Psycholanalysis

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Paul,

Finally, if JTR's killings have nothing to do with his image of women, which I feel comes from his IMAGE of mother, then we might as well close shop cuz we can't know nothin'.

How are we going to pinpoint a "man with a negative image of his mother" 120 years on, when we can't even identify known individuals (like "Morganstone" or George Hutchinson) definitively? This is why I believe it's an exercise in futility. It's also dangerous - we've already seen suspect-based books over-egging or, frankly, inventing psychologically-significant elements of Mr X or Y's biography to fit some preconceived framework, all of which is all very unfortunate. It's doubly unfortunate if, as seems reasonable, Jack was "motivated" by mental illness rather than a bad mother-image.

[Blackkat]

Pilgrim-

Where did you go? LOL I like reading your posts. I think you're post was insightful and I'd like to hear more about what you think.

Moooooo

[paul emmett]

Hi Pilgrim, I enjoyed your earlier post, but I wasn't sure how MJK's hair could become the zone of transfer for the change from mother/woman to woman/mother. I do think the progressions you suggested are most interesting.

Hi Paul,
It's doubly unfortunate if, as seems reasonable, Jack was "motivated" by mental illness rather than a bad mother-image.

Hi Sam, I think we probably even disagree on the concept of motivated. To me one isn't motivated by a mental illness, but one's actions can be motivated by components of a mental illness, like a bad mother image.

And clearly it's not prudent to bury a methodology with a failed application of it.

[Sam Flynn]

Hi Pilgrim, I enjoyed your earlier post, but I wasn't sure how MJK's hair could become the grounds for the change from mother/woman to woman/mother.

Sorry, Paul - and Pilgrim - but that's the kind of "anything goes" problem that plagues these sorts of metaphorical approaches. They may be stimulating as such, but they're ultimately poetic fancies that might on occasion describe, but rarely explain.

Hi Sam, I think we probably even disagree on the concept of motivated. To me one isn't motivated by a mental illness

Agreed. That's why I put the word in quotation marks.

And clearly it's not prudent to bury a methodology with a failed application of it.

Freudian symbolism, as a methodology, was buried long ago - in fact, it was a non-starter from day one when one looks at its origins in bourgeois Vienna. Its greatest legacy was Salvador Dali's paintings and some great movies - but in that respect the psychoanalytic framework was only as useful as iambic pentameter was to Shakespeare's output, or sonata form to Beethoven's. Frameworks such as these can produce great things in the hands of the right people, but there are no "great truths" inherent in the frameworks themselves.

Just as in sculpture, these frameworks are mere armatures on which to hang and structure ideas. That's fine as far as it goes, but generally the armatures are of secondary importance to the work as a whole and are often hidden from view, especially in the greatest works. This isn't the case with psychoanalysis, where the wires of the armature ("this-or-that" complex or defence mechanism, oral aggression, penis envy etc) constantly poke through the clay to distract our attention from the more important details.

[Blackkat]

Paul Said:

Regarding the futility issue, would we say that trying to establish JTR's identity is futile? Trying to deduce why Hamlet waits so long to kill the king, futile?

Good point there, that's a bit of what I was trying to say in my previous post. There are a ton of suspects and though there is a bit of "reason why they are a suspect" isn't everyone mainly throwing around ideas and reasons why that person is a suspect. I have read some posts where there is some surmising going on, sometimes only mere opinions.

It's disappointing when things get to "why we shouldn't even be discussing this" than to the point of the post. NOT that it has happened ...much... here but I suppose we all think differently and what is important in one person's mind about JtR isn't going to be the most important to another. Those more important things that people get distracted from. (because those things are more important to them) I'm not trying to solve the case so I don't have to feel that pressure.

[paul emmett]

It's disappointing when things get to "why we shouldn't even be discussing this" than to the point of the post. NOT that it has happened ...much... here but I suppose we all think differently and what is important in one person's mind about JtR isn't going to be the most important to another. Those more important things that people get distracted from. (because those things are more important to them) I'm not trying to solve the case so I don't have to feel that pressure.

Good points BlackKat. And I find myself guilty on too many fronts. I have gotten away from the thread topic--and I really do want to solve the case. I hope we can get back to psychoanalysis in general and your focus on rage in particular, and Pilgrim's zone of transfer in particular particular.

How would you answer your own question on the type of rage involved?

[Pilgrim]

Freud & Dalí, 'Ambitious Scientist' and Serial Surrealism.

"Freud continued to stare at me without paying the slightest attention to my magazine. Trying to interest him, I explained that it was not a surrealist diversion, but was really an ambitiously scientific article, and I repeated the title, pointing to it at the same time with my finger. Before his imperturbable indifference, my voice became involuntarily sharper and more insistent. Then, continuing to stare at me with a fixity in which his whole being seemed to converge, Freud exclaimed, addressing Stefan Zweig, "I have never seen a more complete example of a Spaniard. What a fanatic !

(...)

