Deviant Criminology
Dr. Richard Weaver Jr., Heather Kenney, and Rachel Czar take listeners on a journey through the world of true crime. With their unique careers in the criminal justice and academic world; they work to provide an entertaining and educational experience for listeners. This podcast examines many areas of true crime including; the formation of laws, cases that defined caselaw, and crimes that impacted the world. Please join us on this journey as we transition from professionals in criminal justice and academia to budding podcasters.
Deviant Criminology
Marquis de Sade: Inside the Sadistic Mind
The term "sadistic killer" traces back to the Marquis de Sade, an 18th-century French nobleman whose criminal actions and controversial writings initiated an entire psychological classification now used in profiling serial murderers.
• Criminal justice defines sadistic killers as offenders who derive sexual gratification from inflicting pain and suffering
• The FBI's classification identifies specific patterns including captivity, torture, and careful planning
• The Marquis de Sade's notorious crimes included imprisoning, torturing, and sexually assaulting multiple victims
• His philosophical writings advocated for pursuing pleasure without moral restraints
• Notable works like "The 120 Days of Sodom" blended graphic depictions with complex philosophical arguments
• The term "sadism" was coined in 1886 by psychiatrist Richard von Krafft-Ebing
• Several notorious serial killers have been influenced by Sade's writings, including Ian Brady of the Moors Murders
• The concept raises philosophical questions about consent, harm, and where society draws moral boundaries
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So in criminal justice and criminal psychology a sadistic killer is defined as an offender who derives sexual gratification or pleasure from inflicting pain, suffering and humiliation on their victims.
Speaker 2:This type of killer is characterized by a deep-seated compulsion to dominate, control and degrade others through acts of extreme violence and torture.
Speaker 2:The concept of sadistic killers has been widely recognized and utilized by law enforcement agencies and researchers in the field of criminal psychology. The fbi's national center for the analysis of violent crimes has included sadistic killers as a distinct category in their classification of serial murders. They have done studies that have found that sadistic killers often demonstrate consistent patterns of behavior, including careful planning, use of pre-selected locations, captivity of victims, various painful sexual acts, sexual bondage, intentional torture and death primarily by means of strangulation or stabbing. So law enforcement agencies have applied this classification in numerous high-profile cases. Probably one of the best examples in modern time is that of the BTK killer, who was Dennis Rader. He was identified as a sadistic serial killer due to his methodological approaches use of bondage, the pleasure he derived from controlling and torturing his victims, and then, similarly, the investigation into the Gilgo Beach killings on Long Island considered the possibility of a sadistic serial killer based on the meticulous disposal of bodies and targeting of sex workers.
Speaker 3:Again, the English language is not something that comes easily, sometimes when you're trying to talk so much, so in the courts the classification of a sadistic killer has been used to support arguments of the death penalty or life sentences without parole. But the psychological profile of a sadistic killer, including their lack of remorse, high likelihood of recidivism, has been presented as evidence of future dangerous, but it's not in and of itself a classification. For instance, in cases involving sexually sadistic killers, serial killers, the prosecutors have used expert testimony to explain the offender's motivations and the ritualistic nature of their crimes, demonstrating the calculated and deliberate nature of their actions. Research has shown that sadistic killers often exhibit specific criminal I'm sorry, specific crime scene behaviors that distinguish them from other types of murderers. These may include excessive violence beyond what is necessary to cause death, post-mortem mutilation, insertion of foreign objects and positioning of the victim's body in degrading poses. Law enforcement agencies use these behavioral markers to identify potential sadistic killers and link seemingly unrelated cases.
Speaker 2:It is important also to note that, while a concept of sadistic killers is widely recognized in criminal psychology, criminal justice and law enforcement, it is not a legal classification of itself. Rather, it is a psychological profile that informs investigative strategies, risk assessments and sentencing considerations within the boundary and frameworks of violent and sexual offenses. So one thing that is important in criminal justice is just terminology true crime there are terms that we hear that have been used. We don't really know. So terminology, again in criminal justice, is an important part of labeling criminal behavior and psychology, the types of crimes committed and utilizing for enhanced sentencing.
Speaker 2:Even in common day speech, a common term heard to describe people who enjoy seeing or inflicting pain on others is sadist, sadistic or sadism. In this context we're not talking about the fetish of sadomasochism, which is a consensual sexual relationship around gathering pleasure from either inflicting or receiving pain again for sexual pleasure. That is probably a different podcast. That's not us. If you want to go search that, actually there's probably several podcasts to do that. But the key in that is that there is consent. What we're talking about is the use of terms in criminal justice again criminal psychology to describe criminal behaviors and psychological aspects. Looking at this, we decided it was important to delve in the origin of these terms and how they came to be associated with cruel, torturous behavior, utilized to describe either gathering sexual pain or just gratification from harming others. So to do this, today we are going to look at the life, criminal behaviors, exploits and legacy of the man known as the Marquis de Sade. So I am Richard, I'm Heather.
Speaker 2:And this is Deviant Criminology.
Speaker 3:Okay, so the person who we know as Marquis de Sade was actually named and I'm going to say this wrong, I'm sure Danatine Alfonso Franskisco, in Paris on June the 2nd 1740, and he was a French nobleman, writer and political activist whose life was marked by scandal and crime and imprisonment. His controversial writings and alleged practices gave rise to the term sadism, which reflects sexual cruelty sexual cruelty.
