Was Jack a women-hater?

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Was Jack a women-hater?

Casebook Message Boards: Ripper Suspects: General Discussion : Was Jack a women-hater?

Author: Bob c Wednesday, 25 November 1998 - 06:07 am
Just before I cowardly disappear for a long week-end, let me ask the panel what they think. Was Jack a women-hater, or did he just hate whores? As far as we know, he only attacked prostitutes, but could that have been because he needed an excuse for what he did? He could hate women in general, but to get decent women to go with him to where he could exercise his dreadful desires in (hmm...) peace would have been inordently more difficult and dangerous as with whores, who would certainly know of places suitable for private interchange. This question does play a part on Jack's motives, if he was removing an evil, if he was sexually driven, childhood trauma etc. Bob
Author: Yazoo Wednesday, 25 November 1998 - 10:09 am
Hey, Bob. An interesting question, often answered with an "obvious" yes. I don't know the answer at this point, and don't know if I ever will. I just don't think it's obvious or easy to answer. Consider the American serial killers, Dahmer and Gacy. One or both were homosexuals...Gacy at least could pose as a heterosexual. Both killed young men...the objects (and I use that noun looking through the monster's eyes) of their sexual desires. Did they kill the kinds of people they were attracted to, possibly could have loved? Or was it that they rejected themselves, their desires...the gender of the victim being less a prime cause than an unfortunate consequence of their murderous self-hate? Other serial killers claim to be motivated by ill-will toward the target's gender, occupation, race, etc. But is that merely the surface, their own self-justification? I don't know. If the anecdotal evidence is correct, there were homeless, vulnerable children about the Whitechapel area. He could have lured them just as easily as a prostitute. There is always the elderly, too, who fit the vulnerability category. JtR seems to have ignored all these potential targets. What part gender played? What part sexuality in general played? What part JtR's individual sexuality played? What part occupation played? What part mere opportunity played? What part his past experience, sexually/maternally/etc, with women played? I don't know; but I THINK some and maybe all of these factors (other people may think of more areas) played a part in the murderer or murderers thinking/motive. Even if we KNEW the answer...we'd still be left with the why behind it all. I'm a big help, huh? Yaz
Author: Christopher-Michael Wednesday, 25 November 1998 - 07:55 pm
Surprisingly, I actually agree with Yaz on this one (gasps all round)! There is an obvious answer to this question, but the answer carries its own problems with it. It does seem silly to ask if a virulent sexual serial murderer of women hated women, but Yaz makes pertinent points: how much of Jack's rage was that hatred of his victims for who they were/what they represented/who they reminded him of and how much of the rage was (consciously or not) directed towards the "right" target? Whomever Jack was, I doubt he was stupid in the sense that he would kill and the consequences be damned. We cannot know what hatreds and motivations festered in him for years before he gave way to the urge to assault, and then, finding confidence, gave flower to the urge to murder. What we can assume with a fair amount of probability are his considerations as greater opportunities opened up in front of him. Let us suppose he began as many killers do; a simple bully. At some point, he is able to abuse someone smaller or weaker than himself and get away with it. Now this is sufficient for a lot of people, but not for Jack. He hates. He is angry, irrational sometimes, and given to brooding. Perhaps he lashes out angrily at someone some day. Who will it be? Not someone who can answer back, and if he is an East Ender in 1888, then this is children, smaller men or women. And if women, then women who are already accustomed to a bit of violence. This slowly escalates; maybe an attack on Ada Wilson, when he comes to the realisation that no one has traced him. The idea begins to take form, and as he walks about Whitechapel, the fantasy of striking someone down begins to take shape in his mind. But he has to be careful; he can't afford to be caught. So he begins paying more attention to where he walks and where the police patrol. What time of night will he be alone? And then, with place and time available to him, what about a victim? Someone who won't fight back, someone who won't cause too much of a fuss. . .Polly Nichols. I seem to have gotten a bit afield here, but the point I wished to make is that I believe Jack would have thought about who would cause him the least amount of trouble first. It would probably always have been women he murdered, as the mutilations show an obsession with the womb and female identity (woman as woman, and not just as easy prey). It was once he found out how easy it could be that his confidence grew and he could progress to stronger targets such as Eddowes or Kelly (or even Stride, Yaz - I can hear you, you know). This is a very interesting discussion. I'm going to spend a couple of days looking over some of my material on sexual obsession, and then I'll be back with some other thoughts. Anyone else care to join in? Christopher-Michael
