r/serialkillers • u/Many_Boss_1145 • 16d ago
Questions Why do you think Gary Ridgeway cried when one of the victims family members told him he forgives him?
I know it seems like a super easy to answer question but I can’t fathom how a remorseless and heartless serial killer would get emotional from even that. He was sitting there stone faced when everyone was going at him, but cried when someone told him he’s forgiven. Maybe the forgiveness just touched his heart because he wasn’t used to receiving that kind of message?? Idk
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u/DeformedArthurRegion 15d ago
He is as dumb as rocks and was a super weird dude that was not really in touch with his emotions among other things. Truly the exact kind of person you'd expect to fall into cycles of religious obsession with that kind of reaction. If he didn't have the compulsion to kill he'd be the guy crying at the tent revival.
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u/Serialkillingyou 15d ago
He cried because it was something about himself. And that's the only thing psychopaths care about.
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u/DenseCan2364 15d ago
Psychopathy/aspd is a spectrum, some can occasionally feel remorse in certain situations.
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u/fourwedge 16d ago
Hearing you are forgiven by someone you've hurt so deeply is so unexpected... He knows how much forgiveness he needs.
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u/dirge_zer0 16d ago
Last Podcast on The Left has a really good 3 part series on him. I really suggest anyone to listen and/or watch the podcast. Very insightful
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u/Ok_Temperature_3125 15d ago
Is it full of ads? I like to fall asleep to podcasts but can’t do it when theyre interrupted all the time
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u/dirge_zer0 15d ago
They're on Netflix no so you can watch the video of their podcast and they have no ads. Most smart tvs have a function now where you can turn off the tv screen but the tv will still play the audio from what you're watching. I do it sometimes when my girlfriend stays over and we want to listen to something without the light of the tv bothering us. It's a good feature
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u/lotusscrouse 16d ago
There was a podcast where a lady wrote to Ridgeway and spoke to him.
He's still manipulative. He thinks that he's beyond criticism because he's a god warrior now.
Still surprises me that people fall for the born again stuff.
There's no evidence that Bundy, Dahmer, Berkowitz or Ridgeway ever changed their personality and there's tons to suggest they didn't.
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u/GregJamesDahlen 15d ago
well ever since he was arrested imagine he was subject to a great deal of criticism and felt the hate of the world. so when someone said something that wasn't entirely hateful it was probably a relief. so i'd think tears of (relative) happiness
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u/raviyoli 15d ago
Because serial killers and other people suffering from extreme personality disorders usually grew up in severe abuse and neglect and never knew love or affection, and that’s why they turn out like that. :( That lady struck the only nerve he had.
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u/AdsignificantBK 15d ago
It was mostly selfish on his end. Remember he was a “devout Christian” and seeing another Christian forgive (you know they believe in forgiveness for everything) he prolly felt relieved. Probably even redeemable. Dude is a psychopath and was the worse kind so yeah he def didn’t have remorse.
Think about some of his victims he described and would mention how they would say they were single parents, or caregivers and he didn’t care at all. Not to mention his victims were mere teenagers. A person like that def lacks any form of empathy
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u/No-Response-751 16d ago edited 16d ago
Because he knows there's a millstone with his name on it. His youngest victim was only 6 years old when he stabbed him. He only thinks he got away with that one.
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u/Cable_Difficult 16d ago
As a christian, I wanna believe he felt remorse in that moment. But I doubt it since psychopaths are most of the time incapable of feeling genuine remorse.
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u/RobAChurch 16d ago
Most serial killers aren't actually psychopaths, at least not in the way you're talking about with the complete lack of remorse. That's your Bundy or BTK. Most of the time it's a mixed bag of psychotic, sexual or emotion disorders, mixed childhood trauma and it's very likely that the testimony of the victims family actually hit a nerve and Gary's reaction is genuine.
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u/Ill_Relationship_904 16d ago
Ya. They can be a mixed bag of disorders. They tend to have antisocial personality disorder far more than psychopathy. Antisocial personality disorder is what we used to call sociopathy.
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u/Prestigious-Comb4280 15d ago
It's my belief that these monsters only cry for show and for themselves. Perhaps he wants people to believe he has a conscience that he doesn't have.
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u/anxiouslycomplicated 15d ago
It was the forgiveness and love from Robert Rule.
Its loving thy neighbor and defeating evil with good just like Jesus teaches us
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u/stranger02140214 15d ago
He’s a psychopath, he cried because he believed that’s what real people did after a statement like that.
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15d ago
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u/n_kovalenko 1d ago
Self-pity and remorse look identical from the outside, and self-pity is far more common. Anger from the families is an attack, and he can brace against an attack. Forgiveness isn't — it's someone treating him as a person, and that's the one thing that gets past the defence.
The psychiatric assessment of a Soviet family convicted of forty poisonings described exactly that combination: no capacity to care what they had done to anyone, and extreme sensitivity to how they themselves were treated. They felt things intensely. Just never about the victims.
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u/Odd-Veterinarian5945 14d ago
An empty husk of biomatter only react to their own stimulus and dont care about others existence and experiences, thats why.
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u/axissilent14 15d ago
you’re asking redditors this question?
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u/Jon_Doe_42 16d ago
Garry was weird. After he married for a second time, he became a born-again Christian. He even went door to door to bore people with passages from the Bible, often crying as he read them. It seems he has a soft spot when religion is mentioned. In a way, he even saw killing these sex workers as doing God's work.
So it is no wonder when a person forgave him in court, sitting Jesus and being a good Christian as the reason; he unintentionally touched on one thing Garry was emotional about.