Speaker 2:Sade's major works included the 120 Days of Sodom, justine, juliet and Philosophy in the Bedroom which explored themes of pleasure in inflicting pain. The 120 Days of Sodom was like the first intro I had to the Marquis and that was like my freshman year of college, which for me was like 24 years old, and it's a very graphic depiction of this 120 day. Basically orgy that happens and it's really very twisted. So having known that and then learning what I had and what we're going to talk about today about him, like it's no surprise that this guy and his name became so interlinked with twisted cruelty through use of paint. So he was born into a noble family with ties to the french royal line.
Speaker 2:Sod received education at the jesuit college, louis le grand in paris, where he studied Latin, Greek and rhetoric, which is just a form of writing. He later joined the military and served as an officer in the Seven Years' War. Then, in 1763, he married Renée Pelagie de Montréal, a Catholic woman from a Borgie family, with whom he had three children, though their relationship became increasingly strained. I'd like to note at this point that if there are any French speakers or historians of French culture, please do not crucify us for our inability to speak French terms. We are American.
Speaker 3:And even if we were bilingual, we probably still wouldn't say it correctly. You learn American French here, not French French.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we are. I mean, we are close to the state that cars Versailles for sales. So yeah, do not hold us accountable for French terminology. So Saad's life of scandal began in 1763 when he faced his first major accusation. So he allegedly locked a prostitute named jean to start in a bedroom, engaged in blasphemous acts involving religious objects and threatening her with weapons. This incident led to his arrest on charges of blasphemy and incitement to sacrilege, both capital offenses at the time, and he was later released following a royal pardon. Now that royal pardon kind of came again. He was born into french aristocratic ties, um, and there's a lot about this incident that was kind of repressed at the time but it did come with a lot of sexual assault and the abuse that is kind of displayed here which I I kind of wonder, just based on the time and the ties that he had, if he really would have been charged if it hadn't been for the religious objects and the religious theme behind what happened.
Speaker 3:If he had simply hired a prostitute and things went sideways, would anybody have really cared?
Speaker 2:And also like playing devil's advocate, which I don't like doing, but in this situation, at this time it was also very common for political rivals, especially in France, were accusing, you know, the Knights Templar of blasphemy and horrific acts being done with the cross and stuff. This seems to be an ongoing theme, especially in religious cultures like France, to really bring horrible attention and light on a political rival.
Speaker 3:One of the most notorious incidents in Saad's criminal history occurred on Easter Sunday in 1768, known as the Rose Keller Affair. He had lured Keller, a 36-year-old widow and beggar, to his house in actually again probably saying that wrong. Under the pretense of offering her employment there, he locked her in a bedroom, subjected her to sexual abuse and severely whipped her. Keller managed to escape and reported the incident to authorities. Saad was subsequently arrested and imprisoned, though he denied the more severe aspects of the assault.
Speaker 2:And some of those aspects are accusations that he flogged her relentlessly with a cat and nine tails, that he actually cut her buttocks and poured wax on it and just really subjected her to torture.
Speaker 3:basically, which I would think that there would be physical evidence. You know, as far as his denial of these things, maybe pretty simple on some level to say, well, that didn't happen, these marks are not on her.
Speaker 2:If that was the case, he very often never denied the accusations but said that they were consenting. So one of his things was no, I didn't hire her to work, she was a prostitute and I had hired her to engage in any sexual action. It was all consensual underpayment. So that's kind of a running theme with him is that, you know, no, everybody was consensual. Even though these people immediately like leave, like escape his clutches and go to the police, he's still got these royal connections, these family that basically he keeps somehow getting away with this, with these pardons. But with this one again he kind of gets off.
Speaker 2:It seems like these charges are dropped or just kind of dissipate, known as the Marseille Affair of June 1772, which further cemented kind of Sod's notoriety and his sadistic nature, which we will get into that term. He and his manservant Latour orchestrated an elaborate orgy involving four prostitutes engaging in acts of flagolation and sodomy. For those who don't know, flagolation is just whipping, so usually done with a standard whip, a cat and nine tails or something of that nature. So Sod offered the women pastilles laced with Spanish fly and aphrodisiac which caused two of them to become very ill. This led to charges of sodomy and poisoning against Sod and Latour and they were sentenced to death and absentia. So, basically, the, the women, leave, they go, report sod and his manservant which I love that term uh find out that this is happening and they flee the country. Um, because they know that these acts are again uh punishable by death and as they, while they're gone, they are sentenced to death. But since they have fled the country, they weren't there to defend themselves.
Speaker 3:And I think that was a practice that happened well, obviously, more often than now. Back then they would go ahead and have the trial without you, sentence you to death with the thought that well, they left, they'll never come back, they're not my problem anymore, and if you do, then we're going to kill you, type of an idea.
Speaker 2:Or especially with aristocratic families like this in Europe, it seemed like, oh, we'll flee and then let our families and the money and people forget about things and get payoffs made to the right people, like pay these four women off which his wife got involved in, like helping silence two of these women, and then they withdrew the claim and then she and the family kind of spoke with royalty and got pardons at some point.
