How Should the Victims Be Remembered?

[halomanuk]

Memorials are to signify feelings for tragedies,we don't even know who killed these women ? (especially Stride) so how can there be a memorial to something we don't know ?

In answer to how they should be remembered Alfred i would say as a historical study in the field of Ripperology,just the same as any other past unrecognised victims would be in any other 'true-crime study'..

[truebluedub]

In my opinion they should be remembered as being victims of a crime, who having through a mixture of social structures and their own choices/actions were at the bottom rung of society (being a neo-marxist I would prioritise structure over agency).
As for how they are remembered outside of ripper and true crime aficionado's I would say that if at all they are points on a tourist map. This of course means that they are commodified in death just as they were in life.

Chris Lowe

[John Bennett]

I can see Ally's argument.

When I think about it, a memorial to the victims of Jack the Ripper would be (by default) a memorial to him.in that they are recognised as being connected by his actions.

If you see what I mean?

[Jeff Leahy]

The question is not how they should be remembered, but why should they be remembered at all. Last year in the UK alone there were over a hundred and fifty homicides. Where is the memorial for these victims? Where is the concern with how those victims, victims who were living and breathing in our own lifetimes who had a chance to actually impact and interact with us, where is the concern for how they are remembered? Where is the push to have them remembered at all.

Five single lives out of the millions of lives that are destroyed globally in wars, genocide, and just basic homicide; what precisely is it about these women that is so special that out of all those other millions of lives lost, these women should be honored above all or especially remembered?

Those of us who study the case don't wish to be disrespectful of the fact that these women were murdered to provide us with our entertainment, and that tends to translate into a veneration of them that is beyond reason, but for the wider world at large, there is absolutely no reason why these women should be remembered.

Isnt there some proverb, that if you save one life you save the world?

I think it was in Slum Dog Millionaire?

Pirate

Besides there's a recession and it will help tourism...

[Nurse Sarah]

You all go on about the memorial in Spitalfields or where ever but isnt this the same as the graves I mentioned earlier?

Why should they get one and not the other poor buggers who are buried with them?

As to why they were special, well, thousands died horribly due to the social factors of the time, but not many will have had their throat cut and intestines thrown about...

[WARSPITE]

London is stuffed full of memorials to the various "great" and the "good". Why are they better than the average pauper.
A lot of good came out of the ripper victims deaths, both then in terms of drawing attention to the slums, and now.
London must make millions per year out of the ripper industry.
Thats why they are special.

[protohistorian]

London is stuffed full of memorials to the various "great" and the "good". Why are they better than the average pauper.
A lot of good came out of the ripper victims deaths, both then in terms of drawing attention to the slums, and now.
London must make millions per year out of the ripper industry.
Thats why they are special.

well lets see, millions saved by Jonas Salk and bumbkis from poor Victorian hookers. Seems less than equal to me. Respectfully Dave

[The Good Michael]

I agree with Pirate Jack. Not only should there be a memorial, but millions of dollars of advertising should be used to herald a grand opening. All the JTR writers should be on hand to hawk their books. I'll be right beside them with a cart selling Eddowes' Steak and Kidney pies. Pay an extra 5 pounds and I'll give you a Jack the Ripper replica knife to cut the pie with.

By all means, let's memorialize these pathetic women and life them high above the millions of nameless, pathetic victims throughout time, so that we can all capitalize on their deaths. There can be no other reason to do it.

Cheers,

Mike

[protohistorian]

Memorials are to signify feelings for tragedies,we don't even know who killed these women ? (especially Stride) so how can there be a memorial to something we don't know ?

In answer to how they should be remembered Alfred i would say as a historical study in the field of Ripperology,just the same as any other past unrecognised victims would be in any other 'true-crime study'..

I do not know how but there is a very tall chap in Rio who disagrees. Respectfully Dave

[Ally]

[QUOTE=WARSPITE;82186]

London is stuffed full of memorials to the various "great" and the "good". Why are they better than the average pauper.