Author: Yazoo Wednesday, 25 November 1998 - 09:01 pm
I can't comment on the "profile" you built, CM. The details are not wrong or right...we don't know. But the thought of yours I do want to emphasize is that our boy had a past...and maybe his past included some violence or mayhem. The possibility exists that he may have gotten busted for it...and this is long before his murders. If the police records still exist for juvenile arrests, or ANY arrests, in the 1870s and early 1880s, there is a chance that the murderer's name appears there. But which name? You need a second point, another pool of likely candidates to make comparisons. But now our boy is older, perhaps less overtly violent -- maybe as faceless and anonymous to his contemporaries as he is to us. Maybe part of who he is..his sense of identity...is involved in what he did? But if a match of one person appears, or one name matches several offenses, or other permutations of this...it is one (and ONLY one) step closer to a possible candidate for JtR. It may come to nothing...will come to nothing without a pool of "likely" names to compare to criminal records. But it's just as much apossibility he ran afoul of the law as to have been committed to an asylum or been a med student/doctor/nurse. We're racing ahead...I'M racing ahead. But someone -- legal or otherwise -- probably watched the embryonic stages of what became JtR at one or several points. And some of those unsolved murders that we knew, and those that Stewart reminds us about, might be part(s) of the "development" of JtR. He did not just suddenly appear one day! And I'll take the heat for this piece of speculation. That's why I say, start with the traditional five victims...but we will be going back before August and forward beyond November 1888 and look at the murders we knew and the ones Stewart has shown us. JtR is NOT everywhere, but he may be in more or less than those traditional five. Yaz
Author: D. Radka Thursday, 26 November 1998 - 12:04 am
All or almost all sexual serial murderers had a woman in their distant past, during their formative years, who mistreated them--the murder series is a latent manifestation of their unexplored feelings of guilt, frustation and terror concerning this time before they learned how to think for themselves. For Henry Lee Lucas his mother Violet, who forced him to watch her have intercourse with her clients and then beat him mercilessly with heavy sticks; for Ottis Toole his older sister Drucilla, who heartlessly baited him to have sex over several years, informing him he was unsatisfactory for her. For Arthur Shawcross, his incestuous, punishing mother. The list goes on and on--they all have an older female authority figure who abuses and terrifies them in an unacceptable manner, they bury the memories and therefore remain afraid, later they begin projecting on others as a way of continuing their self-deceptions. They are unable to grow up. This, simply, is how it happens; the WM certainly was no exception. The ultimate cause of their crimes against women is a woman. Think about it--you wouldn't expect it any other way, would you? What went around, came back around. If one insists on thinking the WM "hated women" or "was a bully," as the comments above cloddishy suggest, these would still be merely two of his own automatically-generated self-deceptive figmentations, nonessential to the crimes or their detection. I've written on these boards time and again that it is naivete' to concieve the WM as a "violent person," as a "hater of women," etc. etc.. Essentially, he had no more in common with common street bullies than with The Face On Mars. He did what he did for bizarre, insane fantasy acting out and gratification; he was driven to it by his own fears and sublimations--can you get it? This is it, right here, right here. When will we stop looking at these crimes from the outside only? Here is a free glimpse into what I'm working on for my original paper: Take a look at Eddowes' face in the autopsy photographs. See those carat-like shapes under each eye, on the cheek and on the chin? What he did was first thoughtfully conceive and draw those images with his knife, then turn the knife and churlishly slash off her nose. First he made the work, then he savaged it. He's acting out his dynamic, showing it to the public, ruminating on it, asking for explanations for it, or for help. He put those pictures on the face for a reason--face is the proper place for this. What on a woman's face resembles a carat? Think fast, it's nighttime in Mitre Square and seconds are precious. Sometimes knitted eyebrows have this shape, or maybe a sharp frown, up by the top and down by the sides. This is what he remembers, projecting it from his past right onto Eddowes' face--it is the disapproving frown of female authority. David
