“The hunt for Jack the Ripper – I remember it as well as I remember anything – I don't know if it was in my time or if it was just talked about. But the boys – horrible little brutes that they were – would say 'Look out, here comes Jack the Ripper' if we ever played in the street – and we would all run. Oh, we were real little cowards. They always imagined him with a large leather apron and a carving knife. (Mrs. Bartholomew, born 1892, Poplar, East London. Interviewed by Anna Davin in June 1973) Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Jack the Ripper was a murderer in the late 1880s. Below are the facts of the case, cited by Buzzfeed's Bergara. Over the course of ten weeks (31 August 1888 to 9 November 1888), five gruesome murders of prostitutes took place in London's East End. All of the murders, with one exception, occurred within a quarter of a mile of Whitechapel, a neighborhood in East London. All five were executed in busy areas, however there were no witnesses to the crimes. All the murders were committed at night, four of them outdoors. The motive for the crimes remains unknown and no clue as to the identity of the killer has ever been discovered. No suspect was ever investigated, despite hundreds of people being detained and questioned across London. The Ripper's identity was never revealed. In the Victorian era, social structure determined your place in the world. There were three main categories within the social structure: the upper class, the middle class and the working class. There were tensions between all three classes, however most of the tension manifested itself between the middle class and the working class. These tensions have led to a sharp rise in classism, which is, according to Merriam-Webster, prejudice or discrimination based on class. According to Haggard, the East End of London (where the working class lived and where the murders took place) was the “symbol of urban poverty”. Many people in the West End (where the middle class lived and worked) saw the East as a place where “the vilest practices are regarded with the most practical indifference… the filthy and abominable things from all parts of the country”. they seem to flow. Entire courts are full of thieves, prostitutes and released convicts.” This vision has been cemented in the minds of many people. Because of this view, many people were almost scared of the East End and, by proxy, the working class as well. Fear may be a primary factor in the prevalence and popularity of the Jack the Ripper case in the common era. According to Walkowitz in Jack the Ripper and The Myth of Male Violence, the “respectable classes” (the middle and upper classes) had a constant fear of social disintegration and class conflict, with most of their concerns concentrated in the East End , where most of the crimes, including the Ripper murders. The middle class feared that the East End would lead to social degeneration or the loss of a desirable society. This fear could have led to the people of the West End becoming more involved in the murders of the time, thus leading to the disclosure of the crime. Furthermore, according to Haggard, the Ripper murders condensed the West End's ambiguous fears of brutality, immorality, and destructiveness into a single entity. Many in the West End believed that the crimes were logical due to the conditions in the East End. The fear only intensified pre-existing social conditions between the classes. This could have led to greater press coverage and greater popularityof the case at that time. The fear of the West End led to a number of other factors leading to the cultural importance held by the Ripper cases. While fear may not be the primary factor in the case's popularity, it certainly contributed to the case's cultural significance. The Ripper murders were truly vile and gruesome. According to the FBI case report conducted in 1988, all victims were sexually assaulted, with their genitals and secondary sexual characteristics heavily mutilated, all subjects were killed quickly, with most of their throats slit from behind. The Ripper also removed organs from some of the victims, including a kidney, a vagina and a nose. The removal of these organs indicated that the Ripper had anatomical knowledge and surgical skills. Indeed, in the murder of Mary Jane Kelly (the last of the Ripper's known victims), her organs had not only been exposed, but many had been removed and placed around her, with her heart absent from the scene. Skin and muscle had also been removed from her right thigh. The skin from the costal arch (the lower edge of the rib cage) down to the public area had been removed in large flaps. The Ripper also typically placed his victims in sexually revealing poses. These crimes were nothing typical. But how did the details of the crimes make them a constant in the culture? Well, according to Keppel and colleagues, any murder similar to that committed by the Ripper is extremely rare. They ran an analysis through the Homicide Investigation Tracking System (HITS), a system of 3359 homicides. This study showed that there were only nine cases in the database where bodies had been explored or mutilated. Six of these murders involved women, only one was a prostitute. There were only two cases (both women, no prostitutes) who had an unusual body pose and had been mutilated or explored. There have been no cases of murders targeting prostitutes, exposing the bodies in unusual positions, with mutilations on any part of the body. The strangeness of this case could fascinate many people. The Ripper case is one you can't find anywhere else, and its details, while vile, make for an excellent story. While the details of the victim's death may be intriguing, there are still other factors that make the case so popular. The fear of middle-class social collapse and the gruesome details of the crimes make for great news. Even the journalists of the time realized this. The press was a primary factor in creating interest around the case. Jack the Ripper actually sent a series of letters to the police and various news agencies and these were published in newspapers in the hope that someone would be able to identify the handwriting. In fact those letters were signed “Jack the Ripper”. That's where the famous assassin got his name. According to Walkowitz, the press transformed the murders into a media event, exploiting the fear of the middle class, the details of the murder and the "fantasies" of the Ripper. The press knew how to follow a headline, and if we remember the cases, it's largely thanks to the press. According to Haggard, the publication of the letters increased the killer's fame and without the press the murders might never have been remembered. So, without the press, perhaps there would never have been a "Jack the Ripper" and the case would not have been as popular as it is today. Before the murders, the public held many medical examiners in high esteem. Doctors were the royalty of the middle class during that time. However, the situation changed significantly after the murders. The newspapers.