Who is asking you to watch them?

@LenHazell53

I was dragged to them by an ex friend as a teen.

I think they are an immoral part of western culture, because they invite us to be entertained at the expense of a character.

I think about violence in the media a lot. From a philosophical and anthropological perspective. And also political.

@Ellatynemouth
Your entitled to your opinion, I respectfully disagree, if a person does not like a media genre they are entitled not to watch it, it is why I don't watch preachy films such as God is not dead, that seek to impose their censorious agenda on other people uninvited and feel they have a right to be respected for there self righteousness.

@LenHazell53

People get murdered in real life. It says something about society when people want to watch reenactments of such murders.

Some of these films exist to satisfy those who would like to murder and torture in real life but don't want to go to jail. Some films aim for complete realism. Some are banned and shared on the black market. It's murder porn.

I find it sickening. It seems to be an American borne phenomenon.

@Ellatynemouth
The unstoppable killer is one of the 8 quintessential monster, it represents the inevitability and unpredictability of death and has been around as long as there has been literature and myth.
The first cinema version was the early filmed version of the Lodger, set in England and based on an English novel, as were a number of films that moved out of being thrillers (such as Peeping Tom 1960) and in to Horror films. So the first (recognizably) modern (non Italian) slasher film was the the "All through the house" section of the British tales from the Crypt 1972 where a Psychotic Santa lays siege to the home of a murderous wife, that lead directly the following year to "Black Christmas" the first actual slasher teen serial killer movie, before it was perfected in 1978 by John Carpenter in Halloween, originally meant to be a full length remake of "all through the house" but shifted from Christmas to Halloween at the insistence of the producer.

It is not particularly an american phenomena, since inevitable death is a universal fear.

@LenHazell53

I disagree.

I used to love horror. Old fashioned horror. Then in the 70s and 80s a new genre emerged which invited us to enjoy the suffering of the victims. That crossed a moral line.

That's the fundamental difference between horror and slasher. (And now torture porn and exploitation flicks.)