My first aggression was perpetrated on a boy of thirteen. I had been watching him for some time stupidly eating a large piece of bread with some chocolate - a mouthful of bread, a mouthful of chocolate. These alternate, almost mechanical gestures, appeared to me to reveal a profound lack of intelligence. Moreover, he was ugly, and the chocolate he was eating, which was of atrocious quality, inspired me with an immense contempt for its consumer. I approached the boy furtively, pretending to be absorbed in the reading of a book by Prince Kropotkin which I always carried with me on my walks. My victim saw me coming, but he had no suspicions of me and continued to devour his bread and his chocolate while looking in another direction. I sized him up and planned what I was going to do, indulging at leasure in the great luxury of premeditation as I approached him. After having observed his horrible, idiotic, uncouth manner of eating, and especially of swallowing, I slapped him hard right in the face, making his bread and chocolate fly high in the air. After which I dashed off in a frenzied flight as fast as my legs could carry me. It took the lad a long time to realize what had happened to him, and when he understood it and tried to run after me I was already so far away that he immediately abandoned his angry impulse to dash after me. I saw him stoop down and pick up his piece of bread and his chocolate.

My unpunished success immediately caused such acts of aggression to assume the endemic character of a real vice which I could no longer forego. I would be on the lookout for every propitious occasion to commit similar acts, and I grew more and more reckless. Soon I noticed that the sympathetic or antipathetic character of my victims no longer played an essential role, and that my pleasure arose solely from the anguish inherent in the execution and the vicissitudes of the assault itself."

The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí, p. 25, p.120.

My Regards.

[Blackkat]

Pilgrim. Heya there you are!

I'm feeling a bit duhhhh - can you elaborate and explain your post to me, and what you mean by it. I'm sorry I have the most horrible sinus headache and my "getting it" is not going to happen.

Thanks Guy!

[Blackkat]

Paul:

I'm not sure if Jack would have really fit into the rage's that I mentioned. I'm still in the mind frame that yes his killings were full of rage. Be it that the rage was brought on from his relationship with his mother or another female figure. (I tend to think it would have been his mother - the grand "set up" of dysfunction that led him to a gruesome release of that anger)

I think, my opinion of course, that he may have been killing in the manner that he was because as you said, he was ridding the streets of something that he hated, but also perhaps he was trying to accomplish something within his own mind. Cleaning up the streets? yes. Cleaning up something in his own mind - so that he could be done with it. Almost as if it was a sort of obstacle and maybe in his own mind he thought that if he could complete this, then all would be well. Thus we see him starting with older prostitutes and potentially ending up with one that was young.

When I think of it in that manner it helps me categorize what suspect may truely fit with those assumptions. Just my own way of narrowing down the field. If it ends up being a no go, I simply go back to square one.

[paul emmett]

Cleaning up the streets? yes. Cleaning up something in his own mind - so that he could be done with it. Almost as if it was a sort of obstacle and maybe in his own mind he thought that if he could complete this, then all would be well. Thus we see him starting with older prostitutes and potentially ending up with one that was young.

Hi BkackKat. I think that some of your last point here was implicit in what Pilgrim was saying earlier. That's one of the reasons I was interested in hearing what he had to say about MJK's hair.

I think that your first point here--cleaning up both outside and "inside"--is almost a fact of life. But I know that that is trouble cuz we have had as much debate here over views of life as we have have had over the efficacy of psychoanalysis. That being said, I still think that we pour forth our inner darkness onto the world--where it is easier to deal with. It's not "whores" that are dirty; it's JTR's image of whores/women, his desires, the desires he projects onto them. So he almost has to be--in my view--cleaning up out AND in.

I was reading BY EAR AND EYES last night, and in the third paragraph in "3.4: What kind of man was JTR?" Magellan begins, "There is no doubt that these murders were sexually motivated and conducted by a man who hated women." Clearly around here we have had some doubt. But again to me Magellan's assertion is almost self-evident. Look at the killings. And THAT is exactly what I think we shoul do NEXT: to see how these killings were sexually motivated, to see what motives were involved, to see why JTR hated women--we don't look to Freud, Klein, LaCan, or Skinner. We look at the killings!

And Magellan goes on to do just that. "The removal of the uterus, an organ strongly symbolic of womanhood and motherhood, was a significant defeminizing mutilation and could have been the primary objective in each murder." Now in point of fact I disagree here, or at least I say there is an ambivalence here because it seems to me that the uterus is a trophy, like vagina, navel, and heart. And I think that a trophy is just that--a trophy, a prize, a reward. In other words, I see his taking of uteri as an idealization of motherhood too.

I know all this raises just more questions. Why idealize? Why idealize what you hate? Can it be idealization and defeminizing? What about the kidneys? . . . . . . . . But my point here is that we look to patterns or broken patterns in JTR's killings to try to provide answers for these and other issues that have been categorized as "psychoanalytic." But, of course, if you don't believe Magellen's initial assertion we have a debate, but, again as others have suggested, that's probably a debate for another thread.

[Blackkat]

Look at the killings. And THAT is exactly what I think we shoul do NEXT: to see how these killings were sexually motivated, to see what motives were involved, to see why JTR hated women--we don't look to Freud, Klein, LaCan, or Skinner. We look at the killings!