Speaker 2:But this also went into some political stuff that we're not going to cover because French politics in 1700s really isn't my thing. We're more talking about the man specifically. But following these incidents, Saad spent years evading authorities, fleeing to Italy and facing multiple arrests and imprisonment. So he never learned from his mistakes. But this very much becomes part of his philosophy. Like he is very, why am I being restricted by your values and morals and mores to what I am allowed to do? Like your virtues and vices should not have the right to control me. So he was arrested in 1801 for his pornographic novels and spent his final years in the Charlton Asylum where he died on December 2nd 1814.
Speaker 3:And his influence extends beyond his lifetime, inspiring later thinkers like Nietzsche, freud and other surrealists. His legacy remains controversial, to say the least, with some viewing him as a precursor to anarchism and totalitarianism, while others condemn his influence as harmful to women and society. Saad's life and works continue to be depicted in various cultural works, sparking ongoing debates about his place in history and literature.
Speaker 2:And I, like the paper I wrote and kind of the research I did, was comparing like the things he wrote back and we're talking mid-late 1700s that were just considered blasphemous and like even pornographic to today's standards, and how we kind of went very puritan for a couple hundred years, especially during the Edwardian years and Victorian years, where it became almost very proper communities and talks of sex, sexuality, like you just didn't do that. And now where it's become again, we're seeing a lot of pornography, a lot of graphic depiction of things and as we'll go forward, we kind of see that with his writings and stuff, like even at the time and we're going to talk about this they were not received. Well, uh, he was punished for his writings, he was sought after, he was demonized and it wasn't until like the mid 1900s that suddenly he kind of saw this resurgence and now he's starting to show up more and more again in writings and literature and depictions in different media.
Speaker 3:And I think a lot of his influence also goes back to that philosophical debate of our people primarily good versus evil. Are you born good and then turn evil, or are you born evil and have to make choices to be good?
Speaker 2:Well, and I think it also goes even to a larger debate, and this was kind of some of the things that he talked about was who decides what's good and evil? Like you know, when we use the term sadist or sadism and relevant to criminals nowadays, like we're talking people that and he did it too but purposely harm people without their consent. But if people are consenting adults in these situations like if he did hire this prostitute and she was very willing to participate and they were both consenting who decides that that's deviant behavior? Quick, shout out to ourselves and what is acceptable? Because I don't.
Speaker 2:Why am I held by your morality and this standard that I didn't agree to but society says I have to agree with? But if it's so taboo, why are there clubs associated with this, like even today there are, you know, masochistic clubs, bondage clubs, things like that, and some even today's literature very much gets into this um of 50 shades of gray and stuff like that, which I know a lot of people in the bondage community hate that book because it's depiction of almost non-consensual to a point, but that's getting a little bit off, but it's very much of what is. Who sets these standards, like what is a virtue and what's a vice, and who gets to set that standard and why is it based off somebody's religious views that maybe everybody doesn't conform to?
Speaker 3:and I think that that's true, and you can take that across the spectrum, though, because you know, one of the things he argues about is you know those baser instincts, um, and if you look at other mammals, you know, for instance, you know dogs or wolves or whatever. They kill other beings and they don't have that guilt associated with it. So at what point should you feel guilty? At what point have you crossed that line of this is okay and this is not okay? So that's kind of where I think about that like evil versus good or good versus evil. Do you have to make the choice that you're not going to be somebody who harms other people? Is that base nature that you would take whatever you can from them for your own benefit?
Speaker 2:And yeah, and I think kind of to a point it goes back to, like one of his famous quotes that I always loved was you know, it's always, it's always by way of pain One arrives at pleasure. And I mean you can take that a very different ways. Like you know, it's going through college. It's a lot of pain, it's a lot of hard work, but in the end you get the pleasure of what you get out of this. He took it in a sexual way. It's none of my damn business, but we're talking about is when it crosses over into criminality that we are interested in how that term came to be.
Speaker 2:So the Marquis de Sade's literary contributions were prolific and diverse, spanning various genres and themes During his numerous imprisonments which kind of seems to be a weird theme along the 16th, 17th, 1800s, as people did their best writings in prison. There's a lot of English people that wrote some great philosophical pieces while in prison in the Tower of London. So his works are characterized by a unique blend of explicit sexual content and profound philosophical discourse, exploring topics such as religion, politics and morality. But due to their provocative nature, many of sod's writings were published posthumously or anonymously at the time, uh, contributing to the mystique surrounding his literary outputs. So it's kind of like almost that shakespeare thing, like there's some things that are attributed to him that he may not have written, and then there's things that aren't attributed to him that he may not have written, and then there's things that aren't attributed to him that he may have. So he's kind of again one of those just in the literary world of that time period, like very well known at the time but also very demonized at the time.
Speaker 3:And it makes sense that you would write those things when you're in confinement, because what else do you have to do?
Speaker 2:Right, especially like this guy. I'm not going gonna say poor guy at all, because like he definitely deserved to be in prison but like he's been condemned to death at this point multiple times and he's got to know at this point that the agreements his family's probably made is like, don't kill him. But it was very common for people to be locked up for the rest of their lives and most of the time it's not what we think of a prison. Now, like he was in this asylum, which I'm gonna I didn't do my research and I apologize for that but probably was a little bit more cush than if he had been put in like the chateau d or something or the tower of london the tower of london.
