Why Mutilate The Nose Specifically?

[Errata]

I think that GM was correct, and the term was overused in this case errata, with Mary Kelly you could make that statement without any pushback, but Kate had her nose almost cut off and had chevron type markings under her eyes. Thats mutilation, not obliteration.

Cheers

I'm a social sciences major. Obliteration always means significance, not totality. Obliteration of Akhenaten's name in history, obliteration of Catholicism in England, obliteration of synagogues in Nazi Germany... none resulted in absolute removal, just removing significant parts.

Total removal is eradication, extinction, or extinguishing (languages extinguish,but then become extinct. Which is odd).

Though colloquially I would use destroy, erase, or ravage.

I'm not making any arguments for how someone else uses the word obliterate. Sure it may be overused if someone is talking about the effect of the mutilations, though I think it's valid in a way. I use the word they way I was taught to use the word. Just like Historians almost never use the word decimate because it's always used wrong, despite the wrong usage now being accepted usage.

I don't think the mutilations obliterated her face in the sense that it was totally destroyed. I think the effect of the mutilations and all the blood on her face would obliterate her face in that it rendered her unrecognizable. And I think it was done to destroy the significance of her features or face to the killer. The word obliterate is the only one off the top of my head that means that. So if I have one word that means what I need it to mean, or I have about two dozen words describing what I mean, I'm going to pick the word. Maybe it makes me a lazy writer. But for the life of me I cannot imagine why it is any kind of a problem to use a word correctly on this board. It's not a cover, it's not backpedaling. It's using a word correctly.

If you don't want me to use the word anymore than I wont. I'm not attached. I certainly don't want to upset anyone. But it does mean I will be auditioning words that mean the destruction of significance in a widespread but not global way. So give me some appropriate words and I will happily use them.

[caz]

Can you state unequivocally that Kate wasnt lured by the man into the square with a promise of something she wanted...or that the man wearing the sailors knotted scarf was the same man she intended to turn in?

No, Mike. Why would I want to do that? I merely observed:

Eddowes was a tiny little thing, but she went willingly into that dark corner with her killer.

So of course she could have been lured with a promise (of money perhaps, since she was penniless - although it wouldn't need to have been in return for anything of a sexual nature, before you start assuming again) but that would still be going 'willingly', just as I observed.

I went on to ask how she planned to defend herself if she knew he was the Whitechapel fiend. Obviously if she had no intention of turning in sailorman and had no idea he meant her harm, my question wouldn't apply.

Assuming is fine for discussion, but not so good if presented as fact. Assuming Kate, Liz and Mary were soliciting when they meet their killer(s) is valid as a topic for discussion, but when presented as the most probable or likely scenario to people who want the actual truth... not merely the truth as perceived by the individual poster..then it becomes misleading.

Again, where in my post did I assume anything at all about these women 'soliciting'? I repeat: Eddowes was a tiny little thing, but she went willingly into that dark corner with her killer. At least there is no indication that she went under threat or was taken by force. I reached no conclusions about why she went.

Serial killers I believe are by definition guilty of more than 3 murders, yes?... and since we cant even link 1 canonical death to 1 person, or prove that only 1 person was responsible for any of the deaths, I would agree with the philosophy that almost all discussion of serial killings on this site should be limited to General Discussion. Perhaps when we have linked 2 murders with one person we might speculate some more on that train of thought, but its unwarranted at this point when discussing who killed any of the five women dubbed the Canonical Group.

So now you have doubts that even Nichols and Chapman were killed by the same hand? If that's the case, your train of thought is likely to be stuck in a dark tunnel without a buffet car for a long time to come.

Love,

Caz
X

[Beowulf]

Was referring to Kelly.

[Michael W Richards]

No I use it specifically. Obliterate has a few definitions but one of them is to destroy the significance of something. I think he destroyed the significance of her face (to him), not the actuality of her face, which I fully admit there was quite a bit left untouched. I think the amount of blood those mutilations generated would have sufficed to completely mask anything he did not cut.

I think that GM was correct, and the term was overused in this case errata, with Mary Kelly you could make that statement without any pushback, but Kate had her nose almost cut off and had chevron type markings under her eyes. Thats mutilation, not obliteration.

Cheers

[The Good Michael]

No I use it specifically. Obliterate has a few definitions but one of them is to destroy the significance of something.

Good cover.

Mike

[Errata]

You use 'obliteration' quite loosely.

Mike

No I use it specifically. Obliterate has a few definitions but one of them is to destroy the significance of something. I think he destroyed the significance of her face (to him), not the actuality of her face, which I fully admit there was quite a bit left untouched. I think the amount of blood those mutilations generated would have sufficed to completely mask anything he did not cut.

