Do you like horror movies?(independent writing post by Ruby Ballesteros)

Do you like horror movies 

 I used to hate horror movies,  I couldn't even go to a Halloween store because I would get scared by the decorations. I also never saw the point of horror movies either, to me it was just blood, gore and lack of character development and meaning. When I was about ten years old, my mom and I decided to have a scary movie marathon, which really meant watching the Goosebumps movies and Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. To say I was absolutely terrified is an understatement, I had nightmares for weeks after watching those movies.... so I swore to myself never again would I put myself through that torture. 

    I kept this mindset until the opening night of my play, it was only last year, but I had never been in a play before and I was so afraid. I was so nervous all day about it, I was obsessing over it, I kept thinking about every possible situation where it could go wrong. At the end of the day, we got study hall instead of PE to work on homework, but naturally being a subbie, I didn't have any. So one of my friends was scrolling on Netflix, and she asked us if we wanted to watch anything, and one of my other friends said we should watch IT. I hated the idea but somehow everyone else said that's what they wanted to watch too, so I reluctantly agreed. I was very scared, Pennywise was terrifying, and the gore was on a never level that I had never seen or fathomed, but when study hall was over and it was time to get ready for the play, I found myself thinking about the movie instead of opening night. The horror movie had taken my mind off something, and sure it was a scary thing, but it helped deal with my real fear of opening night and replacing it with something I knew was irrational. In a New York Times article by Melinda Wenner Moyer, It states, Some studies have found that people who are feeling nervous or are prone to anxiety are drawn to horror films, too. “Perhaps scary movies provide a new focal point for their worries:”  

    It became a tradition to watch a horror movie on every opening night,  and I loved it, it helped relax my mind about my real anxieties and to be honest... It was fun. It was fun jumping at the scares and laughing about it later with my friends. So I began to not view horror movies as something so horrific, but rather just a good escape when you needed it. I later got into other horror movies, one of my favorites being Scream. I will say that if I had watched Scream before IT, I would have been a lot more scared, but Scream was a lot less gorier than IT, so I had no trouble watching Scream at all, and I liked the story line  better too. Now Scream is almost my comfort movie, which I'm not entirely sure is a good thing. I do think a good scare is important in life, since that's pretty much what life is anyway,  but watching horror does have its downsides. 

    As I previously stated, the more I watched horror, the more tolerable it became. I would like to acknowledge that violence in the media is an issue. An Article in the National Library of Medicine by L. Rowell Huesmann stated  “that exposure to violence in television, movies, video games, cell phones, and on the internet increases the risk of violent behavior on the viewer’s part just as growing up in an environment filled with real violence increases the risk of them behaving violently.” I do disencourage growing up in a place that encourages these movies, I try not to get in the habit of watching horror all the time because of the exposure to violence and the increasing tolerance for it. Nevertheless… horror remains a new found interest.