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** This is an archived, static copy of the Casebook messages boards dating from 1998 to 2003. These threads cannot be replied to here. If you want to participate in our current forums please go to https://forum.casebook.org **
Why bother speculating?
Casebook Message Boards: Ripper Suspects: General Discussion :
Why bother speculating?
Author: Perry T Cremeans
Friday, 27 July 2001 - 06:51 am |        | Hello,
I'm new to this board, and this site for that matter, but have always had a deep interest in JTR. I've read several postings, all of which are thought provoking and for the most part well thought out. I do have one problem though, if we will never know who the ripper was, then why keep speculating?
Alot of suspects have been named, theories introduced, and evidence debated on it's validity. But after 110 years the case remains unsolved, although I believe that JTR has been named and that he has been for awhile, the fact remains that most Ripperologists conclude that they will never be able to prove once and for all who JTR was.
This is hard to believe, as the killer HAD to have left some incriminating evidence that police had to have gotten. If all the talk about the case being unsolvable by most counts, then what makes people still research and debate it? Some lists of suspects seem very unlikely, and it seems to be "grasping at straws".
Such as the Tumbletey theory, the fact that he was homosexual seems to me put him down on the list as homosexual serial killers tend to kill members of the same sex, ala John Wayne Gacy and Andrew Cunanan. I have read that Montague John Druitt was also a homosexual,(although if I'm mistaken please correct me), which would put him down on the list as well.
I have had the feeling that maybe, just MAYBE, JTR could have been James Maybrick. I believe the diary to be authentic, unless hard,concrete evidence says otherwise. Again though, why should I bother as the case cannot be solved.
Please, someone post me something to keep my spirits and interest in this fascinating case alive!!!!! |
Author: Christopher T George
Friday, 27 July 2001 - 09:00 am | | Hi, Perry:
Welcome to the boards. The fascination of the Jack the Ripper case is not hard to see. An unfathomable mystery, Victorian England, Sherlock Holmes, Jekyll and Hyde, Kipling, Oscar Wilde, hansom carriages, top hats, cloaks, pea souper fogs, the Empire, Queen Victoria. . .
As for the suspects you mention, you are correct that homosexual serial killers generally kill men. Tumblety was undeniably a homosexual, yet I should think his avowed hatred of women makes it possible that he could have targeted women. You also say you think Druitt was homosexual. This is not known for certain and is only rumored as a possible reason he was dismissed from the Blackheath school. To my mind, the Maybrick candidacy is a non-starter. James Maybrick is only a Ripper suspect because of the Diary which is a modern fake. Sorry!
Best regards
Chris George |
Author: Christopher-Michael DiGrazia
Friday, 27 July 2001 - 11:28 am | | Dear Perry -
Welcome to the Casebook. As my dear colleague CG says, the appeal of the Ripper case is, in large part, a reflection of the time and place it occurred. Put the murders back or forward even as little as 25 years, and then ask yourself if it would have had the same atavistic pull it has on the imagination as it does now. Which is not to say that we would not be speaking of JTR had the murders taken place in 1873 or 1913; simply that the Whitechapel Murders fascinate us because we have been - through fiction - rather conditioned to feel the way we do about them.
There is also the rather darker gravamen of the case to consider as well, which is that the Ripper murdered prostitutes. The idea of a prostitute - someone who sold her phyiscal intimacy for money - touched uncomfortable wellsprings in our Victorian forebears (though they were not all as "Victorian" as we think they were - I recommend "The Worm in the Bud," "When Passion Reigned" or even "My Secret Life" to cure you of that notion). We are still uncomfortable with the idea of prostitution in modern society; is it exploitative? Is it empowering? Can it ever be considered a legitimate, freely made choice? Is the sale of sexual favour outside marriage consistent with the dictates of a moral society? All legitimate questions, and all easily raised by a contemplation of the Ripper case.
I happen to believe that is one of the reasons the murders continue to fascinate, beyond the obvious attractions of an unsolved (and unsolveable?) mystery. The basic truth of the case - pace William Beadle - is simple: five women, who deserved better from life than they got, were brutally murdered by a loathsome nightmare creature in order to satisfy obscene sexual cravings. No sane person takes joy in studying that.
But HOW was it done? How did the killer escape? Why were the police caught so flat-footed? Could the yellow journalism of the time have actually encouraged copycat killings? And if the Ripper was known to higher echelons of the police, why can we find no hard evidence of it? (I am leaving out Macnaghten and Swanson, I know, but Perry is just starting here!). So, with only those five questions, you can begin to debate the creation of tabloid newspapers, police procedurals, railway timetables, living conditions in the East End and so on - and each of those areas of inquiry lead naturally into others, so that if you spend any decent amount of time studying the Ripper case, you build up a good background into Victorian London in the late 1880s, and knowledge for its own sake is a highly commendable thing.
Even were we to have absolute, undeniable, irrefutable proof of Jack the Ripper's identity tomorrow, the central questions of how and why would still remain. And that is the appeal to any great mystery - after all, we know now where RMS Titanic lies, and yet we still ask how and why that great ship of dreams sank. . .
Welcome again,
Christopher-Michael |
Author: Simon Owen
Friday, 27 July 2001 - 03:27 pm | | The challenge is , I think , to solve the mystery that Sherlock Holmes 'failed' to solve ; or , to put it another way , we have a real-life Holmsian mystery that all the experts so far could not crack !