Author: Yazoo Thursday, 26 November 1998 - 07:57 am
Hey, David. Interesting, maybe even right (grins). But I cringe that a woman or, actually, women are the secret source of the rage etc of "all or almost all" serial killers. Children also have fathers who impact on their children, either by their presence or their absence. They have siblings, other relatives, and peers. I don't think there is ONE SINGLE cause for any behavior...from normal to abnormal, performed by a "good" person or a serial killer. That a murderer is also a form of bully -- perhaps the ultimate bully -- is self-evident..to my (ignorant?) self. The advantage in a fight always lies with the attacker, especially if his attack is sudden and unprovoked. You can't even characterize any of the traditional murders as a "fight" -- fair or otherwise. Half the world is filled with women; in JtR's case, he chose the most desperate of the Desperate (not just prostitutes, but prostitutes with no choice between sleeping on the street where everyone had come to fear JtR or risking meeting JtR anyway to earn 4d for "doss" money). He didn't go up against women who were wealthier, healthier, possessed of more self-esteem, on and on. He chose the sick (Chapman) and the alcoholic (several, if not all, of the other five traditional victims). I won't belabor this point further. As to the carat shapes: Forgive me, but I'm not sure what you're so emphatically pointing out. You invite free-association here and I'm inviting a lot of psychoanalyzing about myself if I answer, but... The carat-shapes, in the context of your thesis, could be the vagina. Is this what you're saying? Here I would ask, why not more attacks on the actual vagina of the victim if this was an obsession? Next, the shape and position on the face of the carats could represent tears...whose tears? what are they crying for? Lastly, why the manifestion of the carats only with Eddowes? There is nothing -- we're momentarily assuming the same hand involved in the traditional five -- previously done to the faces of victims; and Kelly's face and body, at first glance, are so devasting as to invite speculation of a totally different killer who shares some of "JtR's" characteristics. Freud himself said, in regard to symbols and free-associative meanings, that sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. The possibility exists in all or some of these murders that a knife was just a knife -- not a substitute for a penis or sex...or even tears -- just a tool used to kill and mutilate. The method of the killings and mutilations may lie one or more steps removed from what the murderer(s) consciously or subconsciously was trying to "express." I'm not knocking what you say or dismissing it. I plan on keeping it in the back of my mind as I look over the details of the five traditional cases, then the others surrounding them. Best of luck on your paper, Yaz
Author: Yazoo Thursday, 26 November 1998 - 09:04 am
David, sorry to bug you but an opportunity to chat with someone knowledgable about psychology is too tempting. Would it be true to say that every crime against persons or property is committed not just against the victim, but also against the society to which the criminal and the victim belong? I mean, society has laws, rules, and values that the criminal flaunts just by committing their crime. Murder being largely held to be the most heinous crime committed in society, would it be acceptable to see at least some of the criminal's "motive" as an attack, directly and through the arrogance/presumption/aggression inherent in the crime (especially murder), upon the laws/customs/values of the society to which he belongs? Thanks, Yaz
Author: Christopher-Michael Friday, 27 November 1998 - 10:06 pm
David - Certainly some very interesting thoughts, and I hesitate to bandy words with someone so knowledgeable. However, I hardly think my suggestion of the WM being a bully is quite so "cloddish" as you believe. Let us return to the three men you use as examples; in each case, Lucas, Toole and Shawcross were abused (in all senses of the word) by more powerful figures than they. Physically at the outset, and then psychologically as the three grew to manhood. Yes, the cause of their rage is A WOMAN and not WOMEN, but that woman still exercised power over them. When the Ripper (or Lucas, &c.) killed, they were exercising power over weaker victims - bullying them, even if that bullying was only in the short moments it took to throttle Chapman into unconsciousness. As far as the markings on Eddowes' face. . .well, I'm