Three thoughts come to mind:
 
1.  These are obviously vivid experiences; most museum visits aren't.
 
2.  These places somehow help people deal with -- come to terms with? --
what they fear and dread, which strikes me as not sick but healthy.
 
3.  A psychiatrist friend once said to me, when a human
behavioral phenomenon is so widespread as to be all but universal -- we
were talking about the dinosaur craze of late -- it doesn't make sense
to try to explain it; it's simply that a lot of people are interested in
the same thing.
 
On Wed, 20 Jul 1994 20:40:24 -0500, Marc Becker wrote:
 
>Would anyone care to speculate what it means for museum professionals to
>have twice as many answers to the ghoulish request than to any other
>requests on this list?  What is the fascination with these small macabre
>dens of the grotesque?  Is this an untouched corner of material culture with
>which we theoretically disassociate but feel compelled toward?