Why write horror? Why not the socially more accepted Science Fiction or Fantasy, in which the reader experiences wonder and the heights of imagination? Why not the even safer Mystery or Western? Literary forms so conventionalized you don’t have to worry about stepping on toes. Go to even greater lengths and write “mainstream” fiction, in which you can just report the obvious and not stimulate much of anything new.
That word “stimulate” is interesting. Because that’s what good horror does, it stimulates parts of the brain many of us would rather never experience directly. The terror of a car crash, a shark attack, physical assault by an armed assailant, etc. This is also why some people think horror is “sick”, “twisted” or “perverse”. To them, stimulating feelings of terror or revulsion or any of the subtler shades of horror, are to be avoided, not explored. For them, the romantic ideals of the Western hero, the blushing heroine, the stalwart detective or any other “stablizer”. Stories can lull the terrors away as easily as they can provide them. For others, fiction itself is a dirty word and only DIY manuals can provide the tranquilizer.
If you’d like to read the rest, please check out Monster 2: From the Pages of Dark Worlds Quarterly.