afraid you've lost me, David, as I've not the slightest idea what point you're trying to make. Are you saying that Eddowes herself represented the disapproving frown of authority to JTR? Was there something in her (appearance, voice, attitude) that caused a bubbling up of the dark satanic wells in the killer? Was it that after 2 (or 3) other murders, he finally felt secure enough to mark his prey, and would take this to a logical extent in the dissassembling of MJK? Not trying to be difficult - just don't think that I was so far off the mark in my assumation. Of course, I am not an expert in sexual psychology, so I could very well be pissing in the wind. Corrections and friendly disagreements always welcome. As ever, Christopher-Michael
Author: D. Radka Sunday, 29 November 1998 - 03:21 am
Good Evening, Certainly Christopher-Michael has not adopted a cloddish position--there are many examples of his acuteness on these boards. With respect to the WM and his woman-hating and bullying, I feel I may perhaps be the only person on these boards to here and there run the risk of a little bit of sympathy for this devil. Let me try to restate my position: These are for the most part merely accidental characteristics from his point of view. To define him by his accidental characteristics is to mis-define him, and therefore to preclude detecting him. This is what the police mostly did, and what Ripperologists have continued for 110 years. Because we are normal people, bullying and woman-hating would be one kind of thing in us were we to have these characteristics, and because the WM was a highly disordered personality, they would be an entirely different kind of thing in him. Although bullying and woman-hating looks like what he was up to to us, I believe Frederick Abberline would have received a totally different kind of explanation from across the suspect table were the WM arrested. It would have been so far 'round the bend, so bizarre and delusionally illtiterate, as to be unimaginable by normal people, I believe. Black is white, fish is bird--I would expect to find this kind of thinking in someone who did the things he did; it would have been assembled out of his early experiences, and it would be an essential characteristic of his I think, because it would be driving what he did. On the other hand, coercion, bullying, hatred, murder, sadism, violence--these are comparatively reasonable plans. Thousands of years of history can be cited to show them behind all manner of totalitarianism. Saddam Hussein does these things all the time--he's got a society based on it. It's not civilized, but it's not disordered, either--in fact it works. I feel the WM killed the women basically for two reasons, (1) so that they would lie still for the mutilations, the performing of which was his primary plan, and (2) so that they wouldn't later identify him to the police. Otherwise the violence is mostly a red herring in the series. (Notice I said "mostly"--I am implying an evolution in his concept beginning with Nichols, since Tabram's body received gratuitous violence and no mutilations.) Now for the mutilations to Eddowes' face, which it appears I described poorly above: Please stand in front of a mirror and make an exaggerated disapproving expression. Do you see carat-shaped features? I did when I tried this; there was one on the bridge of my nose where my eyebrows furrowed, and my mouth made another. In fact, my whole face rather resembled a big carat. This is what I think the WM may have seen on a disapproving woman's face in his childhood, thus he later used Eddowes' face as a kind of projection screen for it. First he tried the frowns a couple times in small scale on her chin, then, going with the metaphor, progressed to bigger ones on her cheeks, then he defaulted into the full fury of his fear and anger, ending his mini-meditation with slicing off her nose. This indicates to me that an implied purpose in the murders was to return to himself to his original position in life, re-experiencing his primordial tensions and anxieties, as a way of trying to overcome them. (Please note I believe the bulk of the mutilations to have a colossal, bizarre significance to his life nested within simply re-playing trauma caused by authority figures--but this must wait for my paper!) David
Author: Christopher-Michael Sunday, 29 November 1998 - 02:17 pm
David - Thank you for restating your position, and I must apologise, as I did completely miss the point you were trying to make. I agree with your two reasons for JTRs murders, and I do believe it is evident that the mutilations themselves were the primary means of gratification for him, rather than the act of violence leading to an opportunity for mutilation. I still think, however, that as I said before, the exertion of power over a weaker person occupied part of his makeup; consciously or not, we cannot say. I could be entirely wrong, but I should not be surprised to find the Ripper regarded by those who knew him as a bully or punk of some sort. Thank you for more fully explaining your thoughts on Eddowes. I shall be interested to read your paper, as I wonder why Eddowes was the first focus for this facial mutilation. Good luck with it, and keep us posted! As ever, Christopher-Michael