And Magellan goes on to do just that. "The removal of the uterus, an organ strongly symbolic of womanhood and motherhood, was a significant defeminizing mutilation and could have been the primary objective in each murder."

THANK GOD! - Look at the killings, something I've been saying for over 3 weeks. WHEEE!!!

Now about "the removal of the uterus" and what Magellan says. Not sure I completely agree with him. Depends on what Jack did with that uterus. I do think that what he did was defeminizing but I don't think that was his primary objective.

I think Jack was taking something that he [in his mind] thought he needed.

See - I know that this will cause a lot of head shaking and eye rolling but I find it strange that he started out with women that were almost too old to be having babies and ended up with one that was still able to have children. [some can debate here he was taking what he could get - fine. that's not the theory I'm going on here]

I think after he got to the last one he [in his mind] achieved what he needed and he may have just walked away totally. Never looking back, and possibly never killing again.

[Sam Flynn]

some can debate here he was taking what he could get - fine. that's not the theory I'm going on here

I'd be genuinely interested to see where you take it, BK, however any theory must account for why different trophies were taken - that's true whether one factors Kelly into the list or not. Any good theory must also be able to filter out potentially confounding variables, such as the average age of doss-house based prostitutes versus the age of those with their own private rooms.

At another level, it may well be that a cut-off point existed whereby women below a certain age were more likely to have wage-earning partners, or were more employable themselves, thus enabling them to rent rooms. Those above the threshold may have been more likely to be forced into lodging-house accommodation, and were thus compelled to work (and be killed) on the streets.

These factors alone might more reasonably explain why the first four (three?) victims of the Ripper were past childbearing age, rather than being a reflection of any specific needs on the part of the killer.

[Blackkat]

I'd be genuinely interested to see where you take it, BK, however any theory must account for why different trophies were taken - that's true whether one factors Kelly into the list or not. Any good theory must also be able to filter out potentially confounding variables, such as the average age of doss-house based prostitutes versus the age of those with their own private rooms.

At another level, it may well be that a cut-off point existed whereby women below a certain age were more likely to have wage-earning partners, or were more employable themselves, thus enabling them to rent rooms. Those above the threshold may have been more likely to be forced into lodging-house accommodation, and were thus compelled to work (and be killed) on the streets.

These factors alone might more reasonably explain why the first four (three?) victims of the Ripper were past childbearing age, rather than being a reflection of any specific needs on the part of the killer.

And this would be if a person was going to try to prove a theory right? Not just discuss different possibilities that could potentially be a "theory" Right because you have to start brainstorming someplace before all the other has to be done. Kinda like coming up with an idea and then going from there. :smiles: Pardon moi for not being clear. Thank you as always Sam : )

[paul emmett]

I see JTR's image of mother/whore as powerful, masculine, phallic. And in turn I see his butcherings, his cutting off of noses and (nearly)heads as his attempts to castrate the POTENT mother image that renders him powerless. He wants to unite with the female pure Mommy, so he kills/castrates the "whores." He excises the dirty and the potent.

I think it might even be argued that he quits cuz it works--kinda. Like Pilgrim, I see the breast under MJK's head as important, but I empasize that it's the kidneys, breast and womb TOGETHER. And using some "humain remains"-like wordplay, I do think that the fusion of womb, breast, and "Kid" rectify the infantile losses of womb and breast, and give JTR a kind of peace. And to close with Pilgrim's telling image of the death's head that was MJK's face, I would say that beneath death, beyond death, through death, JTR finds a purgative symbolic, symbiotic fusion with the cleansed, feminized
Mother.

A while back I said the above. A further while back Pilgrim said, MJK's hair provided "occasion for a literal and desired reversal--'woman/mother' instead of 'mother/woman.'" And now BlackKat says, "I think Jack was taking something that . . . he thought he needed. . . . I find it strange that that he started out with women that were almost too old to be having babies and ended up with one who was still able to have children. . . . I think that after he got to the last one he [in his mind] achieved what he needed and, he may have just walked away totally. Never looking back and possibly never killing again." SORRY FOR NOT BEING ABLE TO WORK THE QUOTE MAKER.

I think it is interesting that all three are suggesting a progression, a benign progression which might begin to explain why the killings stopped. I wonder if people have ever looked at the differences in the MJK killing as suggestive of a salutary progression--indoor/outdoor for example, heart/womb, . . .. What do you think, BlackKat, Pilgrim, All??

[Blackkat]

Indoor/outdoor - could speak volumns. I have to admit I'm still a little leary of saying *all* of what I think may have been going on in his mind, but the indoor has a symbolism to it too. Progression? Yes, because when you think in terms of the womb, and the 'sexual" type of mutilations, and then MJK has her heart taken. All of these hold a good suggestion of why he was doing it.

...........I do think that there may have been some problems in his relationship with his mother but I think Jack may have felt ripped away from his mom. I think he was trying to get back to that. uhhh... does anyone think that he was naked when he killed MJK?