The GSG. What Does It Mean??

[Sam Flynn]

The suggestion that the graffiti writer may have just been a fed up Jew who was just the average Jewish Joe (Moe?) is a very likely scenario in my mind.

...and there is a Jewish precedent for writing on one's door-post a message, if not of defiance, then at least to keep misfortune at bay (Exodus, Chapter 12). Probably of no consequence, but it's still an amusing, if not interesting, parallel.

[DVV]

David,

You must understand that this was a time of Jewish angst. They were steadily pouring into England from countries that didn't want them. The British didn't want them either. There was a lot of hostility towards the newly emigrated Jews, and this hostility was returned. The suggestion that the graffiti writer may have just been a fed up Jew who was just the average Jewish Joe (Moe?) is a very likely scenario in my mind. Varqm's thinking here seems very reasonable. In this case, the graffiti had nothing to do with JTR, and was only a reaction to the troubles of the times.

If an average guy was the writer, then I think JTR read and liked the message and thought this a good place to leave the apron.

Cheers,

Mike

Hi Mike,
so the graffito would be an ironical reaction from an "ordinary Jew" fed up with anti-Jewish feelings in the area?
My God!
And do you really think that JtR, when making his escape, would have had time to read and appreciate it, and then he decided to throw the piece of apron near to it?
You may suggest that JtR read it some time before he commited the murder, but then again, since the wording is a blame on the Jews (at least in its apparent or let's say exoteric meaning), I don't know how you come to the conclusion that the murderer could be a Jew (I mean: because of the GSG), especially an "ordinary" one.

I honestly can't swallow all these speculations - but I will continue to think about...

Amitiés,
David

[The Good Michael]

David,

Not necessarily the killer. Just the writer of the GSG. The killer could have been looking for a scapegoat, or could have been a Jew from that area.

I'm just looking at the writer... for now.

Mike

[DVV]

David,

Not necessarily the killer. Just the writer of the GSG. The killer could have been looking for a scapegoat, or could have been a Jew from that area.

I'm just looking at the writer... for now.

Mike

O'right Mike, reasonable enough... Yet an "ordinary" Jew expressing his anger about anti-Jewish feelings with such a cranky adage...

Amitiés,
David

[The Good Michael]

David,

I think I'm rather ordinary and I've written some pretty cranky things in my day. That was especially when I was in the corporate world and disgruntled. Many editions of my corporate newspaper had my complaints in them, or at least 3 or 4 anyway. I definitely would have written on the wall back then.

I see your point, however.

Cheers,

Mike

[DVV]

Are you trying to convince me that a ripperologist posting from Korea, interested in the origins of the Falasha and eager to discover the religious significance of Aksum is an ordinary person?
I don't believe this one for one second!

Amitiés,
David

[Varqm]

trying to insult people who shows a genuine interest in your thoughts is quite unfair (note I do not say "childish").

You're right. I apologize. I/we are exploring possiblities. There are/were many kinds of individuals and add to that the time (as Good Michael pointed out),building ,street and community in which/when the graffito was written and add to that the events after the Chapman murder, there a number of possibilities. You're reaction was more focused ,I thought, on how it made Jews look bad . I thought it's one-sided/constricted and should not be the focus.

[Stephen Thomas]

David

Help me out here.

Does the French language include the concept of the double negative?

In English it's used for emphasis,

i.e. I'm not going nowhere.

Shakespeare used it.

Elvis used it it in One Night (1960), I ain't never done no wrong.

Do the French do double negatives?

[Sam Flynn]

Do the French do double negatives?

I believe French has its fair share of them, Stephen, perhaps the most famous being "Non, je ne regrette rien" ("No, I don't regret nothing").

[rain]

the Jews have been blamed for a lot of things for a long time.. they were all refugees in london.. it could have been a jew tired of being a target...

But in the 9-17-88, jtr wrote 'they say I am a yid, now..' he could have wrote the message before the murder and place the cloth afterwards there to prove that he was not jewish. If he wrote the letter, that would make sense of the graffitti.

[DVV]

I believe French has its fair share of them, Stephen, perhaps the most famous being "Non, je ne regrette rien" ("No, I don't regret nothing").

