For the past several months, creepy clowns have been terrorizing America, with sightings of actual clowns in at least 10 different states.These fiendish clowns have reportedly tried to lure women and children into the woods, chased people with knives and machetes, and yelled at people from cars. They've been spotted hanging out in cemeteries and they have been caught in the headlights of cars as they appear alongside desolate country roads in the dead of night.This isn't the first time there has been a wave of clown sightings in the United States. After eerily similar events occurred in the Boston area in the 1980s, Loren Coleman, a cryptozoologist who studies the folklore behind mythical beasts such as Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster, came
…show more content…
Nonetheless, the perpetrators seem to be capitalizing on our longstanding love-hate relationship with clowns, tapping into the primal dread that so many children (and more than a few adults) experience in their presence. In fact, a 2008 study conducted in England revealed that very few children actually like clowns. It also concluded that the common practice of decorating children's wards in hospitals with pictures of clowns may create the exact opposite of a nurturing environment. It's no wonder so many people hate Ronald McDonald. I'm not just interested in pointing out that clowns give us the creeps; I'm also interested in why we find them so disturbing. While the study was not specifically looking at the creepiness of clowns, much of what they discovered can help explain this intriguing phenomenon. Clown-like characters have been around for thousands of years. Historically, jesters and clowns have been a vehicle for satire and for poking fun at powerful people. They provided a safety valve for letting off steam and they were granted unique freedom of expression, as long as their value as entertainers outweighed the discomfort they caused the
Nonetheless, the perpetrators seem to be capitalizing on our longstanding love-hate relationship with clowns, tapping into the primal dread that so many children (and more than a few adults) experience in their presence. In fact, a 2008 study conducted in England revealed that very few children actually like clowns. It also concluded that the common practice of decorating children's wards in hospitals with pictures of clowns may create the exact opposite of a nurturing environment. It's no wonder so many people hate Ronald McDonald. I'm not just interested in pointing out that clowns give us the creeps; I'm also interested in why we find them so disturbing. While the study was not specifically looking at the creepiness of clowns, much of what they discovered can help explain this intriguing phenomenon. Clown-like characters have been around for thousands of years. Historically, jesters and clowns have been a vehicle for satire and for poking fun at powerful people. They provided a safety valve for letting off steam and they were granted unique freedom of expression, as long as their value as entertainers outweighed the discomfort they caused the