Speaker 2:It had nice parts to it, supposedly probably not where he would have been, though no, he would have probably been in like the really small confinement room or the basement. Assad's writing is known for its exploration of extreme human behaviors and societal taboos. His works featured, again, really graphic depictions of sexual acts and violence, and then sexual violent acts, often intertwined with complex philosophical arguments. So he was very big at like. Here we are exploring human sexuality. And then what does it mean to even be a sexual being, as a human being? Um, way too much use of the term human being. So this juxtaposition, though, of the carnal and intellectual became a hallmark of sod's writing. Uh, challenging readers to confront uncomfortable truths about human nature, societal norms.
Speaker 2:Uh, and again, some of the novels that he's well known for is that 120 days of Sodom, and that's a thick book, like I read it, and for a dyslexic that's really hard. And again, it has a lot of terms that at that time being in college, I had to go back and be like I don't, this is an old Latin term or this is an old term that's not even used anymore. But in the end end, like the concepts and things that came out, it really does make you think, and there are parts, even as a grown man at that time that had worked in law enforcement. Everything I was going back like this is like you have to take a step back and be like it's hard. Odd to think that people enjoy this, be like this, or that these things were happening, because some of the stuff he describes in there in detail are things he was accused of in the courts.
Speaker 2:The text blends graphic depictions again with these philosophical debates. But he liked to push boundaries of acceptable literature and writings for his time and would go just blow right past that. So there were a lot of people that were prolific at that time. You're coming right around the time of Alexander Dumas and things. So you look at like the Count of Monte Cristo and what that looked like. And then you look at 120 days of Sodom and you're like there was a wide range of what was acceptable and he just blew right past that.
Speaker 3:Which I think you know again, that wide range of what's acceptable. You know, even when we mentioned consent, consent isn't always the out for everything. As an example, I can't consent to being killed and you giving the money to my family. That's just not something that we recognize as a legal defense. You can't come in and say, yeah, I killed her, but she consented to it.
Speaker 2:Yes, well, I mean that even goes back to like even consensual and again, I don't have a bondage expert here, not my area but even if you're having consensual sex and the person authorizes you to choke them, and if you do it and accidentally kill them, you still committed murder like so there are limitation and that's why people I know that are part of this community are very big on like do your research. You just don't like pick up one day and become a bondage expert, like there are whole groups that dedicate to like education around this and safety and safe practices. So yeah, you're, you're pushing taboos, but you also have to know that if you cross that line and it does go into criminal, it's not hard to do, which is why people are very protective of this community and why people were very, from what I understand, not happy with 50 shades of gray because it did almost kind of exploit and give a bad name to people that are into that.
Speaker 3:That more bondage, masochism, realm I think it was back to what you talked about, the respect for consent that I think the people you're describing respect that, where somebody would have the ability to withdraw consent at some point in time and say stop, this isn't what I want to do anymore or not cross those specific lines where I'm not so sure that Saad would have agreed with that. I think he would have been like you know, why do your rules confine to me? If she wants to consent to me killing her and giving her family money, then why is it any of your business?
Speaker 2:Well, and even just going back to that time period of the 1700s of how were women even viewed Like? Women weren't seen as equals to men, they were seen as subservient to men. So if this is what a man wants to do, then it's almost your obligation. So if you even put it in the context of that, the back in this time period, the women weren't seen as equals. He was being charged for abusing women, so he had to. We really now we're putting that in context think of how bad he had to be, that as an aristocrat abusing women, which almost probably happened all the time. He was taking it to a level that even the king was like kill him, kill him now. And the king really did, like bone apart, hated this man.
Speaker 2:So Saad explored themes of libertinism, materialism and moral relativism, often through shocking narratives that challenged conventional ethics and I think, minus the fact that these were his things like he was very much into this stuff. But he also wanted to shock people and really grab people's attention. And one thing that I kind of caught on in, that, that I want to build off on, was kind of this concept of libertine novels. They're a distinct literary genre that emerged in the 18th century, primarily in France, with roots in the european libertine tradition.
Speaker 2:These works are characterized by their exploration of themes to challenge social norms of religious orthodoxy, so these are kind of seen as works. A lot of his work is that way, but they were challenging either political standards at the time, sexuality, religion, um there was stuff that was. It was kind of seen to include things that were anti-establishment, eroticism, which there was a lot of that that was starting to come out, transgressive characteristics and philosophical explorations to engage about enlightenment ideas and advocating for individual freedoms. So I thought that that was very interesting that he was kind of put in this genre. Even though he was an outcast. He was kind of considered as part of these enlightenment movement of libertine novels.
Speaker 2:And I think he embodied that to the extreme right, like it wasn't just I should have these freedoms in these specific subsets, but he was kind of like I should be able to do whatever the hell I want and screw everybody else yes, and it's very much in your face, like he didn't try to hide this, like that was one of the things that was very stuck out, and he threw elaborate parties for a while that were basically orgies and political people came to these. So it wasn't that he ever hid this, but it was that even for that time period he crossed that threshold where it went from innocent, behind-the-scenes taboos of acceptable France, which human sexuality has always been a little bit more accepting of there. It was blowing right past that into this very what at the time was considered very dark, almost anti-Christian, and what would later become known as sadistic behavior dark, almost anti-Christian and what would later become known as sadistic behavior.
Speaker 3:So those libertine novels that you're referencing, they represent a cultural movement in literary and intellectual history which epitomizes the Western world's tradition into modernity, and it redefined the pleasure as an individual's natural right and challenged those longstanding ideas that somebody else would define.
