me what he did to those other women.

The fantasy makes them feel powerful or important or valuable or needed perhaps in a way they’ve never felt before. And such men can spot this neediness and manipulate it.

It's a safe relationship as the man is behind bars. I imagine it's similar to when people have "online relationships". - lots of communication but not actually getting to know someone in person.

But how could you look past what he's done?
Not to mention most profilers would agree serial killers don't have an off switch.
Surely you would lose friends/family over that 'safe' relationship.

Horrifying. And pointless. He's never going to get out is he? Maybe that's why she's doing it, gets to be married without having to actually live with a man.

Saviour complex
They think they can fix them, or nurture them

Some women have deeply rooted fantasies about their power to "save" and redeem a man - the worse the man the greater their achievement. Some women like the status of being married in a "safe" way, without the reality of ever having to deal with an actual man physically present. But yes, the women that do this tend to be damaged. John Douglas talks about it in his true crime books a bit.

It’s the dark side of female desire taken to a very sick extreme. It’s like in romance books or 50 shades (even things like Twilight) where the attractive male figure is often “dark” or “bad” or “misunderstood” in some way - it’s the badness and the darkness that is the turn on - the fact that the guy is actually alright underneath it all is just what makes it morally ok to like him because most women don’t to be with actual evil people (or vampires), many just want that facade (at least in fiction)in a man who is actually alright.

Its why more teenage girls fancied Draco Malloy than any other character in Harry Potter etc. It’s why there are whole romance novels written by women fantasising about the like of Heathcliff or Mr Darcy but zero written about some upfront kind, clever and caring man who appears that way from the offset and has no “dark” characteristics.

This is that desire taken to extremes in women who take it outside fiction and don’t care that the man is actually bad - or else deluded themselves so much that they think he’s not.

These women have serious mental problems - but their desire stems from the same basic place that sees women on this site say “mummies boys” give the “the ick”, husband being too polite gives them “the ick” etc. At a basic level niceness on its own isn’t a turn on for women - while things like height, Tatts often are as they denote some kind of toughness or dominance. It’s that stuff these women just take it to 1000.

People can be very strange, lonely, desperate, damaged, or mentally ill. Often they're a combination of those.

It makes for behaviour that others find baffling or deranged.

This shouldn't be a surprise.

What’s wrong with loads of people in this world?!
unhinged
lonely
low iq

i could go on

She is marrying a man she is never going to actually share a life with. They will never share a walk in the park, dinner in a restaurant, have sex. Definitely fantasy territory.
Reminds of the TV character from whichever comedy show, tragic female, can't meet a man in real life, marries a man on death row etc.
Belfield is evil personified. A complete psychopath. I don't believe all his crimes have been charged against him.
She will have her 15 minutes of fame.
Hopefully she won't end up like the actress who married Michael Peterson (Charles Bronson) 😪

It's sick

Absolutely disgusting

I could not believe it when I read this story , I will never understand how any woman could even consider this .

But if she divorces him will he then be entitled to half of her assets?

Low self esteem. These women have a saviour complex and think they can "rescue" these men and be the one to "save" them.

It's baffling, depressing and disgusting.

Imagine being so desperate to have a man that you'd marry a multiple murderer and rapist, whose victims include a child?

The woman needs help.

No-one is entitied to half of their spouses assets in any case. 50-50 is a common starting point but it's not an entitlement.

In this case he'd get nothing I'd imagine.

A desire to save and understand the complex man, it makes them feel important that they are able to have such a deep understanding and connection with these men that other people can’t

so low self esteem, I think fame for some, a desire to be The One, its pathetic, sad and also utterly selfish and self absorbed

She is being used by Bellfield to continue his torture of the families who are still grieving that’s what in it for him and it really shouldn’t be allowed (but then you get it to the couples laws around human rights)