Talk:John Wayne Gacy

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[edit] I can't believe there are people out there like that!

I am doing my college term paper on the history of the serial killers and their behaivor and I never even heard of Gacy. Well, ever since I started my research I am hooked on his past. Just to think there were and most likely some where in the world there are still people like them. Gacy, Bundy, Ramierez, The Harps, SOS, and The Boston Stangler were all sick people.

Please calm your hysteria, this article is reporting on human knowledge (in keeping with the missions of Wikipedia), not displaying sentimental resent.--213.40.61.253 04:59, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

You would think that if your in college and it has somthing to do with serial killers then you would learn a little about some of the most famous

[edit] Pedophile?

Someone took Gacy out of the "pedophile" category because he went after teens rather than younger children. Maybe a new, more general category is needed: "famous perverts". Soon we might be able to officially add Michael Jackson to the list, along with various Catholic priests.

Its a shame that gacy lacked the charm that made ted bundy such a personable serial killer. Clearly he didn't lack a sense of humour though,as is evidenced by his alter ego "pogo the clown"I think life would be duller but for these sexual psychopaths and their entertaining deviancies-so long live(lol)john wayne gacy-a role model for psychotic clowns everywhere!!!!! [by some Ann Nonymous]

Alfred Hitchcock said that people go to movies to see other people in peril, to remind themselves of how much better off they are than the guy in the film. Serial killers and other extremes of humanity serve a similar purpose in real life. Wahkeenah 6 July 2005 03:28 (UTC)

Did you mean "paedophile"? It's so amusing when people choose to employ a word that is clearly beyond their intellectual capacity to spell correctly. Returning swiftly to the subject under discussion,it is our collective fascination with serial killers that i find disturbing, not the behaviour of a few disturbed and demented individuals. The fact that five books, a film and countless magazine articles have been written about this man (presumably feeding the public's morbid and rapacious appetite) is a poor reflection of our "humanity". Perhaps Gacy,Bundy and the rest only differ from us in one respect; they didn't seek their pleasures vicariously.

In America it's spelled "pedophile". Either way, it's grim. But their stories are interesting for a number of reasons, one being that we wonder why they are like that, while also being relieved that we are *not* like that. Where does that evil come from? Some serial killers wonder about that, too. Ted Bundy read a lot about serial killers, as did the BTK guy. But various extremes of humanity tend to be interesting, not just serial killers, but also conventional criminals like bank robbers, organized crime, etc. and also positives like historical figures (well, *some* are positive). In short, anyone who has done something we would likely not do, that's outside the norm, makes for good press. I don't think the fascination is necessarily a bad thing. A lot of folks are just saying, "Wow, look what he did!" but (hopefully) not many are saying "I wish I had done that!" Those latter are the ones to keep an eye on. Wahkeenah 6 July 2005 23:31 (UTC)
It may be necessary to indicate that John Wayne Gacy is the lowest common denominator of the rare group of child molester/killers; moreover, there is no relationship with Michael Jackson (Jackson is a boylover, yes, but he's no murderer). This vile man is certainly not worthy of the title "paedophile" or "paederast" (boylover).--213.40.61.253 04:59, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lyrics to Sufjan Stevens' song about Gacy

I just deleted a duplicate reference to the song in the article, by the way... --Gregoe86 01:44, 22 November 2005 (UTC) [for tone/style, think Elliott Smith/Nick Drake]

"John Wayne Gacy, Jr" from the CD, Come On Feel The Illinoise!

His father was a drinker And his mother cried in bed Folding John Wayne's T-shirt When the swing set hit his head

The neighbors they adored him For his humor and his conversation Look underneath the house there, Find the few living things rotting fast in their sleep, oh the dead Twenty-seven people, even more They were boys, with their cars summer jobs, oh my God Are you one of them?