Speaker 2:What you were able to do it's kind of interesting, like when you start again kind of putting things in weird context, like and criminals seem to do this, but uh, the sod is almost to the beginning of the 18th century, as jack the ripper was to the 19th century, like these sadistic people that kind of shepherded in this weird moral quandrum that was going to come for years or kind of define the next century and the sods work, even though many of them were destroyed and found much later. His behavior stuff kind of did almost show a whiplash backwards to a very more moralistic society that we see in a Dwarven society compared to where Jack the Ripper is kind of motioned towards bringing in this more new age for law enforcement and then kind of a cruelty nature that would be seen over the next hundred years towards the poor, prostitution and things like that.
Speaker 3:And I think there's always that pendulum that swings back and forth because you see something extreme and you say we have to do something so that doesn't happen again, and then you have a tightening down of whether it be religious morality or legal morality, of we're not going to let people do these things. And sometimes it's oh my gosh, I can't believe that somebody ever thought to do these things. We need to make it so nobody else does it. And I think there's also a desensitization to these things when you see them. So I think you know like when these things came to light it was shocking.
Speaker 2:But I think the more people who, following these footsteps, like you, talk about Jack the Ripper and we mentioned BTK and the more you hear about these things, the less appalling they seem to us in general absolutely and they almost start becoming part of society and who, who the cultures are in themselves and how people identify themselves, and sometimes it can be for the better, but then sometimes it can be for influencing people for the worst, which will will come up here momentarily, but it's just very. It's very interesting to get into these topics because we don't often think about like most of this episode is not about crime specifically, but it's about the philosophy and the types of behaviors that later led to these crimes and labeling of these crimes, specifically this how one guy's name became just synonymous and especially once the FBI kind of picked up on it, associated with serial killers and horrific crimes being committed by very terrible people torturing individuals.
Speaker 3:And I also think it makes you think about where those lines are, like we were talking about. As far. Are we going to say that, like, just take homosexuality as an example, once upon a time that was illegal and now it's not. And at what point do we change certain behaviors from criminal versus non-criminal? And I think that his dialogue and the things he did were horrible, but at least it got people thinking about. Well, where do we draw this line?
Speaker 2:It's almost a twisted advocacy that he was doing Like he was, you know, with the LGBTQ plus population and everything like it took advocates that were willing to put themselves out there to bring attention to like. This is not abnormal. It's your sense of morality that is pushing on me what is acceptable compared to what I believe is acceptable and it's not your right to demonize a whole group of people that aren't harming anybody. But doing this I'd love now the sod you can say he did in his crime show that he did harm people. But his wider conversation and his writings were more about accepting people that are into, maybe, a lifestyle of masochism and again, consensual is a big key there of pleasure and pain. So in a way, he was an advocate at the time for look your morals and your. If somebody goes out and they do these things, they're into flagylation or they're into, they're into, some kind of what we consider bondage or something like that.
Speaker 2:At the time that was sinful and you could be prosecuted for it. And he's saying no, like we are harming people for their enjoyment and their pleasure. That's carnal. It's who we are as a species. That's not right. So it sometimes does take people to advocate and put themselves out there and almost become criminal pariahs. He just kind of cross-lined and was a criminal and a horrible person and it goes back to that. I think I've said almost every episode we've ever done of you can be two things at the same time, like you can be this advocate that's advocating for more liberal, um, treatment of people and acceptance of people that are different than you.
Speaker 3:That may not get your morality and then also be a sadistic human being that tortures women without their consent and I think the the key word there was harm that you came up with, um, and I think that that's where people have to really stop and think and go through it. What is the harm that's being done with this? And I think sometimes, on the face of it, people like, oh this, stop and think and go through it. What is the harm that's being done with this? And I think sometimes, on the face of it, people are like, oh, this is harmful. Once you go through it, you figure out it's not really harmful to society because it's none of our business what they're doing and they're not harming each other. So we need to take a step back and just let them do whatever they're going to do.
Speaker 2:Yes, as long as you've got two consenting adults, it's none of your business what they are doing in their bedrooms, Right? But at this time they could come in and literally go through your bedroom. So, at the core, Saad's literary work is a consistent challenge of the conventional morality. His writings advocated for a more materialistic and determinist view of human behavior, often presenting characters who act on the basis impulses of themselves, without regard for social norms or ethical consideration. This unflinching exploration of human nature kind of coupled with his graphic depictions of sexuality and violence. And they are very graphic, Even, like I said, the writings he did at that time.
Speaker 2:For now you're even like, okay, that's a little much, Like it would be an X rated movie if it was put out. So I said, the writings he did at that time, for now you're even like, okay, that's a little much, Like it would be an X-rated movie if it was put out. So. But he ensued that his name would be an enduring influence on literary, philosophical and cultural discourses. And his writings didn't just stop there, Like they did influence people in a very negative way as well, which we'll talk about right now.
Speaker 3:So, when it comes to serial killers, we have several notorious serial killers and sadistic murderers who have referenced or been influenced by the sods work in the Brady, or Brad, brady, brady, brady, uh ian, the brady or brad.
Speaker 2:Uh, brady, brady, ian brady ian brady sorry, ian brady.
