Why disguise the fact that JtR was educated?

[John Wheat]

To DJA

I think you'll find most people with Aspergers Syndrome are good at maths my experience would suggest this. Many people with Aspergers Syndrome have a fascination with numbers. A fascination with numbers is used in some preliminary tests to suggest a person may be on the Autistic Spectrum. I think you'll find that by suggesting Jack had Aspergers Syndrome with no evidence that you are in fact an arrogant fool.

[curious4]

Hello DJA

I don't agree that Jack had Aspbergers. He would have needed top social skills to persuade any woman to go to a lonely spot with him, particularly in the prevailing climate of fear and those with Aspbergers aren't known for this. I have been told I have leanings in this direction myself and have innocently been rubbing people up the wrong way unintentionally all my life. (I am now guided by my daughter but still believe in my heart of hearts that people just don't get the joke).

As to dyslexia, I think you are falling into the trap that many people do and associating it with low intelligence. This is as wrong and old-fashioned as believing that epilepsi is a mental illness. In Ingrid Madison's exellent book "Hoppande Bokstäver" (roughly translated, Jumping Letters), which is, to my mind the best book ever written on dyslexia, she interviews, among others, a doctor and an author who coped with dyslexia and managed to have successful careers. It is just that the more intelligent sufferers are able to overcome it more easily. All testify to suffering agonies at school with teachers who had no idea about this and who called them lazy and stupid. If I am right, this may have shaped his character. To me the letters are almost gloating: "you called me stupid but look how much cleverer I am than all of you".

You will have to read my original post to see what I am talking about regarding certain mistakes indicating dyslexia (at least until I can get a new copy of the book). Don't somehow think antibiotics would help - but spell check certainly does!

Best wishes
C4

[DJA]

Your making a lot of assumptions DJA which is never a good thing, what evidence have you based your assumptions on? Even your assumptions are poor. Considering most people with Aspergers Syndrome tend to be good at maths what makes you think Jack would have Aspergers Syndrome and maths not be a strong point?

Cheers John

"Strongly suspect" based on reading his published Medical Papers and Medical Journals' Obituaries.

Most people with Aspergers tend to be good at maths?

Tell that to the people on "Wrong Planet".
Some members get a laugh from arrogant fools.
Most of them will just find you offensive though.

This guy has a problem with maths to the degree that most people have his year of birth wrong.

[curious4]

Hello John,

Yes, exactly, "widely believed" not proved. The police certainly took them seriously at the time, it was only afterwards that the journalist idea was put forward. I don't agree with it, the murders were horrific enough in themselves, no need for hype.

Best wishes
C4

[curious4]

Indeed GUT shame they abolished drawing and quartering!

[John Wheat]

To Curious 4

Considering it is widely believed that none of the letters purportedly by Jack were actually written by him why are you using certain letters to suggest Jack was dyslexic and also well educated?

Cheers John

[John Wheat]

Strongly suspect Jack the ripper was an Aspie.

Also born left handed.

A friend was Dyslexic as a child.

His father was a medical doctor who had a hobby in electronics.
Especially radio and other communication equipment.
The F111 aircraft that Australia purchased in the 1970s carried gear of his design.

True story which should be check able these days.

His name is similar to Capone.(Hi Dave,in case you read this).

Antibiotics were the answer.

Math was not our Jack's strong point.
He had difficulty with inclusive dates.
A lot of us did as children.

Spent many,many days reading posts on Wrong Planet.

Your making a lot of assumptions DJA which is never a good thing, what evidence have you based your assumptions on? Even your assumptions are poor. Considering most people with Aspergers Syndrome tend to be good at maths what makes you think Jack would have Aspergers Syndrome and maths not be a strong point?

Cheers John

[DJA]

Strongly suspect Jack the ripper was an Aspie.

Also born left handed.

A friend was Dyslexic as a child.

His father was a medical doctor who had a hobby in electronics.
Especially radio and other communication equipment.
The F111 aircraft that Australia purchased in the 1970s carried gear of his design.

True story which should be check able these days.

His name is similar to Capone.(Hi Dave,in case you read this).

Antibiotics were the answer.

Math was not our Jack's strong point.
He had difficulty with inclusive dates.
A lot of us did as children.

Spent many,many days reading posts on Wrong Planet.

[GUT]

My point us that the mistakes made were not random, but typical for a dyslectic. I am somewhat handicapped at the moment by not having my copy of Sigrid Madison's book (loaned to an ex-friend's husband who has disappeared into the wilds of Finland with it. To my mind, book-stealing should be punished in the same way horse-stealers were punished in the old Wild West).