He dressed up like a clown for them With his face paint white and red And on his best behavior In a dark room, on the bed, he kissed them all He'd kill ten thousand people With the slight of his hand, running far, running fast to the dead He took off all their clothes for them He put a cloth on their lips, quiet hands, quiet kiss on the mouth

And in my best behavior I am really just like him Look beneath the floorboards For the secrets I have hid

Gay Icon Project

In my effort to merge the now-deleted list from the article Gay icon to the Gay icons category, I have added this page to the category. I engaged in this effort as a "human script", adding everyone from the list to the category, bypassing the fact-checking stage. That is what I am relying on you to do. Please check the article Gay icon and make a judgment as to whether this person or group fits the category. By distributing this task from the regular editors of one article to the regular editors of several articles, I believe that the task of fact-checking this information can be expedited. Thank you very much. Philwelch 20:14, 24 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Statement to Detectives

A detective from Des Plaines told me in a private interview for a paper I am working on that he actually asked Gacy how many boys he killed. To this, Gacy replied, "I always liked the number 45." This is not to say that Gacy wasn't playing when he said that. But it sort of fits with the fact that between January, 1972 and 1976, there is only one listed victim. Serial killers are called 'serial' for a reason. If Gacy had 12 other victims, they were more than likely during this period of time. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.80.34.112 (talk) 22:43, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sufjan Stevens

I have no idea why people keep inserting a duplicate reference to Sufjan Stevens, but it keeps happening! Simply read the article, and you will find that we are one step ahead of you and have already referenced the Sufjan Stevens song. I'm really getting tired of removing duplicate references.--Alhutch 07:52, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

I just removed this utterly irrelevant bit of Sufjan Stevens: 'While not writing songs, Stevens chairs the local chapter of the Redundancy Society of Redundancy.'

  • You need to read the history of this entry a little more carefully. Wahkeenah 18:18, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
    • The anon user did what I had in mind. That should take care of the continual complaint as referenced by Alhutch, noted above. See? The "self cleaning oven". :) Wahkeenah 13:46, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
      • If this is a joke, I don't get it. Feel free to spell it out for n00bs like me - until then, I'm dropping reference #2. There's also been some discussion over Illinois/Illinoise/Come On! Feel The Illinoise! over at the Sufjan Stevens talk page, so I've updated the link from pointing to Illinoise (Album) to Illinois (Album). The fewer redirects, the better. TheRuss 08:49, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
        • Seriously, how do extra references to Sufjan Stevens' song keep getting added? It's already listed. TheRuss 23:43, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

I read this because of the Sufjan song. I didn't see the reference. I would have added but I saw this. I don't know maybe check again... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.125.180.78 (talk) 01:16, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Clown picture

If that was indeed a picture of Gacy as a clown that was removed, then I think it IS relevant to the article. Anyone else agree? seinman 08:48, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

It was indeed a picture of Gacy as a clown that was removed. It's quite a well-known photo, and I agree that it was certainly relevant. - Nunh-huh 08:59, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
I was looking at the page this morning because I was listening to the Sufjan Stevens song, and I hadn't seen the clown photo before. Why remove it? It couldn't be more relevant. And anyway why is being well-known a criterion for excluding something? Trigger1606 12.19, 10 February 2006 (GMT)
It isn't. I was agreeing with you that it should stay! - Nunh-huh 15:03, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
Well I'm gonna go ahead and revert, then. Seems like it would be a decent addition to the article. seinman 15:55, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
Or technically a RE-addition, since someone else had displaced it with the mug shot on January 25. I shrunk that spooky photo back to the size it was prior to the 25th. Wahkeenah 12:46, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
The picture would be more relevant to Evil clown than this article. I think it is reasonable to use it in one article. adnghiem501 01:39, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
The picture is a picture of John Wayne Gacy. It's not a generic "evil clown". There's no reason to restrict it to one article, in any case.- Nunh-huh 02:30, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
Absolutely. The clown thing was an integral part of the story. I'm guessing some of the users here are too young to remember this case. Wahkeenah 02:32, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
This clown picture is seriously scary ! The John Wayne Gacy picture that was used on this page before (which was a mug shot) was more appropriate I think. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 132.211.201.120 (talk) 16:09, 19 December 2006 (UTC).

[edit] Survivors

I am David Daniel. I was 28 in 1977, but I looked 18 or 19. I had long hair and I was still carded until I was 33. I returned to Illinois from California and I called my dad (in Hoffman Estates) from a bus depot. He said he could come get me. I went out front to wait. A man pulled up and the following conversation took place:

"Want a ride?"

"No thanks."

'I'll take you anywhere you want to go."

"No thanks."

"Really. Get in. I'll give you a ride."

"I have a ride comin'."

"I have some pot."

"I have a ride. My dad's comin'."

"Just smoke some pot with me until your dad comes."

"No thanks. He'll be here pretty soon."

"How far is he?"

"Thanks anyway, I have a ride."