The answer seems to be there tantalisingly in front of us , the proof that it was our favourite suspect all along , so we join the hunt ( " the game is afoot ! " ) but as we run towards him the Ripper moves away into the London fog. We follow but he is gone , our theory which we thought so watertight and robust falls to pieces as error and speculation , do we give up the chase or do we carry on ? No , we think we see him again and we chase again only for the Ripper's identity to slip through our fingers once more , he is as ethereal as the mist. And that is how you get sucked in to all this...
How could you NOT want to find out the name of the most infamous serial killer and the name of he who committed one of the two most notorious unsolved murders ( the other is the Black Dahlia killer ) of the modern age ? I don't accept that the Ripper case is unsolvable , maybe at the moment yes , but new evidence or new theories could turn up at any time. For instance , check out Ed's amazing theories on the Goulston Street graffiti on these very boards !
Simon |
Author: Perry T Cremeans
Friday, 27 July 2001 - 10:21 pm | | Dear Sirs,
I appreciate the posts to my plea, I agree with all of you on your fascination with JTR. I, myself have the same desire, that is to find the identity of the ripper. My point being that some individuals want people to actually pay for their "solution" to the crime leaves me a bit down-trodden.
My desire to find out who the ripper was stems from a deep, personal level, you see, my g/f was murdered some ten years ago. Her killer was caught, but that senseless crime forever altered me. As Christopher-Michael pointed out, "five women who deserved better from life than they got, were brutally murdered by a loathsome nightmare creature in order to satisfy obscene sexual cravings."
I would very much like to bring peace to these victims, for even though the romance of an unsolved case remains, the five victims still have no real advocate.
Most Graciously yours,
Perry |
Author: Perry T Cremeans
Friday, 27 July 2001 - 10:22 pm | | Thank you all so much for the wonderful greetings! :D
Perry |
Author: Harry Mann
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 06:44 am | | Perry,
Why do anything if one thinks that no end result will ensue.The fact that you post here,and that you follow the comments of others,seems that at leasst you are hopeful of a solution.
AS an elderly poster,it has given me much satisfaction in arguing my points against the opinion of others,who without doubt are younger and more intelligent than I.May it give you the same satisfaction.
Who really cares if a solution satisfactory to all is found.We may in time arrive at an answer that convinces each individually that they have identified the killer,and that should reward the time spent here.
I am indeed sorry to hear of your personnel circumstances,,and hope time will heal the wounds.
Regards,H.Mann. |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 08:13 am | | Hear hear Harry.
Could I just correct the usually impeccable Chris George, for one tiny error in his post.
Where he wrote: 'James Maybrick is only a Ripper suspect because of the Diary which is a modern fake. Sorry!', what I'm sure he meant to say was:
'James Maybrick is only a Ripper suspect because of the Diary which I am totally satisfied is a modern fake. Sorry!'
Subtle difference there, but I'm sure Chris never meant to offend those of us who have put, and are still putting, a great deal of time and effort into the diary debate, and are still searching for our own brand of total satisfaction.
Love,
Caz |
Author: Christopher T George
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 10:08 am | | Hi, Caz:
I beg to differ with you. The Maybrick Diary is a fake. The debate is not over whether it is a fake. It is over who did the fake.
Best regards
Chris George |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 11:44 am | | Hi Chris,
I beg to differ with you, sir, because you have now changed it from being a modern fake, to just a fake fake.
I know what the debate is over, but I, for one, have not had anyone satisfy me that the diary, as you wrote originally, 'is a modern fake.' That is what remains your belief.
Love,
Caz |
Author: Christopher T George
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 12:51 pm | | Hi, Caz:
I beg to differ with you. The Diary is a fake. I personally believe it is a modern fake but I may be wrong about it being recent. However, whether it is a new or old hoax, it is certainly a fake. And that's the faking truth!
All the best
Chris |
Author: David Radka
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 02:22 pm | | The reason why the case hasn't been solved, and here's another clue for you all, is because those interested in solving it don't understand precisely WHICH myths about the case to deconstruct. They deconstruct every myth they find, blink, and think themselves quite smart. They are in fact quite smugly stupid. Now I can't write my thesis and say in it that so-and-so and so-and-so is stupid; I can't let that come out officially and expect anything else than the worst treatment from them afterward, I just CAN'T put that in my paper. Follow me? But I can put it here, speaking in general terms only.
It is the indiscriminate, promiscuous puncturing of myths that creates the illusion that progress is being made, when in fact merely the stupification and dullification of the Ripperologist, not to mention the hapless public occurs. The people who know enough, and are smart enough to solve the case, walk right by the solution time after time, year after year, forever and ever, amen. Mark Warren for one example is ALTOGETHER capable, if he just wouldn't pickle his brain with myth deconstruction and would concentrate on discrimination instead. There are one or two parts of this that would come right into view if only smugness were removed. It's all right there, I tell you again.
There is a certain someone who posts here, and I do not say the name, noted and self-acknowledged as a cynical person, who represents the very archetype of the situation.
David |
Author: John Omlor
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 02:56 pm | | Hi David,
This is not relevant to your point, but you do know that you are completely misusing one of your terms here, right?
