Despite emerging as the single-largest party in the Maharashtra Assembly polls, the BJP is still a few paces away from forming the government, thanks to its ally, Shiv Sena, holding it to ransom on account of what appears to be a post-poll demand. Amid all the hullabaloo, statements emerging from the Shiv Sena also suggest that somewhere, it hopes to emerge as the ‘righteous’ one when things conclude. Watching this political conundrum unfold brings to mind moments from the recently released film Joker.
The Todd Phillips-directed standalone origin story of one of the greatest comic book villains of all times, Arthur Fleck aka ‘Joker’, paints a sombre picture of how a mentally disturbed individual transforms into the ‘clown prince of crime’. The anchorless Fleck has experienced emotional turmoil for most of his adult life, and unfortunately, ends up finding an outlet through violent acts. This disturbed man quickly becomes emblematic of what would free society of its troubles and transform the social order. In other words, a deranged individual is pitched as the hero we have been awaiting.
The way Shiv Sena made new demands in the wake of the election results—rotation of Chief Ministers from both the BJP and Shiv Sena—and at the same time maintained that it didn’t indulge in politics of power or the appointment of politicians and business scions as heads of sports bodies et al, offers some of the instances in the recent past where two contradicting thoughts emerge from the same source. While this is nothing wrong in holding opposing thoughts, F Scott Fitzgerald believed that it was a test of first-rate intelligence, and these are not with that intention. On the contrary, such posturing is done in the hope of presenting an unbiased stance and emerging as a ‘hero’ even if you lose.
Take a look around, you’d notice that heroes across various fields have been constantly hurled at the masses in the hope that they would make the millions see the light. Moreover, in an environment where mass media and think tanks have become synonymous with ‘collective consciousness’, an individual finds it utterly frustrating to do the right thing. Thanks to successful programming of the mind, many of us are willing to be fooled into thinking or responding in a certain way if that makes things easy.
As the narrative unfolds in Joker, we realise, or at least ought to, that ‘society’ places a high premium on doing the ‘right’ thing, and while you ponder what is right or not, you forget the bigger question —who defines the right and wrong? Philosophers have mused that there are two ways of getting things wrong, one where you believe what is false and the other where you refuse to believe what is true. Towards the end of Joker, Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix) smiles at what has unfolded, but the bigger joke was not that he is seen as a messiah. Instead, what makes him crack is that no one understands what they are following.
gautam@chintamani.org