Here, I turned around and went back into the station. I knew he was gay and that that was the reason he was insistent. I had long-hair and was popular with girls at the time and fit his "type." Sometime later, after the murders were discovered, I heard about Gacy. I didn't think anything of it. I read about one of his victims being picked up at a bus depot. I looked at his photo and said, "Oh, my God." It is scary to think that I was that close to a serial killer and that I would have died that day had I taken that ride.

I have, subsequently, met a survivor of the Hillside Stranglers, and the last survivor of William Bonin, named Harold Tate.

David Daniel

P.S. It is possible that at least one of unknown victims was also mistaken for being younger than he was, and this may contribute to the inability of police to identify him.

[edit] Father's middle name

Was his father John S. Gacy, or another John Wayne Gacy? "John Wayne Gacy Jr." tends to imply the latter, and Googling on ""john wayne gacy sr" produces hundreds of hits, while the same search on "john s gacy" gets just three hits, including this Wikipedia article. This came up on Talk:John Wayne, relating to the question of whether Gacy's middle name came from the movie star or from his father; unless somebody can cite a source, it seems to me that 'John Wayne Gacy Sr' is better-supported than 'John S. Gacy'. --Calair 23:53, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] '1 minute per victim'

This is obviously true, but even verifiable facts can still be POV when presented with the intent to persuade rather than inform, which is how this came across to me. --Calair 01:57, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

It's not about persuasion, it's about divine retribution. The guy tortured and murdered at least 33 kids, and if he suffered for 27 minutes while being executed, that's a good thing. Wahkeenah 02:28, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
The questions of whether divine retribution exists, and whether one person's suffering can be used to justify another's, are both highly controversial. Until those debates are resolved, which is probably not going to be done on this page, it's not appropriate for this article to be offering judgement on whether the manner of Gacy's death was a good thing. --Calair 05:04, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
I didn't put any of that in the article. All I stated was the mathematical fact. The reader is free to connect the dots, or not. FYI, I don't literally believe in divine retribution, it's just a good metaphor. Wahkeenah 05:08, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
I agree that it sounded extremely POV. Wether it's a "good" thing or not is irrelevant, and obviously opinion. I removed it originally but Wahkeenah reverted, just for the record. --seinman 04:52, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
And for the record, 49 seconds per victim is a plain mathematical fact. You can spin it as POV if you want. I'm assuming you're not trying to argue that his guilt or innocence itself is POV. That would be ludicrous. In any case, the mother is dead, and he deserved worse than what he got. Finis. Wahkeenah 05:08, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
Nobody here is disputing that 27 divided by 33 is slightly less than 1. (Nor, I hope, do they need an article about a serial killer to tell them that). But as the NPOV tutorial explains, it's quite possible for selective juxtaposition of entirely true facts to create bias by insinuation. When we present a fact in an article, we're not just communicating that fact; we're alleging that it's relevant to the context in which it appears. As a 'plain mathematical fact', "27/33<1" is obvious and not particularly interesting. It only becomes interesting when woven into a judgement - whether explicitly stated or just implied - and while there are appropriate places for that judgement to be made, Wikipedia isn't one of them. --Calair 07:03, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
Then you should also take out the POV entry about how the people cheering outside the prison was supposedly so offensive. Here's a guy who killed at least 33 kids, then proceeded to abuse the legal system, costing the Illinois taxpayers countless dollars to milk as much time out of his worthless existence as possible--defiant to the very end, because in his own mind there was nothing wrong with what he had done--before he finally got his just deserts. That is the reason so many were cheering at Joliet that night in 1994. What Gacy did was offensive in the extreme. What the protestors did was nothing. Wahkeenah 12:39, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
Never mind, I done did it myself. Wahkeenah 12:45, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
I agree with your edit. If some prominent politician or organisation had referred to it as "a display of shockingly bad taste", that might have warranted inclusion - clearly identified as a quote from that source - because the stated opinions of significant people may be relevant. But I dislike that "some people have said" style of weasel-wording, I've removed similar passages from other articles, and I'd have taken it out of this one if I'd noticed it before you did. (The reason I didn't, BTW, is that I was looking through recent edits - that one's been there for a while, so it got past me.) --Calair 23:16, 8 March 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Evil clowns