To point out the flaws in something (a myth or a sentence or a paragraph or any text or argument) or to show its weaknesses or to analyze what might be wrong with it or to critique it or to tear it down or to undo it is not, under any circumstances or in any sense, to "deconstruct" it. That word has a completely different set of meanings, based on certain specific acts of performative readings and, within and through them, a respect for undecidability and the aporias of language and for the history of philosophy and for an analysis of presence, both ontological and metaphysical, within language and being, as written in Europe and the United States, by certain people from about 1964 to the current time. The term signifies a historically and discipline-specific set of texts and it does not mean and never has meant "to tear down or to analyze or to critique," not in philosphical terms nor in critical terms nor in the history of reading and writing in the past forty years.
Just wanted to make that distinction clear.
Now back to your regularly scheduled program.
--John |
Author: Alegria
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 04:25 pm | | Although my old Webster's doesn't have an entry for deconstruct, on-line dictionary had this:
de·con·struct (dkn-strkt)
tr.v. de·con·struct·ed, de·con·struct·ing, de·con·structs
1. To break down into components; dismantle.
2. To write about or analyze (a literary text, for example), following the tenets of deconstruction.
It is probably one of those new-fangled usages... as with disrespect which has changed from a noun to a verb in the minds of many. He disrespected you!
And speaking of which... as you all know I am maliciously targeting Radka's posts for deletion, but I think I'll keep this one. That way when his "theory" eventually surfaces, we can all refer to it and remember that he really wanted to call everyone stupid, but he refrained because the small group who might purchase the thing, wouldn't if he called them idiots. |
Author: Alegria
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 04:25 pm | | BTW Perry,
Welcome to the boards. |
Author: John Omlor
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 05:13 pm | | Ally,
Yes, I am aware of the more recent, unfortunate dictionary definitions of the term. The first one you cite above, a common and casual usage, but not actually a formal or historically accurate one, has become too common but is in fact imprecise.
The term, as a word first in French and then in English, was coined by Jacques Derrida writing specifically about Husserl and Heidegger and was a rewriting (with an important difference) of a similar term in the latter's work, in German.
Derrida is very careful to constantly and repeatedly distinguish it from the sort of breaking down or dismantling operation defined in the first definition you cite. It is not anything at all like that sort of operation and is in many ways actually opposed to just such strategies of taking apart, even via critical reading and writing, and to just such operations of dismantling.
In fact, the irony of the definition you cite is that its two parts are actually contradictory. Definition 2 stands in opposition to definition 1.
I love that about our language.
But the second definition, relating specifically to a body of texts that now form a part of the history of philosophy and literary criticism, is in fact a too-convenient shorthand for a very complicated set of readings and writings with very specific names and dates attached to them and with a very specific insistence on how the word functions in the context of these disciplines.
We let the first usage slide all the time -- even though it is a sort of catachresis. It is also unfortunate, because to use the first meaning is to contradict the second which is more closely and directly tied to the history of the term.
Anyway, as always, I'm once again sorry I mentioned anything about this. When you write a long and detailed study of way too many pages largely about this very topic and spend too many years working specifically with this very term and its history you tend to forget that its history and precise usages are not really all that important to the outside world.
I'm sure David was using the word casually and in the strictly literal sense -- as in "de-construct" with a hyphen implied.
I apologize for the nit-picking in this case.
Cheers, and carry on,
--John |
Author: David Radka
Saturday, 28 July 2001 - 08:10 pm | | I rest my case.
David |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 05:41 am | | Hi Chris,
You might still be begging to differ with me about various other things. But you are actually now admitting that I was right about what you ought to have written in the first place!
I would have had absolutely no problem if you had written originally: 'I personally believe it is a modern fake but I may be wrong about it being recent.' (And I think you knew that, you naughty thing.  )
So many thanks for finally making the tiny correction this silly beggar asked for.
Love,
Caz |
Author: Harry Mann
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 07:54 am | | David,
I think the term stupid is a little bit harsh.Most of the posters are pleasant and more than a little intelligent.
In my case a teacher once said I was born stupid and in time my condition would only worsen,so I am not offended.Still I do not like being reminded of it.
Of course you and I both know the riddle of the identity of Jack.In my case it's been a long held family secret,which I am not at liberty to reveal.
What's your reason?.
I know your comment was not directed at me personally,but please refrain from using such words in a general manner,and please stop looking in the mirror while posting.
I was going to nominate you into the League of lighthearted Fiends,(sorry,Friends)but I have now had second thoughts.
Regards,
Dum,Dum. |
Author: John Omlor
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 10:35 am | | Hi David,
Yes, I was hoping that you'd see my small interruption as a vindication of your "theory" about "indiscriminate, promiscuous puncturing."
I just wanted to be sure I knew what you were so bothered by (and to be sure we were being precise with our language).
Now it makes perfect sense.
Thanks,
--John
PS: Hi Harry, -- One thing everyone should remember is that when the right people call you "stupid," it becomes a compliment.  |
Author: Warwick Parminter
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 11:40 am | | Harry,
your comments about your teacher brought to mind my own school days. The way I was treated at school,--and I would guess this could apply to you too Harry,-- well, it just couldn't be imagined today. Take a mixed class of 12/13year olds. The headmaster is taking the class, the children sit two to a desk. The headmaster stalks up and down the isles as they get on with their work. You may feel like a bit of fun with your desk buddie,--forbidden fruit is sweetest after all, don't get me wrong, this would be just naughty boy stuff. Anyway, the head spots you, ---the first you know of it is a heavy hand giving you such a wackeroo up the back of the head, your head explodes into a wild ringing. A hand grasps you by the scruff of the neck,and hauls you out of your seat, then proceeds to push you down to the front of the class, a punch in the back for every step you take.There you stand , on view, the hair on the back of your head standing up like a cockatoo ,for the rest of the class to study, red faced and blubbering. The lesson ends, but not your ordeal,you accompany the head to his study, and get at least two of the best on each hand with the cane. Now it's over. Am I right Harry, or am I right?. The strange thing is I have never felt ill will to any of my teachers. And thinking back, I always have a damn good smile about it all.