Because, plain and simple, they actually are better. The tall poppy syndrome is about the most nauseating concept ever to come out of the socialist moronic mindset. Plainly put some people are better than others and we should venerate those of great achievement because ALL people should strive to be like them, and should not strive to be like a bunch of drunks whoring themselves to buy gin. Without people of actual achievement, the pathetic ne'er do well would be sitting in their lightless house, not being able to watch TV to numb their gin soaked brain or come on the internet to whine about how people who actually do things with their lives aren't any better than the wastes of space littering up the dole rolls.

A lot of good came out of the ripper victims deaths, both then in terms of drawing attention to the slums, and now.

Yes but the victims didn't have a damn thing to do with it. They made no choice, they took no action. Their role was completely passive. Dying isn't really a great achievement.

London must make millions per year out of the ripper industry.
Thats why they are special.

Ah I see. They make money for the Ripper industry and London that makes them special. Whores in life and whores in death. What a thing to be remembered for.

[Mascara & Paranoia]

They are remembered. As products of Jack the Ripper.

Not one person, unless you were looking up your family tree and happened to be related, would know any of the victims and bother to look them up otherwise. They'll never be perceived as people first, but victims of Jack the Ripper, and that's the only reason any of us have ever heard of them. Sad but true.

As to how they should be remembered, I don't know. Obviously not disrespectfully, but still, like others have said; they were no different to any other person living in that era apart from the way in which they died, and remembering that is only ever remembering their killer.

[truebluedub]

Because, plain and simple, they actually are better. The tall poppy syndrome is about the most nauseating concept ever to come out of the socialist moronic mindset. Plainly put some people are better than others and we should venerate those of great achievement because ALL people should strive to be like them, and should not strive to be like a bunch of drunks whoring themselves to buy gin. Without people of actual achievement, the pathetic ne'er do well would be sitting in their lightless house, not being able to watch TV to numb their gin soaked brain or come on the internet to whine about how people who actually do things with their lives aren't any better than the wastes of space littering up the dole rolls.

For those from countries where the term is unknown or not used in everyday discourse wikipedia tall poppy

Ally,

Ah I see. They make money for the Ripper industry and London that makes them special. Whores in life and whores in death. What a thing to be remembered for.

Yes that's obviously happening, or is it likely that these flowers were laid by descendants:

a set of recently taken on flickr

It's called dark tourism and is what happens when people make pilgrimages to sites of death, disaster or the macabre - anything from holocaust tourism to the London dungeons, it's a massive umbrella term with seven typologies under it.

Actually since it was suggested on page 2 this is fast becoming the consensus on how the victims are being remembered.
Chris Lowe

[halomanuk]

Memorials are to signify feelings for tragedies,we don't even know who killed these women ? (especially Stride) so how can there be a memorial to something we don't know ?

In answer to how they should be remembered Alfred i would say as a historical study in the field of Ripperology,just the same as any other past unrecognised victims would be in any other 'true-crime study'..

I do not know how but there is a very tall chap in Rio who disagrees. Respectfully Dave

Aaah but the statue in Rio is more of a homage or effigy of Christ than a 'memorial' n'est pas Dave ?

[Robert]

I suspect it's a question of numbers. If Jack had killed 30 or 40 then obviously he would have been even more famous than he is now, but the interest in the victims would be less. It's something to do with the saying that goes something like, "One death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic."

Even within the "canonical five" there are marked differences in levels of interest, with Kelly being the "face" of the victims (supported by Eddowes) and Stride, Chapman and Nichols being pushed into the shadows.

[perrymason]

If you speaking about the victims in a Canonical Group specifically, they should be remembered for being unwitting accomplices in gruesome, sensationalized stories.

If you talking about any LVP innocent victim of a savage killer who ruthlessly "ripped" their bodies and their lives from them....they should be remembered as mothers, daughters, sisters and girlfriends. With desperate lives, and little if any hope for changing that situation in their lifetimes. Women who struggled to survive so that they could struggle to survive another day. Like any kind of life was at least some kind of life. Im frankly surprised that suicide rates for these women werent through the roof.

Best regards all.