There's no need for this page to mention every appearance of the evil clown trope - Gacy was obviously a big influence, but he's not the only reason people find clowns scary. If it specifically references Gacy (like calling a clown character 'Pogo') that's one thing, but for the rest, a pointer to evil clown should save some duplication. (I removed the Pennywise bit because an unsourced, nameless 'is speculated' isn't noteworthy.) --Calair 03:12, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

  • It's good to weed the excess. I'm not sure what movie he referred to, but I recall at some point Roger Ebert said clowns had kind of scared him as a kid, which would have been well before Gacy's time. Different kids react differently to clowns, just like they react differently to thunderstorms or any other potentially scary thing. I was never especially scared of clowns, but Gacy's makeup is scary, even if I didn't know what he was. It looks like a death-head. Wahkeenah 03:27, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
Yeah, Lon Chaney Sr. is supposed to have said "There's nothing funny about a clown in the moonlight", and he died back in 1930. --Calair 03:41, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
Aha! Good point. I have trouble visually separating Lon Sr. from James Cagney for some reason. But it's a context thing. You expect to see clowns under the big top in bright lights. If you see one in a dark alley, or while you're chained in the basement of a suburban home, that's not a good sign. Wahkeenah 03:49, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removed sentence

I removed "Gacy had many nicknames, including the one he was best known for, 'gacy', and also used the alias 'Mikey Weiss'." from the Trial and execution section. Gacy is not a nickname, there is no source provided for Mikey Weiss, and the sentence was out of place in that section. KillerChihuahua?!? 18:13, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Influencial Childhood

I would say his diagnosis stems from the obvious childhood issues he faced as with any serial killer or serial murderer. Although he did not have an absent father he might as well have seeing as his father was a chronic alcoholic. This can really influence a young child especially a son. Whereas a son usually envisions being like his father he tends to follow in similar footsteps. Moving around as much as his family did it was impossible for him to hold any valuable friendships or relationships. Most serial killers who target children do it for the subconcious reason of them not having their own childhood. No one needs to state the obvious but it could have been that he was involved in public services such as his occupation a clown, To get closer to children.

[edit] Edited Marilyn Manson Reference

Removed sentence "Marilyn Manson also had a song titled "King kill 33", the lyrics are clearly refering to Wayne Gacy."

This is an inaccuracy. This song actually refers to the essay "King-Kill/33" by James Shelby Downard and has nothing verifiable to do with John Wayne Gacy.

Added note: "Bier is affectionately referred to as "Pogo" by some fans and bandmates."

Huntera 17:34, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] No mention of psychopathy?

Much is made of Gacy dressing up as Pogo the Clown but on the entire page there is no mention of Gacy being a psychopath - a pretty relevant piece of information for those who want to understand how he could commit his crimes. I can think of many sources, I believe Dr Robert Hare mentions Gacy several times in his book "Without Conscience". Any thoughts?

[edit] World of Warcraft mention

I'm not sure how appropriate the World of Warcraft trivia piece is because that user name seems to be more a reference to John Wayne Bobbit than it does to John Wayne Gacy.

[edit] Democratic party

How is this category relevant? We don't go through and list party affiliation of every random individual unless it has some connection. JoshuaZ 20:52, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

I think it's a good idea here to stop and take a look at all the groups, in addition to the Democratic Party, that might be embarressed by this article:
  • The Jaycees
  • The Roman Catholic Church
  • Kentucky Fried Chicken
  • The prison and parole officials of Iowa
  • The police of Chicago and Des Plaines, IL
  • The residents of Norwood Park, Chicago
  • All professional and amateur clowns
  • All homosexuals and bisexuals
It's not the purpose of a encyclopedia to avoid offending groups and people; it is to state facts. Removing mention of all these groups would be ridiculous.
What matters most is verifiability. Do we have a source for his political affilation? -Will Beback · † · 19:21, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
Categories are especially dangerous and we run the risk of overcatting anyways. Cats should only be inlcided when they are substantially connected to the topic at hand. JoshuaZ 19:32, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Influence on the Halloween Movies?

I remember hearing that in the Halloween movies, young Michael wearing a clown costume was influenced by Gacy. Has anyone else heard anything about this?

[edit] Removed piece of trivia

I removed the following point from the trivia sub-section:

  • In the radio shows of Grand Theft Auto III, there are occasionally advertisements of a fictional video game called "Pogo the Monkey". The apparent objective of the game is to kill government officials.