Regards Rick. |
Author: Caroline Anne Morris
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 02:18 pm | | Yeah Rick, but I do hope you're not one of these people who say "Well, it never did me any harm", as though it's something to be recommended these days, and for every little boy and girl, regardless.
Love,
Caz |
Author: Warwick Parminter
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 03:00 pm | | No Caz,
I could never say or think that. I do think I benefitted rather than suffered from that treatment, it prepared me for the army,which I had to do and liked. But I like kids,- the good ones,- they should be disciplined but not knocked around. I must say Caz, I think it has gone too far the other way, and they are perhaps being spoiled by lack of discipline. But heaven forbid that children should be hurt.
Regards Rick. |
Author: David Radka
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 04:03 pm | | I apologize for offending Mr. Mann and any others with my crude remark. I do not consider anyone here, or anyone writing on the case a stupid person. Nor am I a particularly smart one. I do get frustrated with how studies of the case have been traditionally made, find I need to object to it, and sometimes I let this interfere with what I say. I apologize sincerely for any hurt feelings, and will not let it happen again.
I believe I have got the idea of deconstruction generaly tied to logical objections in my mind, hence my wrong-headed tendency to find the matter rather stupid. I attended Dr. Stanley H. Rosen of Pennsylvania State University awhile back, when he was writing an anti-Derridian text. He gave a lecture course in which he essentially slowly read a draft of this book to us, and waited for comments. This made for a powerful course--I sat front row center and absorbed a terrific salutary pounding all semester; all in the room felt the same thing, even physically. Dr. Rosen is perhaps the strongest objector to deconstructionist strategies in the academic world, totally antithetical to the Yale school. He is one of the best professors I've ever had. I remember quirky things about this experience--the personalities of the other graduate students taking the course, what they said, the layout of the room, its accoustics, how it smelled, what a fellow student's notes looked like when she loaned them to me, what the nearby bell tower, "Old Main," sounded like when it rang every 30 minutes during the lectures, what the late afternoon light coming through the windows looked like, and so on. I bought a Sony Walkman to tape them, and replay the course occasionally. Some of this comes back to me when I think of the case--it's just a personal quirk of mine.
David |
Author: John Omlor
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 04:46 pm | | Hi David,
Yes, I know the objections you are speaking about and in another time and place I would be more than willing to talk to you about their mistaken assumptions and the problems with the readings of specific Derridean texts that too often accompany them.
You should know, however, that there is very little, almost no, "deconstruction" of the Derridean sort in what used to be known as the "Yale School." Miller, DeMan, Bloom, Hartman and company had precious little in common with Derrida or his work within the history of philosophy. They were, over twenty years ago, doing something separate and even then different from Derrida, and although all of these people were colleagues and friends at one time, their work in the field of literature is markedly different from Professor Derrida's own (this can be seen even in the single volume they all published together). And their "strategies" as you say, are certainly not utterly "Derridean," even if they call themselves "deconstructionist" (a word which Derrida has routinely repudiated, by the way, precisely because his work represents a philosophical challenge to the notion of sedimented "isms" of all sorts and movements and fixed strategies as well -- about "deconstruction" he once said, "it is a word whose fortunes have disagreeably surprised me"). I respect your admiration for Stanley Rosen, and I too admire some of his work, especially on Plato, Hegel, and Nietzsche; but I think you'll find that, in the end, his reading of Professor Derrida's work is not his most careful nor his most compelling writing.
But this is neither the place nor the time and these things have nothing at all to do with what actually takes place on these boards, where neither you nor I nor anyone at all has been doing anything that is in any way, shape, or form, anything like Derridean "deconstruction." I've done something similar professionally for years, and I've done it even with the kind aid and assistance of its "founder," and I can say with complete confidence that it is definitely not taking place anywhere on these boards.
But enough of talking shop. Let's get back to the original question.
"Why bother speculating?" For an answer to this question, one might read Freud's Beyond the Pleasure Principle, which is all about the need to speculate and to push beyond what we know and to draw back when we fear we have pushed too far. In the book, Freud describes a game he watches his little grandchild play -- the child throws out a spool with string attached and as it goes away he says fort ("gone" or "away" in German). Then he pulls it back and says da ("there"). When he cannot see it because it goes too far around the edge of the bed he is playing beside, he becomes upset until it returns safely. Freud later notices that the child utters the same syllables in response to the leaving and arriving of its mother.
This little game of fort/da is the foundation of speculation. It's what many of us do all the time, intellectually. We throw our spool of thought out as far as it will go and when we fear we have lost sight of it and its line, which attaches it to us, we yank it back for a reassuring return. Freud writes about the courage to speculate and the reason to know when speculation is in danger of eliding over that which we simply do not know. This concern is built into the act of theoretical writing.