Author: Christopher T. George Monday, 30 November 1998 - 02:09 pm
Hello, David: I am assuming you mean "caret" rather than "carat" as in 24 carat gold or "carrot" as in Bugs Bunny. This brings up an interesting possibility. Could Jack the Ripper have been in the printing trade? A "caret" is a printer's symbol to mean "a wedge-shaped mark made on written or printed matter to indicate the place where something is to be inserted" (Webster's dictionary). And this by extension might bring up another intriguing possibility, in that the police of the day may well have been right that the Dear Boss letters were written by an "enterprising journalist." Enterprising indeed if he were Jack the Ripper. Chris George
Author: D. Radka Friday, 04 December 1998 - 09:37 pm
Dear Mr. George, You are quite correct in pointing out the connections among the terms caret, carat, carrot, and Bugs Bunny. According to my research, Mr. Bunny was in fact responsible for the Whitechapel murders. Expelled from King's Medical College due to an over-fondness toward fermented carrot juice, he was obliged to get his living as a carrot porter in Spitalfields market. Resentful in his humiliated straits of the success of his former medical school professors, he sought a means to tease the medical profession in the form of indestructible ironies. Thus he turned to macabre murder and dismemberment in the streets, fittingly using a sharpened carrot to commit the crimes. Sometimes he employed his budding medical skills, sometimes he didn't. Therefore, autopsy physicians were presented with the insoluable problem of the perpetrator both seeming to possess medical skill, and at the same time seeming to possess no medical skill. Dr. Bond became so vexed by his inability to penetrate this irony that he threw himself from a second story window, committing suicide. Mr. Bunny further illuminates a problem presented by Mr. Israel Schwartz, who testified that he saw a tipsy young man walk down Berner Street and attack Elizabeth Stride--this was Mr. Bunny on one of his high-octane, beta-carotene binges. Being a foreigner and not wishing not to appear obtuse to perceived British cultural notions, Schwartz elected to omit describing the suspect he saw as a rabbit when providing information to the police. Thank you for your thoughtful contribution to our discussion. David
Author: wascallywabbit Friday, 04 December 1998 - 10:05 pm
Mr. David,Mr. George and all those interested, I think it is dastardly to accuse my fellow bunny of such human deeds as the Whitechapel murders.We are much more interested in the charms of the opposite sex than it's demise. Please keep your sleuthing focused on two-legged suspects and leave innocent hares to enjoy the pleasures of life! wascallywabbit
Author: D. Radka Saturday, 05 December 1998 - 12:09 am
The grand riddle of the Whitechapel murders: "What's up, Doc?" David
Author: wascallywabbit Saturday, 05 December 1998 - 08:32 pm
Please Mr. Radka, stop making fun of furry forest creatures. I know you are a sensible fellow and probably mean no harm or disrespect. Of course, Harvey is well over six feet tall and I know that some Pukka's feel that they are bunnydom's avengers.A word to the wise,I trust! wascallywabbit
Author: Bob_c Monday, 07 December 1998 - 06:39 am
He ho hum. As I read the above... There are no silly questions..... Bob
Author: Rotter Thursday, 11 February 1999 - 04:35 am
We have mentioned a number of killers here, and I would like to add Ed Gein to use his example for whatever anecdotal value they might have. Ed Gein didn't have any expressed animosity towards women-he said he just needed bodies for "material" in his case to make some kind of woman-skin suit. He studied anatomy and had some primitive notions about a sex-change operation. Like the Ripper, he killed his victims quickly and "painlessly" and went to work on the bodies. Of course, we don't know the Ripper's objective, but the killing itself could have been secondary just a means to obtain a body in order to try out some similarly crazy (but probably sustantially different) theories. In a sense the Ripper may not be a violent man at all. His killing was quick, like euthenasia, and perhaps not just to avoid capture. Ed Gein worked his way up to killings by robbing graves for "material," the first job being to dig up a grave and rob a uterus. Were there graveyard disturbances in London at the time (long shot)? Gein was also a model prisoner in the asylum (not that it got him released, despite many efforts). If the ripper was "caged in an asylum" there is no reason to expect him to have been violent there.