However, if I can ask you to take the time to read my original post, easily found if you type JTR dyslectic in the search box, you will perhaps understand more fully what I mean.

Interesting that so many of the royal families are affected. Princess Victoria, Sweden is also affected it seems.

Best wishes
C4

Hangings to good for book takers.

[curious4]

Random

My point us that the mistakes made were not random, but typical for a dyslectic. I am somewhat handicapped at the moment by not having my copy of Sigrid Madison's book (loaned to an ex-friend's husband who has disappeared into the wilds of Finland with it. To my mind, book-stealing should be punished in the same way horse-stealers were punished in the old Wild West).

However, if I can ask you to take the time to read my original post, easily found if you type JTR dyslectic in the search box, you will perhaps understand more fully what I mean.

Interesting that so many of the royal families are affected. Princess Victoria, Sweden is also affected it seems.

Best wishes
C4

[Rosella]

^ It has been noticed that the King of Sweden, Carl Gustav, who is about 70 and is a dyslexic, (undiagnosed for much of his life, poor man) does apparently still repeat mistakes when he is writing speeches and in signing his signature, often writing Gustav without the 'a'.

Prince Harry, who reputedly has dyslexia (it's never been publicly confirmed and it's been said that he wasn't diagnosed with it until the age of 17) still sometimes signs notes Hary instead of Harry. The same thing then recurs over in these two men's writings. Through no fault of their own they just don't recognise they're doing it. Surely if Jack was dyslexic the same errors would occur in the same words over again not just in random words?

[curious4]

Depends on how much intensive training they've had. And I believe one analyst believed the Dear Boss letter had been copied/written from an original. This would fit if he had first written the the letter, checked it as carefully as he could, and then written the final version.

Swedes are, I believe, quite advanced in dealing with dyslexia. My daughter had to undergo a whole day of tests at a hospital by a specially trained speech therapist who concluded that she had compensated very well for a quite big problem, as I believe many of the brightest dyslextics do. If he had been forced to learn to spell fairly well by repeated beatings (as was the custom then), he would probably be fairly confident writing letters.

Best wishes
C4

[RivkahChaya]

Not to put to fine a point on it, but someone, like a schoolteacher, which one suspect was (which doesn't mean anything-- I'm not suggesting Druitt wrote any letters-- it's just an example of how many teachers were about at the time), who had experience with the kind of mistakes that people make when they are still learning would know to write "knif." Ditto someone who wasn't an immigrant, but worked with or around them, and knew what kind of mistakes people just learning English make might also know to write "knif.

I've known dyslexics, and every one avoided writing tasks like poison ivy. I know you really want the letters to be genuine, and also genuinely by a dyslexic, so you can make assumptions about a dyslexic Jack, but I personally think that if JtR were dyslexic, he wouldn't have chosen to write letters to anyone.

[curious4]

Logic

I think the key to this is how he wrote. An educated man trying to "dumb down" would be more likely to write "nife" than "knif", while a dyslectic is likely to remember the k but drop the final e. An educated man trying to feign ignorance would put in some bad grammar. This doesn't happen except in missed apostrophes and starting sentences with a small letter, both of which are typical for dyslectics.

Best wishes
C4

P S I see I have written Sailor Jack by mistake in my first. Probably a freudian slip - I must try to get out more!

[RivkahChaya]

One reason is certainly to hide who the author is. IIRC, at least one person was arrested and convicted (I assume fined, not jailed) for writing a false Ripper letter. If any of the letters we're discussing were written after the conviction, there was very good reason to disguise the author, but even if not, there are still good reasons for wanting to hide one's identity. For one thing, a journalist might have had an identifiable style as well as handwriting, and be trying to alter both. Another reason is that if the writer of the hoaxes, assuming they are hoaxes, presumed that JtR lived where he "worked," then he'd presume an uneducated Jack, and write as an uneducated person, to make the letter more believable.

If JtR did write the letters, he'd have good reason not to send the police evidence leading directly to him, so he'd want to disguise his handwriting and voice.

It's easier to sound less educated than one is, than to sound more educated, so that explains why the author chose to sound semi-literate. He probably was middle class with a good, but non-secondary (ie, college) education. If he had been a college professor, or otherwise highly erudite, he could have "dumbed down" to something still higher than what he did write as, and that makes sense, because large numbers of people were moderately educated.

One thing is for certain: the letters and cards were not written by an immigrant who was still learning English, and who spoke Yiddish as a first language. I'm very familiar with how people like that write. The only thing that remotely represents it is the Goulston St. graffito. Now that doesn't mean JtR wasn't Jewish; it just means that if he was a recent Jewish immigrant, he didn't write any of the missives.