Writing about Jack the Ripper, it seems to me, also often plays its own little game of fort/da. Speculations are thrown out and responses are offered and the speculations are reeled back in again and thrown out again and responses are offered again and anxiety permeates the activity, but in the end, this is how a community arrives at at least momentary understandings and meanings, always recognizing that they are likely to change or be revised at a moment's notice. But to not play, to not speculate, is, for some of us unthinkable. It is simply what we do.
At least that's my thought on the matter this lazy Sunday. For more on the implications of this little game of fort/da for writing in general and speculation specifically, people might want to read Beyond the Pleasure Principle and then, slowly, carefully and patiently, read an essay called "To Speculate -- On 'Freud'" by an old friend of mine. It appears in translation in his excellent and provocative book The Post Card. Check it out.
Bye for now,
--John
PS: David, I was born in the shadow of "Old Main" -- right there on campus. My dad was a returning vet attending PSU on the GI Bill, and I was born during the Penn Sate - Holy Cross football game one November. My dad walked my mom carefully down the cold, rain-soaked steps of the stadium, placed her lovingly in a cab for the hospital, and promised her he'd be there as soon as the game was over. I waited long enough for him to make it. He still attends every home game, despite the fact that he now lives in Florida. |
Author: Steve Hellerstedt
Sunday, 29 July 2001 - 10:47 pm | | To add onto the original question-- Would anyone reading this be satisfied if Jack the Ripper's identity was conclusively established? If, in effect, the case was closed?
Be honest. |
Author: Warwick Parminter
Monday, 30 July 2001 - 03:25 am | | | Steve, would I be right in describing your question as a kind of paradox?, everybody wants to know, but no one wants the mystery to die!!--no answer!! Rick |
Author: Harry Mann
Monday, 30 July 2001 - 06:07 am | | Rick,
We could have been sitting in the same class,you describe identical happenings.And how about the six r's.Six r's? youngster's say,surely you mean three.In the thirties,Royalty,Religion and race were as much if not more,a part of lessons taught in English schools.There was no more sinful acts than to question the superiority of the English people,the existance of God,and the divine right of the English monarch.
Well might Jack have received similar brainwashing.Could it have influenced his behaviour as it did others.
H.Mann. |
Author: Warwick Parminter
Tuesday, 31 July 2001 - 12:02 pm | | Yes Harry,
those were the days, the good old days when the majority of the map of the world was Brrritish pink, working class adults and children knew their place and stayed in it!
I'm glad I was a child of the thirties and the regime didn't hurt me so much, but I remember it, my dad was a coal miner, how could I forget!! Yes I think JtR had schooling and I think most definately he also had a taste of the same treatment, but worse. We suffered the the last kicks of that treatment I think.
Regards Rick |
Author: Templar
Monday, 22 October 2001 - 11:55 pm | | Sorry to bump this topic after it's extended dormancy, but I think there is some kernel of importance here. I started out studying about the Ripper a long time ago, and my memory of the case is a little foggy. Even so I remember thinking, back when I studied this in the 80s, that I was unconvinced by many of the cases against suspects then (even in my youth). Since then I've gone on to study many serial killers, and I have yet to find someone who is a real convincing suspect. It is fun to conjecture, but in the end what do we really know?
A man, who was almost certainly not insane (and apparently not impaired, psychologically in any way) killed (probably, at least) 5 women, in a criminally organized way. He did this in a span of 70 days in the late summer and autumn of 1888.
I confess that I think that his motivation was that of your everyday modern serial killer, i.e. sexual gratification. I believe that the double event is strong evidence for this. The risk of getting caught in the act once would scare off all but the most...motivated criminal. This separates him from other killers with even more venial motives, John Williams of Radcliffe Highway fame, although organized, was more interested in money than gratification.
I am unmoved by the necessity for "anatomical knowledge". A moderately intelligent man could attain this knowledge with little hindrance, especially if it was something that was...interesting...to one. I think most of you will agree that Jack took some pleasure in his work, it's humorous that people logicize it backwards. "He must be a doctor or intern or barber because he had anatomical knowledge." More like "He had anatomical knowledge because thinking about mutilating human beings excited him".
I've seen a lot of people trying to smash round pegs into square holes over the years when it comes to Ripper suspects (not here, necessarily). I'm sure that "peg bashing" is part of the reason why this case has gone unsolved this long.
I'm interested in discussing any of my conjectures with people who have favorite suspects. I am not familiar with ALL of the suspects listed here, but I look forward to reading about them. |
Author: graziano
Tuesday, 23 October 2001 - 03:48 am | | "I confess that I think that his motivation was that of your everyday modern serial killer, i.e. sexual gratification.I believe that the double event is strong evidence for this."
"I am sure that "peg bashing" is part of the reason why this case has gone unsolved this long."
What are you doing here ?
Ever and ever repeating the same song with the same melody.
And then you are astonished that the case has not been solved yet.
The double event, evidence of what ?
That Jack was a serial sexual killer that being disturbed with the first victim in his fiendish work, unsatisfied in his thirst of blood, he goes to the second with a rage doubled that equals only the audacity and the luck he will find to escape unscathered ?
That he slashed the face of his victim to steal her feminity because he is an hidden transexual?
Or because his penis is 5 cm long ?
That he takes out the uterus, he puts it in his pocket because in doing so he can punish his mother who went away when he was 6 years and three months old ?
Of course we do not care of the places he chose that night, of the times of the murders, the sightings by the witnesses, the similarities of the two events and so on...