Speaker 3:One of the most infamous moore's murders was known admirer of de sade, and those murders were a series of horrific child killings committed by ian and mira hindley in and around manchester, england, between July 1963 and October 1965. And that case is considered one of the most notorious and high-profile murder cases in 20th century Britain. Where he had read several of de Sade's books and encouraged his accomplice, mira, to read them as well. He also promoted Sade's writings to Henley's brother-in-law, david Smith. The couple, brady and Henley, had copies of Saad's works in their possession, including the Life and Ideas of the Marquis de Saad by Geoffrey Gore. The influence of Saad's philosophy on Brady was evident in his actions and writings. He saw serial killers as superior beings, echoing Saad's ideas about embracing natural instincts without moral restraint. He compared serial killers to writers, saying they both pursue the quest for immortality, but killers use a knife rather than a pen, skin rather than paper.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So again, that's kind of taking that his writings and his influences like to a twisted level and I think that we see that with a lot of criminals that obsess with certain type of people or certain. You know, there are killers that have linked to other killers and I did this because of them or were influenced by them. We see that with mass shootings I want to hit the same body count that that person had. And Brady seemed to really think and embrace the almost godlike concept that the Marquis de Sade had about himself and reproduce that. Produce that, because there are multiple.
Speaker 2:One thing that sod did from jail, in prison and asylums was he wrote letters to people and a lot of those letters he was writing as if it was about himself, that there was a lot of fictionalization to it and he seemed to really want to make himself almost seem like this godly figure and very egocentric, very um, stuck on himself and that he was a better and more higher formative person than other people were. And you see that in these letters that were intimate letters to people he cared about outside of just his literary writings. So he almost seemed to have this kind of falsified concept of himself and his own superiority that br Brady kind of latched onto and that's not a good thing and we're not going to cover the more murders in this episode, but it's interesting to see how much influence he had on somebody that took those so much to heart. They committed horrific child killings not just murders but child murders.
Speaker 3:And I think on some level you have to have that kind of God complex to separate yourself out from those other people, because you have to in some ways dehumanize your victim to do the things that these people do, and so you have to figure out some way to break that to the empathy and sympathy and every other human feeling you would have towards those people. I think the only way you can do that is to somehow think that you're different and superior to them.
Speaker 2:Well, and that's one thing you see when you look at the profile of seductive killers, like if you go back to again BTK and there's many others that we won't name here but hopefully we'll cover over time but it's never about sex itself, it's about the domination, power and control and that very much goes with that God complex, like I have power over you. There's a line in I believe it's the movie Red Dragon, when the main character's talking about the serial killer that's active and he makes a comment of like we have to study the patterns because this guy's not going to stop. And one of the cops in the room says, well, why not? And Will Graham says, well, because it makes him God. And that's very much kind of what we see here. Like my ability to hurt women, control women, torture them, makes me God. So how do you combat that? And you can see it in his writings. This guy kind of took it upon himself and believed that and in real life harmed many people.
Speaker 3:So there's a broader cultural influence to me, unfortunately. I'm sure that a lot of people out there would see it differently. But there was this radical change to the societal norms because of his graphic depictions of sexual violence, incest, torture and murder in the 18th century France, which profoundly changed the societal norms. His work, though largely suppressed, circulated underground and influential select intellectuals and artists. His radical philosophy rejected the existence of a supreme being and posited a lawless, destructive nature as the original guide to behavior, starkly departing from the Enlightenment ideals and sparking ongoing debates on morality, freedom and human nature.
Speaker 2:So he also kind of pioneered the exploration of human sexuality. So Saad's novels were among the first to delve into the dark, hidden impulses of human nature. He was before Freud's concepts of like the subconscious by over a century. So in a way he's even kind of brown groundbreaking in the psych uh, psychological field and psychology, even though most people would never admit that. He presented homosexuality as an equal norm. So he was very much again ahead of his time, like uh in that area and that it was just as acceptable as heterosexuality, uh, anticipating the modern gay movement long before Oscar Wilde. Uh. The term sadism coined by psychiatrist Richard Von Croft Ebbing in 1886 was inspired by sods work marking the beginning of a more clinical approach to understanding sexual behavior. So it's with Croft Ebbing great name, kind of him being a psychiatrist, psychologist and kind of looking into Saad's writings and applying that to what he was seeing in some of his patients and things, that we start to develop the term sadistic sadism and what we get to as sadistic killers.
Speaker 3:So he also has a large influence on literature and philosophy. The philosophy aspect of it is more interesting to me. Just again, that human nature. Where does it stop? What's actually natural? Do you actually respect other people's humans? Are we essentially good or essentially evil? And you can talk for hours about that, as you know, as far as you have to teach kids not to hit, not to steal, so I'm going to say this wrong Bolladere, frederick Nietzsche and Guillaume Apollonary. I'm going to go with Apollonary, okay, I wasn't sure on that one. Nietzsche's the one I'm most familiar with. I'm not very familiar with the other two, including George Bastille, michael Fouquet and Camille Aglia, engaged in Saad's ideas, exploring their implications for sexuality, nihilism and transgression.
Speaker 2:He also had some impacts on cinema and the visual arts, so influences on artists like Eugene Delacroix and Theodore Gerlkult In cinema. His life and works inspired numerous films, most of them French and I'm not going to be able to pronounce so if you want to look those up, google it. But he's also had some influence on pop culture and music. So he had impacts extending into enigma's 1990s hit song, sadness, part one, which that is a great album. Um sod appeared as a non-player character in the 2014 assassins creed unity game. I remember that it was one of those moments where, like he appeared and I was like, oh my God, I know who they're depicting. So many kids aren't going to understand that, but he was a protagonist in the French Revolution section of that Assassin's Creed game.