[The Good Michael]

I personally think that there was something about Eddowes that made the killer uncomfortable, and that's why he obliterated her face.

You use 'obliteration' quite loosely.

Mike

[GUT]

G'Day Beowulf

Eddows murdered and mutilated in her own apartment, sorry I don't follow.

[Beowulf]

If you think this killer is ridiculously educated, cutting off the nose was the punishment for adultery in ancient middle eastern cultures, which is why they developed the first rhinoplasty.

Otherwise the two most literally disfiguring acts are the removal of the nose, and the removal of the lips. These cuts render people unidentifiable. A person with no nose and no lips could be anyone. I personally think that there was something about Eddowes that made the killer uncomfortable, and that's why he obliterated her face. Like, if she looked like his kindly sister or something, he wouldn't want THAT face to watch him rip her open.

Except that she was murdered and mutilated in her own apartment...*clue*

[Michael W Richards]

As to the issue of the nose......when faced with a potential literal translation for a symbolic gesture such as the slicing of Kates nose, I dont see why that interpretation shouldnt take precedence.

Kate allegedly, if her ex landlady accurately parroted Kate's statement to her before her death, was about to stick her nose into the Ripper investigations and see if she couldnt benefit from information she thought valuable to the police regarding the murders, by providing said information.....or perhaps she thought to blackmail the parties she felt were responsible. She is "treated" to a substantial amount of alcohol by someone Saturday afternoon into the evening, and by the time of day alone, we can rule out her street walking to earn that money herself. She didnt have any money to get drunk....and yet she got stinking drunk. Just like Mary Kelly did.

Were either or both of these women liquored up by someone to get them to open up about some information they held?

Again, its interesting when wondering about that to consider an anagram of Kates combined aliases in her last 24 Hours....Mary Jane Kelly, _ 6 Dorset Street. Are these deaths somehow linked by the alcohol the women had before being killed??

Cheers

[Michael W Richards]

Too much common sense, MrB.

And on a thread where someone complained that 'serial killer' talk had no place on casebook.

Eddowes was a tiny little thing, but she went willingly into that dark corner with her killer. How was she planning to defend herself when he inevitably took out his sharp knife - as he would if she was right about him being the Whitechapel fiend? Offer him a cup of sweet tea?

Love,

Caz
X

Can you state unequivocally that Kate wasnt lured by the man into the square with a promise of something she wanted...or that the man wearing the sailors knotted scarf was the same man she intended to turn in?

Seems to me Kates drunk that afternoon was almost certainly sponsored, perhaps that "meeting" had something to do with that. Youre aware that the police speculated on the same pre-arranged meeting scenario.

Assuming is fine for discussion, but not so good if presented as fact. Assuming Kate, Liz and Mary were soliciting when they meet their killer(s) is valid as a topic for discussion, but when presented as the most probable or likely scenario to people who want the actual truth... not merely the truth as perceived by the individual poster..then it becomes misleading.

Serial killers I believe are by definition guilty of more than 3 murders, yes?... and since we cant even link 1 canonical death to 1 person, or prove that only 1 person was responsible for any of the deaths, I would agree with the philosophy that almost all discussion of serial killings on this site should be limited to General Discussion. Perhaps when we have linked 2 murders with one person we might speculate some more on that train of thought, but its unwarranted at this point when discussing who killed any of the five women dubbed the Canonical Group.

Cheers Caz

[Errata]

If you think this killer is ridiculously educated, cutting off the nose was the punishment for adultery in ancient middle eastern cultures, which is why they developed the first rhinoplasty.

Otherwise the two most literally disfiguring acts are the removal of the nose, and the removal of the lips. These cuts render people unidentifiable. A person with no nose and no lips could be anyone. I personally think that there was something about Eddowes that made the killer uncomfortable, and that's why he obliterated her face. Like, if she looked like his kindly sister or something, he wouldn't want THAT face to watch him rip her open.

[GUT]

I've always thought that the nose was simply a side effect of his "Frenzy".

[caz]

Friend or fiend?

Too much common sense, MrB.

And on a thread where someone complained that 'serial killer' talk had no place on casebook.

Eddowes was a tiny little thing, but she went willingly into that dark corner with her killer. How was she planning to defend herself when he inevitably took out his sharp knife - as he would if she was right about him being the Whitechapel fiend? Offer him a cup of sweet tea?

Love,

Caz
X

[MrBarnett]

Hi,

Surely if the killer had wanted to warn people against shopping him to the police the most obvious thing to have done would have been to remove the tongue.

I suppose nasal mutilation could be a way of saying ' Keep your nose out of it!'.

But if that was his intention, it would imply that Kate's suspicion was correct. So she knew he was the Ripper and he knew she knew. It would have been an act of suicide then to disappear into the darkest corner of Mitre Square with him.

MrB