I don't think it really has anything to do with Gacy, nor has it been claimed anywhere that it really did.

[edit] They Saved Gacy's Brain

Is there some reason Wikipedia is so obsessed with the fact that Gacy's brain is preserved in a jar? No matter how smart this Dr. Morrison is, I don't think she knows enough to create a Frankenstein and stick the brain in there. Since the brain's already had a full forensic study, I don't see how this information is relevant. --64.107.77.21 20:58, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Clown festival mishap

Have any of you all heard this story? Some big city like Detroit or somewhere in the Midwest was going to have a clown festival for kids as a community event so they put a picture of a clown in the newspaper ad for the festival and it turned out to be one of Gacy's paintings. Once they realized it, the ad was pulled immediately. If anyone can find a source for that, it would be a good piece of trivia, no? GingerGin 02:43, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] interviews

Oh, there is also this book by Jason Moss, a UNLV student who did this paper on Gacy and interviews him over a long period of time. I don't have the book, but it would be a good reference to some really interesting facts. GingerGin 02:50, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] no one has said this yet.......in a rap song, a gacy reference

The song Adrenaline Rush by Twista....And y'all can't trace me I bury my victims in the wall like gacey —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.192.163.253 (talk) 04:24, 5 March 2007 (UTC).

[edit] No Children?

This article states that John Wayne Gacy had no children; however, according to the Crime Library, he and his first wife had a son and a daughter together. --MosheA 22:20, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mistake

It seems to me that the quoted year in this sentence from the 'Begins murdering' section must be wrong: His marriage fell apart and his wife divorced him in mid-1986. Possibly it is meant to be 1968? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 202.78.155.203 (talk) 22:27, 14 May 2007 (UTC).

An IP vandalized this - I've changed it back to 1976 (there were two divorces, the previous in 1968). Ttiotsw 23:04, 14 May 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Biography

Reference might be included to a published biography, "Killer Clown: the John Wayne Gacy Murders"

[edit] Occupation

Does anyone else think it's ridiculous to have "murderer" among his list of occupations in the side-panel? That's hardly an occupation. Oscabat 05:09, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Think of the victims

Gacy should not be trivialised as just another interesting popular culture icon. The 19 people he is known to have killed deserve better. So I've listed their names one by one. Others may choose to fill out the details of their lives. CallMeHenry 16:19, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Pennywise the Clown

According to the IMBD article on the 1990 TV movie IT ([1]), the character 'Pennywise' was inspired by John Wayne Gacy. If this can be confirmed, I think it would make a good addition to the trivia section. HotaruAburame 21:22, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] which did he do first

Did he rape them then kill them, or kill them then rape them? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.2.175.84 (talk) 03:09, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] I was not aware that Wiki

...normally tagged people whose real "orientation" is rape and murder as LGBT because their victim pathology was same-sex. This label needs to come off. Gacy's presented identity to the world was heteronormative. Alternately, someone needs to provide something else in the article besides 'He rapemurdered young men' to back this up, IMHO. --Parcequilfaut (talk) 17:45, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. Let somebody provide documentation for him being gay or bisexual if they think the category belongs there. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.252.49.193 (talk) 18:07, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
The article says he described himself as a lesbian, does that count? casecloser (talk) 04:45, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Recent edit reversion

I appreciate that the contributor spent some time with the additions today, but there are some issues with it that made me decide to remove it. The material was largely unsourced, with only an extended listing of items taken during a search having a citation. The listing had POV issues in that parts of it were bolded, imparting some air of significance to those items with no explanation of why that was done. The additions also had spelling errors and some grammar problems. Part of the problem is also that it gave undue weight to the disappearance of one individual. Finally, I have no idea why the list of known victims was rearranged by date of birth, but that made no sense. The listing as it exists in the current version is a listing in order of disappearance, which is more relevant to the article. Wildhartlivie (talk) 21:32, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "Open containers"?

In the third paragraph of the 'Trial and execution' section the article states that there were arrests for 'open containers.' I have two main questions about this statement:

  1. Containers of what?
  2. Why does their opening make any difference?

The answer should probably be written into the article as well due to this lack of clarity. --Hydraton31 (talk) {Contributions} 21:05, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

In the US, there are many "open container" laws, which are basically laws that prohibit possessing or consuming an open container of alcohol in public. Wildhartlivie (talk) 02:30, 28 May 2008 (UTC)