Speaker 2:So again, he also kind of had some contributions to psychology and psychiatry. So Saad's impact on the field. So Saad's impact on the field again were brought in by Richard von Kraft-Ebbing Just want to keep saying his name In the work Psychopathia Sexualis, which was published in 1886, and it was the first scientific study that used the term sadism, deriving from Saad's name, and it was used to describe sexual gratification through inflicting pain on others. This work along with albert mall's shift to understanding of sexual perversions from a symptom of mental health disorders to an integral part of moral, general, autonomous and continuous sexual instincts. So we see kind of human sexuality now being more understood in psychology is natural and nature, but also putting a line on what's normal, natural and going more into this sadistic and when it becomes harmful.
Speaker 3:And I think those philosophical discussions are especially difficult here in America, where you have that Puritan influence, where we had one point in time where procreation was the only driving force, supposedly, in having sex, and then, of course, you had families who had 20 kids. Is that an excuse? I want a baby. So I'm going to do these things Because I think that we would all agree at this point in time that it's a natural thing that people want to have sex. It's not simply for procreation, and we've had that shift in our society from one extreme and I think we're at a good place now. I hope we don't go further, like you know, past the consent part, past that harmful part, but it's always a possibility because, just like you said before, the law didn't used to protect women the way it does now. There was a certain point in time where you know, once you were married, whatever happened happened. It was behind closed doors. So I hope that we don't go past that range, but it's always a possibility.
Speaker 2:Or that we go backwards and start punishing people again for who they love and who they don't. I mean, and like you talk about with the Puritan aspects. In America, like even today, we're starting to see researchers have teaching abstinence and preaching abstinence, but damn if I can't turn on TV and see. As for boner pills that are made for men, well in ages, that shouldn't be reprocreating. So I don't understand. We do have this double standard, and I think that was something that Saad was trying to point out was you have this double standard of what's acceptable and not acceptable human behavior when it comes to human pleasure and gratification?
Speaker 3:And I think you're also hitting the nail on head with that double life aspect of it. You go through the Bible Belt where it's church after church and, like you said, you know abstinence don't have sex until you're married. On and on and on.
Speaker 2:But then every other exit off the interstate has a lion's den. Yes, like the, the and back then, like what he wrote would have been pornographic when we talked about veronica guardian, like what was considered pornographic back in the 1930s and then today what we consider pornography and acceptable, um, like, even when I was younger, like showing a butt on tv I was like you couldn't do that besides certain. And now you can turn on TV like two o'clock in the afternoon and somebody's showing a naked man's butt and nobody seems to think twice about it. And I think Saad was showing that. Like that double standard.
Speaker 2:And then how, if we just are more open about it, talk about it and make it more accepted by society, we take it from being a crime where back in the 1800s into the 1900s, even in some parts of the world today, and even the like, people are arrested, executed for the people they love in the acts that are natural human behaviors for them that at um different times were not considered harmful, like.
Speaker 2:It's very weird again to see that if we go back to Roman and Greek times where sexuality was just open, we didn't have to hide it During this time. The Marquis is definitely pointing out that, like I'm holding these orgies and many of you are showing up, you hide who you are. I'm not ashamed. And he's writing these books and he's the character in many of these books. So it's very interesting to see that he was pushing those limits but then how he took it beyond those limits and then became. He became an episode. Like you know. He became not notorious as literally the definition of like the worst killers we have in the string of murderers, terms that we use.
Speaker 3:His commercial interest and academic interest works saw a resurgence in sales after becoming widely available in the 1960s, which of course that again was that period in America where a lot of these norms and societal expectations started to loosen up. We talked about those 1930s ones where obviously there was a market for it because people were buying those pictures of Ronnie and things like that. But on the surface we said, oh, that's wrong. But at the same time people who are on the surface saying that's wrong are still buying them and taking them home. In the 1960s things loosened up a lot and at that point in time particularly Justine and Philosophy in the Bedroom became more widely available, and his life and writings have since become the subject of extensive academic study and debate, despite their often shocking nature.
Speaker 2:While Saad's actions were scandalous and criminal, they occurred within a specific historical context. Some historians argued that the severity of his punishments, uh, was partly due to his family's efforts to avoid public disgrace. Almost they were institutionalizing him just to be like, get him out of here. We don't want any more of these scandals again. This is also that tumultuous time between king louis and bonaparte. So the factions of you know who was on louis side, who was on bonaparte side and you know, especially during that time where it was bonaparte louis, bonaparte, louis, like there were a lot of things and sod was just bringing unnecessary attention to the family.
Speaker 2:Um, though censored for much of the 19th and 20th century, he continues to provoke discussions on issues of freedom, morality and the nature of human desire. And, like you said, the 1960s were like the perfect breeding ground for his stuff to come back, especially in the US, which is where you saw that resurgence, because that really was kind of a free love, like let's talk about it. And especially, like Justine, when you read that one which I'm never going to promote, like reading that, but do what you will if you're into erotic stuff um, it's very graphic and, again, very depicting, like a young girl's ascent into sexuality. So, um, it doesn't surprise me that that was the time that it resurged. And now he's again becoming known a little bit more again in certain circles. But so many times people use this term and all of the he's being sadistic. Where did that come from? Well, now we have given you the basis of where that comes from and kind of some areas of how we became associated with this.
