Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
pity
Museum billed as celebration of London women opens as Jack the Ripper exhibit
- Thread starter Belushi
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cesare
shady's dreams ♥
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
This has been referred to a few times. Is it actually sexism and misogyny on the part of the museum owner?
I can see that the guy's an arsehole for bullshitting the planning app, a charlatan for the way he has represented the museum itself, and obviously the crimes themselves were misogynistic, but him? He's just looking to rip off a few tourists isn't he? Your common or garden shyster.
Wouldn't that make any commercial enterprise related to JTR misogynistic/sexist; all the books, films, tours, etc,?
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
Oh, well I probably wouldn't be thinking of him as sexist if he hadn't used "the lives of East End women" to obtain planning permission for his commercial women-killer museum.
If he'd just asked for a Jack The Ripper museum I probably wouldn't be bothered too much.
andysays
Love and solidarity
I'm not sure if it's worth arguing the toss over whether he himself is misogynistic/sexist.
It strikes me that his actions as recounted here are actually worse than common-or-garden misogyny/sexism (of which the commercial exploitation of JTR is an example). What he appears to have done is to deliberately and cynically exploit his history as a "diversity officer" of some sort, along with the closure of the Fawcett Museum (apologies if I've got the title wrong, but I'm sure people know what I mean) and a promise that his museum would be some kind of replacement, in order to gain planning permission and/or goodwill for his money-making scheme.
He's a top level shit, whichever further adjectives we apply to him
MochaSoul
It's being enslaved of your own free will
One could apply to open a museum to highlight the trials and tribulations of black people in America and then dedicate it to lynching postcard photo art and/or humour. It's not like moments of "the lives of black people" wouldn't feature... at the point of death. Perhaps it wouldn't be racist.
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
Exactly.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
I don't get why he did that. Would he not have got planning for a JTR museum if he'd been straight about it?
It's fucking dishonest for sure, but if he'd put in planning for "the lives of East End Jews" and then opened a holocaust museum, he'd be a grade A cunt, but a racist?
Bakunin
I am Noodle's bitch.
It was only once and purely for the purposes of research.
Blimey, you turn a flamethrower on a busload of nuns, just the once, and for some reason people think you're a psycho.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
Ahhhhh. Yes ok.
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
He who has not torched a bus full of nuns cast the first stone that's what I always say.
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
If you can think of another term for cynically exploiting the deaths of women/people of colour/jewish people that were killed because they were women/people of colour/jewish (in other words, adding insult to injury) that isn't "sexist" or "racist", then run it by us yeah.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Because these cunts think they own the fucking world and can take the piss for a few giggles as and when they like.
Cid
Proper break this time
The equivalent might be a holocaust museum with a silhouette of a nazi above the door and the sign picked out in a nazi-era font. With a bloke standing outside in period dress offering holocaust tours. Probably selling toy nazis and books by David Irving.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
But that brings us back to the original point. All of the films and Ripper TV series have been produced for commercial gain but aren't considered sexist, or are they?
Bakunin
I am Noodle's bitch.
This is the extreme end of the true crime market, unfortunately. It's the kind of thing catering to people who might read Dennis Nilsen's memoirs as though they were reading Playboy and it's an area I stay well clear of. I could make more money doing the trash-for-cash end of the market, but as I'd have to look in the mirror afterwards I don't touch it and I'd prefer it wasn't there. Unfortunately, it is.
This is exactly the kind of thing that gives the true crime business a bad name, especially the dishonesty associated with the planning application. It's not as if Jack operated round Cable Street, anyway. I'm seeing people eyeing the cash they might make because, within true crime, Jack is probably the most infamous serial killer in history and they see that as a potential marketing tool.
This is exactly the kind of thing that gives the true crime business a bad name, especially the dishonesty associated with the planning application. It's not as if Jack operated round Cable Street, anyway. I'm seeing people eyeing the cash they might make because, within true crime, Jack is probably the most infamous serial killer in history and they see that as a potential marketing tool.
Rob Ray
Weight is meaningless
He would have drawn a bunch of complaints, which would have led to a longer and more public examination of the application. It's not just activists who'd have gotten stuck in either, residents are pretty sick of the constant crowds of gawkers shuffling round Whitechapel every night while top-hatted guides compete to shout the most lurid version of the murders on every street corner. Last five years has seen a huge uptick in the number of tours.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
There are Hitler museums and exhibitions in Berlin which are sold exactly that way.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
With stylised frontages and mugs andt-shirts with pics of camp guards dragging jews/commie/gays/roma to the ovens?
Those two examples are no way comparable - have look at the C4 news thing for what this actually is.
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
Are you saying that those films/productions have obtained licences or whatever pretending to be something that they're not?
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
And it's a serious museum with proper academic credentials and a program of ongoing education and critical research - not a tatty old shop with some photos bought off e-bay.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
Oh yes, I'm not for a second suggesting that it isn't tasteless, shite, and exploitative.
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
It's tasteless, shite and exploitative at the expense of women
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
No. But is that the difference between an enterprise being misogynistic or otherwise?
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
Misrepresentation doesn't necessarily equal misogynistic. But misrepresentation at the expense of women, does.
Spymaster
Plastic Paddy
So again, aren't the films and books etc., at the expense of women in the same way?
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