Author: D. Radka Thursday, 11 February 1999 - 01:31 pm
I think you are right. The reason the Ripper killed his victims was to use their bodies for what we usually term "the mutilations." I don't believe he got off much on inflicting pain, torturing, or especially in taking the risks of being captured that doing these things would entail for him. Perhaps these things were a part of it, but if they were, I think they would be an insignificant part. I basically believe he killed the women because he wanted to put his hands into their entrails, and if possible under time constraints to retrieve certain internal organs. I do feel he was a little bit of a Gein in this respect. But the main point is he and his victim swimming together inside her body for a few moments, while a bizarre "meditation" concerning the matter was taking place--this is what I think the Whitechapel murders were essentially about. David
Author: Species8514 Monday, 27 August 2001 - 05:32 am
Jack was a tortured mind. He once was quite clever with a good education. He spoke softly, and could be very gentle. He didnt drink to excess, but did frequent local pubs often. He would sit on his own, disappering in to the background - watching people. He was well liked, but had no friends. Jack wasnt ugly, nor had any marks on his face. He was neither rich nor poor - money came and went but it wasnt a factor in his life. He was about 36, and was born in London, although he had travelled in the area. Strangely enough he didnt hate women, but just as a lion will go for the weakest pray - so did Jack. Of all the people he could have murdered these were the safest. Prositutes were ten a penny, and he knew that at least two of his first victims would be overlooked as part of the "Norm" of every day life. Jack suffered mental pain, He knew what he was and also new he couldnt stop it. Sucide never entered Jacks mind though. He liked what he did despite the duality going on in his mind. His father had slaughtered animals when he was a child, and had often watched. His mother died in childbirth. He was an only child. Jack was a neat, tidy, and logical person. He always had a fob watch with him.
Author: Warwick Parminter Monday, 27 August 2001 - 08:09 pm
Very interesting Species 8514, where do you get your info?
Author: Tom Wescott Monday, 27 August 2001 - 09:37 pm
Species, You're way off base here...Jack wasn't 36, he was 37. He lied about his age. Yours truly, Tom Wescott
Author: Leanne Perry Tuesday, 28 August 2001 - 06:29 am
HE WAS ONLY THIRTY! Leanne!
Author: graziano Tuesday, 28 August 2001 - 09:19 am
Hello Leanne, which one of them ? Bye. Graziano.
Author: Jon Tuesday, 28 August 2001 - 12:43 pm
Blured vision Graz? You should take more water with it
Author: graziano Tuesday, 28 August 2001 - 01:38 pm
Hello Jon, after smoking crack, now abusing alcohol ? No,no,no, I will not go elsewhere. Never. Bye. Gra..hic..ziano. P.S.: Speaking about water, I do not have forgotten the one in the Hanbury street yard. I am just waiting my forensic doctor friend Aldo who should have come back last week from holiday but I have the impression that he is even less serious than me. As I will give you my explanation, you will be....splashed.
Author: Mark List Tuesday, 28 August 2001 - 02:12 pm
Yeah, where did the profile come from? It sounds right (i.e. a possible profile for a serial killer) I'm curious where the information came from. mark
Author: Heather Savage Thursday, 11 April 2002 - 09:33 pm
Hi everyone, The FBI profilers made a profile on Jack the Ripper and they used whatever evidence that they could find or what was provided. They said that he was 36-37 years of age, 5'8" to 5'9", and basically gave him the typical serial killer profile: bed wetter, killed animals,etc. What do you think of all of that? Do you think that Jack could have had somebody else do the letters for him or maybe even the killings? Ave, Heather
Author: Paul Boothby Friday, 12 April 2002 - 09:51 am
Heather, sorry to go off the post so completely, but is Heather Savage really your name? The profile shows another name completely. Sorry if this seems a rude question, but there was a policewoman named Heather Savage who was as responsible as anyone for bringing British Serial Killers Fred and Rose West to justice. Just thought you should know.....if you didn't already. Cheers......Paul Ooops sorry, the more I think about it the more I think it was W.D.C. Hazel Savage (and I can't at the moment check). Apologies all round.

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