Speaker 3:And of course he was criticized widely, which you know. In my opinion, a lot of this is a good thing. I really don't like this particular person, but that's just my feelings on him. And that critical reception of his works has undergone significant shifts over time and basically reflects the changing societal attitudes and intellectual trends attitudes and intellectual trends During his lifetime and in the immediate aftermath. His writings were met with intense hostility and revulsion. Contemporary critics lambasted his plays and novels as obscene, with particularly vitriol directed at Justine, which was the one you just mentioned, which many deemed utterly repugnant. And the negative perception persisted well into the 19th century, exemplified by French historian Jules Michelet's scathing characterization of Dessade as the professor immaturist of crime.
Speaker 2:And like yeah, that's how he was viewed as somebody that was promoting crime and the evaluation of females specifically. So, like in feminist literature, he is lambasted, as he probably should be, but at the same time, I think, in different realms, as they're saying, he's very much allotted. Like, even though he had a lot of condemnation, there were 19th century authors that really expressed a degree of admiration for his work, like Charles Adelaire, which I'm sure I'm saying that wrong and then kind of one of my literary heroes, edgar Allan Poe, very much admired him and his ability to speak freely, his ability to speak freely. This appreciation, though, was far from universal, as evident by critiques such as Antola France, who dismissed Saad's writings as tedious and unworthy of serious consideration. And, again, it wasn't until the 20th century that Saad's literary works were starting to be seen more as acceptable.
Speaker 3:And I guess that's kind of where you know I'm falling on this Like I appreciate, like the, you know, the Edgar Allen Poe idea that it's freedom of speech, freedom of expression. I'm glad that he's writing about things that would normally be considered, you know, topics that shouldn't be talked about. I'm glad that he's questioning some of those things about where should the line be drawn and things like people who are just loving each other should be legal. We shouldn't be criminalizing that. That's none of our business. But he also took it way past the line where I would have wanted him to stop personally. But again, that's just my own judgment.
Speaker 2:So I think we've covered very well like Saad's impact, the crimes that he committed and how he's influenced terminology Like his philosophical stance often justified and glorified sexual violence, presenting it as a natural expression of human desire, and his works gained notoriety in this resurgence in the 20th century. As we're reading those and we're starting to see the writings that he had, we're starting to see the evolution of the acceptance of certain human behaviors and that maybe we need to evolve, kind of as he was trying to say and if you're interested in his politics and stuff like that's kind of a different area but really we're talking about like is his impact on crime, his crimes and how they did bring attention to the whores that were maybe being that not maybe, but were being perpetrated on women at that time. And you know, like I said, feminist scholars have very much lambasted him. But I think there's also needs to be an appreciation that it brought attention to the horrific um, especially of women of lower status, lower class um in France, england and even today that we owe even sex workers and stuff like that the right to be heard and their tortures and tormentors punished.
Speaker 2:The term sadism, as we talked about, evolved from the initial clinical usage in psychiatry and sexology to entering kind of more general usage term, kind of being seen as referring to the deviation of pleasure from afflicting pain, humiliation or dominance, not necessarily in a sexual context. So I mean it's not uncommon I've heard it where people will be like, oh my boss is such a sadist, like he wants us to stay late this week, and you're like I don't know if you really know what that term originates from.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think sadistic at this point just means, in common language, the intentional infliction of harm or pain on another.
Speaker 2:And getting pleasure from doing it Right, Like my boss really likes making me save after he's so sadistic and you're like ooh so modern usage distinguished between clinic and sadism and consensual BDSM practices. So I think there also needs to be very big clarification in the understanding of the term sadism when used by consensual adults and then what we're talking about here of unconsensual torture and harm of an individual really for the purpose of power and your own gratification of domination. So in the end, like we just kind of wanted to bring attention to the Marquis de Sade I don't know if you have any last thoughts on him.
Speaker 3:Just to me it's interesting the way we fixate on some of these things. Like, if you look at criminal minds, I feel like almost every other episode of criminal minds had some type of sadistic killer involved in the episodes, To the point where, like there was one point where I was watching it and I was like I don't even know if I can keep watching this show because it just was getting so dark, even though it was fictional. But he definitely, in my mind, was one of the first ones who pressed those lines and took the art way past where it was before as far as like the literary art side of it, to the point today where we have like TV shows like Criminal Minds. That really pushes those boundaries and you see things. You're like I really I really didn't want those images in my head right before I went to sleep.
Speaker 2:And I think with him like there's so many writers and authors that push those boundaries in their writings and their works. But when you talk to them they're very normal. Where the Marquis de Sade was like no, no, I'm writing this, this is my life Like I really do embody these views and I think that kind of goes back to like Edgar Allan Poe. I don't think he like appreciated that side of him. To like Edgar Allen Poe, I don't think he like appreciated that side of him. But I think like Poe took very even at his time what was considered almost taboo look at human mental health and behavior and that darkness of murder and the fascination with killing and people at that time even kind of weren't accepting of Poe's work. And now now he's a literary hero. The only difference was Poe kind of only harmed himself, not other people. But I think like to end this episode we'll leave it with the words of the Marquis himself where he said in one of his writings if it is the dirty element that gives pleasure to the act of lust, then the dirtier it is, the more pleasurable it is bound to be.
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