Hello Sam and Stephen,
Right Sam, the French do like this.
Worse, they can use a negative adverb in an affirmative sentence (that's the desperate expletive "ne")!
As an example: "Avant qu'il ne soit trop tard" ("Before it is not to late"!!!).
And after this, they dare to forbid regional languages.

Paure pople de Prouvènço
Sempre mai entamena
Sènso sousto ni defenso
Is outrage abandouna...
Frederic Mistral

[DVV]

the Jews have been blamed for a lot of things for a long time.. they were all refugees in london.. it could have been a jew tired of being a target...

But in the 9-17-88, jtr wrote 'they say I am a yid, now..' he could have wrote the message before the murder and place the cloth afterwards there to prove that he was not jewish. If he wrote the letter, that would make sense of the graffitti.

Hi Rain,
the 17 Sept letter is the most ridiculous document I know (with Maybrick diairy, which, by the way, uses it).
The text of the 17 Sept, if you look at it, cannot be first communication of the writer.
So that's the hoax of an a hoax - and a very clumsy one, though short.

Amitiés,
David

[Stephen Thomas]

I believe French has its fair share of them, Stephen, perhaps the most famous being "Non, je ne regrette rien" ("No, I don't regret nothing").

Good shout, Sam. I should have remembered that.

In 'proper' English the GSG means of course 'Jews should be blamed for some unspecified thing' which would be sort of an idiotic thing to bother writing. I see the GSG as a 'Support your local police, beat yourself up' type of statement from someone feeling oppressed. I was in Marseille recently and there's a similar type of graffiti painted on a wall at the main entrance to the Arab Quarter which says 'Aid the police, denounce your neighbour'.

[DVV]

Good shout, Sam. I should have remembered that.

In 'proper' English the GSG means of course 'Jews should be blamed for some unspecified thing' which would be sort of an idiotic thing to bother writing. I see the GSG as a 'Support your local police, beat yourself up' type of statement from someone feeling oppressed. I was in Marseille recently and there's a similar type of graffiti painted on a wall at the main entrance to the Arab Quarter which says 'Aid the police, denounce your neighbour'.

Hi Stephen,
I'm from the area and I know Marseille very well. My great grand-parents were penniless Corsicans who emigrated to Toulon's "Chicago" (the poorest area, full of prostitutes and rascals, which is now an Algerian quarter - and believe me, it's harder now for a Tunisian or a Moroccan than to anyone else, but nothing has really changed since the Corsican period), and my grandfather died there, shot by the police in 1945.
A sentence like "Aid the police, denounce your neighbour" is obviously ironical to me.
This said, you can't compare it to the GSG, far more cranky, and written in little characters, with a "schoolboy" handwriting.
Now, the GSG was first given as JtR's work (first, by contemporary police); then, some people suggested that the piece of apron was thrown near to it by chance, when the murderer was making his escape (that's not my favourite hypothesis but I find it reasonable, and a very plausible alternative).

Now, you and others began to suggest that the GSG is a work of an "innocent" Jew alluding to antisemitism (connected or not with the Whitechapel murders, Leather Apron, etc...that's not really clear) in the area...
Honestly, when you think of the wording, the handwriting, etc, isn't it a little bit far-fetched, though ingenuous?

Amitiés,
David

[Johnr]

Hello All,
Interesting theories all round on this thread.
Without a skerrick of proof I believe the GSG was scawled by a non-Jewish local, peeved by his belief 'they' were getting away with far too much:
"the Jews never get blamed for nuffin' ".
I imagine every second policeman in "H" Division nightly heard the same old double-negative refrain: " I never done nuffin', Mister".(Meaning "I'm innocent
,honest").I agree the closeness of the Sunday markets had something to do with the graffiti.
On the old boards, several Ripper students contributed wonderful research to establish exactly where the graffiti was written and exactly where the apron was positioned. What a shame that is all lost.
I am not convinced the apron was located close to the graffiti, despite comments to that effect by one policemen or newspaperman.
I don't believe the graffiti was Ripper-connected. JOHN RUFFELS.