Who cares ?
We know that the killer is a psychodon't-know-what, so we do not need but only to explain the way the comb and the boxes were placed.
The only evidence, if there is any, that the night of the double event brings us is that there was more than one killer, preparation and collusion.
You write well.
Try to reason in the same way.
It's not important how long you have been studying the case. What matters is how deep.
Bye. Graziano.
P.S.: If you want to go with classification of killers (as far as this notion could have some meaning - I doubt), notice that in the case of JtR there are at least 5 importants elements which should lead us to classify him as a disorganized killer, and not, as you say, an organized one.
P.S.S.: If one wants to get to the truth, speculating is necessary, repeating is no advance. |
Author: Rosemary O'Ryan
Tuesday, 23 October 2001 - 06:52 am | | Dia Templus,
Seventy days...and I always thought Jack was moonlighting!
Rosey :-) |
Author: Templar
Tuesday, 23 October 2001 - 02:21 pm | |
Quote:What are you doing here ?
Yes, true, I do concede that I am not the first to take this stance. But I firmly believe it's the correct way to go. I hardly think that my expression over the current status of the case can be considered "astonished", indeed, no contemporary police force in the world could have caught Jack (unless someone had the great fortune to catch him in the act). Even today, a murder that is unsolved 24 hours after it is perpetrated is unlikely to be solved at all; it stands to reason that an intelligent, driven, and dedicated individual could have easily eluded the 19th century authorities.
Quote:The double event, evidence of what ?
That Jack's driving desire was to mutilate women. It is what, one might say, "got him off" so to speak. Otherwise, why commit two murders, indeed, why commit a second after so nearly being discovered over the first body? How do the wounds and mutilations of the two victims differ? I think your histrionics undermine your own argument:
Quote:The only evidence, if there is any, that the night of the double event brings us is that there was more than one killer, preparation and collusion
Your theory regarding two conspirators in collusion, while entertaining, is difficult to swallow. A Leopold & Loeb situation, or perhaps a Leonard Lake & Charles Ng situation? Which would you say, and why? The savagery of the act would seem to discount thrill killers, and two men with the same appetite for murder and mutilation with a skill for eluding the police would be difficult to find in 1888 London. It would be hard for them to find each other, no?
There has been no evidence introduced that would make one believe that two murderers were working together, except one witness that claims to have seen 2 men with Liz Stride. I might also point out that 6 other witnesses saw Stride with just one man, including one that saw her minutes before the murder.
It is humorous to me that you fail to see that launching into the kind of conjecture that you have (i.e. two Rippers) is the modus operandi equivalent of a psychological profiler saying that Jack did his crimes because he had a 5" glans or a transsexual fetish or a seething hatred of his mother.
In other words:
Sure there is some evidence that two people participated in the double event, but in examining the evidence, is there good solid evidence that there were two murderers?
No, although you might have evidence that you have not presented heretofore to back up this claim.
Do the crimes follow a logical escalation from hurried experiment, to macabre masterpiece?
Yes, with the notable exception of Liz Stride, who appeared to be (by Jack's standards) relatively untouched. Amazingly enough there was another murder that night, after Stride, with the kind of mutilation one might expect between the murders of Chapman and Kelly.
Now really, what evidence screams at you that this must be the work of two people?
In regards to your post scripts, firstly the major factor in distinguishing between an "organized" and a "disorganized" killer is preparation. A killer that brings his tool(s) (e.g. a long, conspicuous knife) to a murder scene will almost always be considered an organized killer. The fact that Jack chose prostitutes at random (or seemingly so) is incidental, he set out to kill a prostitute.
Finally I could conjecture all day about how many angels could dance on the head of a pin. It would get me nowhere. Pray tell, how does focusing on one person and citing reasons why he/she/it is Jack somehow further an investigation? Conjecture is fun. I admit that I, myself, do enjoy it. However, it furthers nothing, unless speculation leads you to research, even so the taint of human suspicions often color the researcher's opinions, n'est çe pa?
Depth of knowledge is nothing without proper application. |
Author: graziano
Tuesday, 23 October 2001 - 02:50 pm | | The right spelling is: "N'est ce pas ?".
Graziano. |
Author: Warwick Parminter
Tuesday, 23 October 2001 - 03:48 pm | | Oyez, Oyez, this is to certify that on the specified dates from and including 7th August 1888 to 9th November 1888 the famous killer known as JACK the RIPPER shall hold stage, no other killer shall be allowed to kill during this time period, upon pain of being arrested, imprisoned, and hung. /red(If we can catch the bugger!!!)
Rick |
Author: Templar
Tuesday, 23 October 2001 - 04:46 pm | |
Quote:The right spelling is: "N'est ce pas ?".
Hmmm...
Well I guess you've got me there, wonderful bit of sleuthing. Of course it is neither relevant to the issue at hand, nor does it, in any way further your argument. This is the danger of conjecture; a cold hard look at the facts has denuded your theory of any possibility of being true. Clearly, since you cannot come up with a lucid response I must assume you lack one, and that your "scholarship" and "research" has consisted of sitting in your easy chair, dreaming up "pie in the sky" theories on Jack the Ripper.
