Also in my experience most women are very cautious about being out alone at night anyway, so are probably taking suitable precautions already. And women are adults with the ability to reason, aren’t we? Can’t we just be given the facts about the situation and decide for ourselves how we want to modify our behaviour, if at all?
Most women are already over-cautious if anything - I’ve been amazed to find that most of my female friends are reluctant to walk to the local shop (down a busy, well-lit road) after dark, and are unhappy and frightened when they have to come home from work/college alone at 5pm in the winter. I just can’t imagine thinking like that.

Not to mention that (as far as I know) men are actually more likely to be the victims of stranger violence, but are rarely told that they should be afraid to go out alone. Perhaps men should be more cautious, and women should be a little more bold.
And it’s a bit of a feminist cliche, of course, but it’s true that women are more at risk from their male partners and friends than from strangers. So much more so that even this ‘blip’ in the statistics doesn’t change it. So staying home or being escorted everywhere by men is probably not making women any safer overall.

That’s not clear at all. I think it is more likely that he or she is targetting women, and it just so happens that prostitutes are the most vulnerable women to attack. Do you really imaging that this killer would not abduct and murder a woman out alone at night if he or she thought that th victim was a lawyer or a greengrocer?

I think the general argument is getting sucked into the bizarre. I mean, my argument is based on the suggestion that as 5 prostitutes have been killed so far, the guy is almost certainly targeting prostitutes. Yours seems to be based on the idea he’s attacking easy targets, and prostitutes are easy targets because they wander around at night on their own. I think there are probably other easy targets too (children, pensioners) yet all those attacked have been prostitutes. Also, from the news coverage I’ve seen at least one of the prostitutes hung around in a group for safety, which suggests this guy isn’t just lifting people from the street. But I don’t want to go too far down this route for obvious reasons - it’s completely speculative and not very nice.

And again, do you really think the police advice will have any effect, especially on the most at-risk group of people?

ps I’m cringeingly aware that both of us are men and posting the most on this, so I’m going to shut up now and just wait for Antonia to pitch in.

I don’t think Tim or JDC’s responses have adequately explained it and I’ve made clear why.

I’ve got a lot of faith in Antonia to be able to articulate it more clearly and have an open mind as to whether she’s got a point or not.

I’ve mainly been responding to other people’s less adequate (in my view) responses in the meantime since I originally asked the question, since Antonia, who works full time and is a councillor (and so has probably got better things to do) hasn’t come back to the issue yet.

The police were clearly giving sensible advice to the women of Ipswich, NOT casting aspersions on their lifestyles.

Anyway, I hadn’t heard the phrase “reclaim the night” used for some time but people in Ipswich and Cambridge (where I live, and where there have been a series of rather horrible attacks recently - although not murders) are now talking about doing just that.

There are actions they take which make them an easy target.

Taking similar actions (e.g. wandering about alone at night) could well make you an easy target.

It isn’t wise to do it when one knows such a killer is around.

So don’t. That’s why the police said it.

They aren’t saying “wandering around at night alone makes you a prostitute” or “wandering around alone at night makes you culpable” - they’re just saying “There’s someone who kills women - currently they’ve all been prostitutes but equally they’ve all been wandering around alone at night so that’s not something I’d do if I were you since there’s obviously a pattern here…”

The comparison that I think was drawn was that of people saying that women who dress scantily or provocatively are inciting rape.

There’s a very real difference.

One of these is saying that the intention to rape is in part created as a result of the woman’s actions. On the other nobody is saying any such thing - the intention to kill is clearly there already as this person has already done so several times.

To imply that a rapist isn’t entirely to blame because the intention was in part caused by the woman’s clothing is repugnant and simply untrue. To say that it is easier for a serial killer to carry out their intentions if you wander about alone is just a bald fact, unfortunate though it is.

Unless you’re saying that what people mean when they blame women who are raped for dressing a particular way what they mean is that it is *easier* to rape them there just really isn’t a comparison here. And I doubt that’s what you’re implying they mean.

should read “many of the prostitutes - the group this killer has attacked -”

Sorry! Edited after typing and didn’t finish the edit…

Is an important point. If someone was going round killing welders, I wouldn’t feel unsafe because the majority of welders share the same gender as me and I might be mistaken for one. I don’t want to say that the killer won’t expand his range of targets because I don’t know what goes on in the mind of someone that fucked up. But if he does expand the range of targets, who’s to say men aren’t just as much at risk as women?

Again, my suspicion is that the police warning will have no effect on behaviour at all, because people will make their own judgements about whether going out is a reasonable risk. And even if it had some effect on behaviour, I don’t think that change would be sufficient to stop the killings - especially since the many prostitutes attacked are likely to still be on the streets out of economic necessity or other forms of coercion.

So given my suspicion that the police warning will have no effect whatsoever (except to give the impression the police are doing something), it boils down to whether or not the warning gives the impression that women are responsible for getting attacked. I think it does, other posters clearly don’t.