Quote:Oyez, Oyez, this is to certify that on the specified dates from and including 7th August 1888 to 9th November 1888 the famous killer known as JACK the RIPPER shall hold stage, no other killer shall be allowed to kill during this time period
At least you have something to say, albeit no more moving than graziano's flawed logic. How many women were murdered in London's East End in 1888? What was the average per week? How many of them were prostitutes? How many had their throats cut? How many with the fatal wound being 6-7 inches in length?
With those questions in mind, what is the actual chance that two individuals (in collusion or otherwise) would commit a murder on the same night, a stone's throw apart, use the exact same M.O. to extinguish life of a prostitute, right down to the depth and length of the cut in the throat?
If you're as bad at math as I am I'll put it simply:
The chances are infinitesimally small.
The temptation to cloud the water with multiple perpetrators is appealing, but totally groundless. |
Author: Rosemary O'Ryan
Tuesday, 23 October 2001 - 07:42 pm | | Dear Templar,
Pie in the sky...indeed! So now we await your considered opinion regarding... who, what, and why. You great arch-teaser? Rosey :-) |
Author: Warwick Parminter
Tuesday, 23 October 2001 - 08:14 pm | | | Hello Templar, I take it you were accepting my post as sarcasm, it was meant that way. If you are interested in my view of whether there was more than one Ripper I'd say, Tabram is a big may or may not, I wouldn't like to be forced to say one way or tother as to whether she was a Ripper victim. But Stride!! I can't believe she was a Ripper victim, and I can't understand how so many people think she was! She didn't fit the Ripper pattern, she was too young and attractive, and maybe too healthy and active,--too much of a challenge for the Ripper, looking at the type he had chosen previously. I believe she was killed by someone who she knew well, otherwise she would have fought harder, and screamed louder. She didn't believe whoever had his hands on her would do what he did. She was left where she fell, she wasn't interfered with in the least, if she had been a Ripper victim he would have had time to get her in some sort of mutilating position before taking off. Was Stride strangled or stifled before her throat was cut? She bled a lot, and she was still bleeding when found,--she was still alive! The Ripper never left a victim alive, his way was too violent and thorough. The weapon used was wrong, was it Bagster Phillips who described it,-- about 1 inch wide with a round end, a very clean cut, but it didn't get both corotid arteries, sounds like a razor job to me. Nothing like the Mitre Square throat cutting. To my mind, two different men who maybe,--very likely-- didn't know the other existed. One man hadn't killed before, the other had, and he killed as a matter of course. I think 30 September 1888 was a night of pure chance regarding two killers on the prowl. |
Author: graziano
Wednesday, 24 October 2001 - 02:24 am | | Templar,
no question of sleuthing.
Since it happens that French has been my second mother language and I spoke it daily and regularly for 20 years I just pointed a mistake you made writing it.
Now, for the rest of your life you are not going to do it anymore and whenever you will use this same expression you will be able to say: "a guy taught me that online".
So, I am very glad to have been useful on these boards.
With all the mistakes I do with my english, it would be ridiculous for me to act with the goal you hinted.
Now, for Jack(s) the Ripper(s).
It is not that I do not want to answer you, but if you ask me for "solid" evidence it is clear that you have already made up your mind as far as the case is concerned and that whatever I will tell you, you are already ready to discard it.
Because I have not any single piece of "solid" evidence.
Because in the whole case there is not a single piece of "solid" evidence to prove whatever thing.
The only "advantage" for the theory that "Jack was one" comes from the perverse reasoning that it is clear that there were murders committed, thus there was at least one murderer.
Of that we are sure.
So, goes on the perverse reasoning, whatever other thing you add to that, you must prove it bringing up evidences, "solid" ones.
But asking to prove things that are not immediately obvious and accepting obvious (obvious not in the meaning of true but simply of first-to-come-to-mind-as-feasible) solutions by lack of better, even if used as the way of thinking in the law enforcement procedures, it is only a choice of the way of thinking, limiting all possible alternative results by artificial intellectual concepts and structures.
When you ask me, "Give me solid evidences for the murderers being more than one", I could ask you "Give me yours for the impossibility of more than one killer to be there".
And you would not be better off than me.
Without any piece of undisputable evidence available, all what we can do (all of us) is speculating trying to imagine a realistic scenario which takes in consideration the facts we know (this suppose a lot of work in analyzing documents) and uses them in the way allowed by such instruments as natural laws determined by phisics or chemistry or explains them by aspects of human behaviour and psychology as described by medecine or psychiatry.
Without, of course and overall, forgetting the historical context.
Notice, please, that the "Jack was one theory" uses often and regularly, for the purpose of explaining the inexplicable, not very scientifically proved arguments such as "audacity" or "luck", just, in my opinion, aknowledging by itself its shortages and shortcomings.
As far as I am concerned after having read, analyzed and scrutinized what I could with my available time and as deep as my intellectual possibilities and my "scientific" knowledge allow me to do I came to the conclusion that any solution of the case with one murderer is simply not realistic because phisically impossible.
On the contrary, that the events of what is generally known as the "Jack the Ripper case" are the results of the actions of a well prepared group of individuals (at least two but probably more) whose will to butcher women was only the mean to get to the real goal (at that time planes and Twin towers were not immediately available).
It is absolutely possible that in this group someone took a lot of pleasure cutting ladies thus responding to some characteristics of a sexual serial killer.
And it is, in my opinion, very likely that embedded with all that there was also some sort of a gang war to control prostitution.
My goal in saying that is neither to convince you or anyone else nor to bring the murderers before justice,
so if you are interested in my statements go through the boards and read them.
If you are not, do not.
But do not ask me please to repeat them all because it would simply be beyond my phisical capabilities.
And do not take this as a refusal to counter you for lack of arguments.
It would just not be fair.
If you do and come back saying "Your arguments are bullsh**" that would also be fair.
Concerning theories regarding more than one killer, may I suggest you to read on these boards the posts of Ed Carter and Simon Owen (the ones of the former are scattered all around, those of the latter are on a specific board) and the objections to them made by, as far as I can remember, Jon and Chris George or Guy Hatton.
Also some old posts of a certain Yazoo and other that I am now forgetting (always regarding the possibility or not of more than one killer).
All those have inspired mines.
And of course, as a newbie to another newbie I couldn't suggest you better than to read "opera omnia" on these boards (worthwhile much more than a lot of books on the subject).
I know, a lot of boring work, but I think necessary and useful.
Unless, of course, you believe that John Douglas got the truth and that's it.
Au revoir, mon ami.
Graziano.
P.S.: Useless to say that the above is only personal opinion. |
Author: graziano
Wednesday, 24 October 2001 - 05:39 am | | Templar,
just one point specifically to your statements about Jack.
You say: "Two men with the same appetite for murder and mutilation with a skill for eluding the police would be difficult to find in 1888 London.",
so, even if you are right and Jack was in fact only one, does it suggests that you consider him also responsible for the "Torso murders" ?
Thanks. Graziano. |
Author: Rosemary O'Ryan
Wednesday, 24 October 2001 - 08:35 am | | \Dear Graziano,
With a razor-sharp wit...you make the most astonishing observations! Perhaps there could be a
advantage in comparing the 'similitude' of Jack Ripper and Jack I Torso.
Rosey:-) |
Author: Templar
Wednesday, 24 October 2001 - 05:35 pm | |
Quote:Tabram is a big may or may not, I wouldn't like to be forced to say one way or tother as to whether she was a Ripper victim.
Agreed. However, some of the methodology of the killer of Tabram is different than the (so-called} "canonical" victims. To me, the fact that her body was run through by the murderous implement seems unlike our Jack. That is not to say, at all, that a fledgling psychopath might not experiment with murder.
Quote:I can't believe she [Stride] was a Ripper victim, and I can't understand how so many people think she was! She didn't fit the Ripper pattern, she was too young and attractive, and maybe too healthy and active,--too much of a challenge for the Ripper, looking at the type he had chosen previously...She bled a lot, and she was still bleeding when found,--she was still alive! The Ripper never left a victim alive, his way was too violent and thorough.
As a point of clarification, Stride was nearly the same age as Eddowes and Chapman, and was older than Nichols. Kelly was the real young one. (DOBs: Nichols = 1845, Chapman = 1841, Stride = 1843, Eddowes = 1842, Kelly = c. 1863). I think you give Jack far too much credit when selecting a victim. He was an opportunist, I hardly think, for his purposes, that the age (or even the appearance) of the women was a factor in his selection of a victim. For further clarification Nichols was also still "alive" when found, however, through the description of the post-mortem, it is unlikely that she would have survived even if she had gotten prompt medical attention.
I've not yet read information on the weapon used on Stride, however, I would caution that the Ripper may have further mutilated the necks of the victims after they had (or nearly had) "bled out". Ergo the neck wounds would not necessarily match other Ripper fatal slashes, especially if he had just cut her (with the expectation of "doing his thing" after she was dead or nearly so) when someone interrupted him.
Quote:It is not that I do not want to answer you, but if you ask me for "solid" evidence it is clear that you have already made up your mind as far as the case is concerned and that whatever I will tell you, you are already ready to discard it. Because I have not any single piece of "solid" evidence...When you ask me, "Give me solid evidences for the murderers being more than one", I could ask you "Give me yours for the impossibility of more than one killer to be there".
You are coming dangerously close to argumentum ad ignorantiam. Because I cannot prove that one person did the killing doesn’t make it any more likely that two did it. In fact, my previous post continues to stand on that particular issue. Is it impossible? No. Is it at all likely? No. I just wanted to know some of what made you specifically think that two people were involved.
Quote:Notice, please, that the "Jack was one theory" uses often and regularly, for the purpose of explaining the inexplicable, not very scientifically proved arguments such as "audacity" or "luck", just, in my opinion, acknowledging by itself its shortages and shortcomings.
I must be unaware of these theories. However subjective terms such as "audacious" do not advance the actual knowledge of Jack, I would try not to use such terms myself. "Luck" is an issue that is best not dealt with here.
Quote:so, even if you are right and Jack was in fact only one, does it suggests that you consider him also responsible for the "Torso murders" ?
Ha! Touché. No, I do not consider them the same person. The M.O. is very different. Torso crimes were committed off the dumpsite (another controversial topic!), obviously in a location that the killer felt comfortable in, and then transported to the dumpsite. Body parts were discarded in the Thames. Jack had none of these traits (that we can be sure of). Jack was a hunter, not a "grabber". Additionally there is some (admittedly circumstantial) evidence that the torso victims were dumped at locations where they were apt to go unnoticed for a period (at least one was decomposing). Jack's work suggests a desire to display his handiwork, or at least not to hide it.
Never the less I will endeavor to wade through the (rather bulky) quantity of information on the site...it seems almost insurmountable |
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