Towards the end of Joker, the title character stands atop a car, revelling in the midst of a crowd of protesters made up in his image. Now, almost inevitably, the character has become a symbol for real-life protestors too.
At its release, the film – which stars Joaquin Phoenix in a dark take on the Batman villain – prompted moral panic and a warning issued by the US Military. It was feared that it would inspire lone killers – particularly incels – but so far, Joker has proved more inspiring to mass protest movements across the world. Anti-government protesters in Beirut, Lebanon, Santiago, Chile, Catalonia and Hong Kong have been spotted amidst crowds sporting Joker face paint and masks.
The Joker is not the first pop culture icon to be appropriated by protesters. In the movements currently rippling across the world, the mask from Money Heist (a Spanish Netflix show about a group of criminals who make off with billions of government money) has been spotted, as well as the stylised Guy Fawkes mask from V for Vendetta, which came to symbolise the Occupy movement in 2011 and 2012. The iconic red cloaks and white bonnets of The Handmaid’s Tale have also been donned by movements focused on women’s rights as a symbol of gender-based oppression. But what are the factors that make some pop culture symbols get co-opted by protest movements?
Some of it comes down to the themes explored in the original work. Joker, for instance, embodies a – fairly blunt – representation of the failures of neoliberal capitalism, and its disastrous consequences.
In one scene, we see Arthur Fleck (the Joker) being told he will no longer be able to receive counselling or medication because the mental health service is being defunded by the government. “They don’t give a shit about people like you, Arthur. And they don’t give a shit about people like me either,” Fleck’s social worker and counsellor tells him. His unravelling mental health and its fatal consequences can be traced directly to him not receiving the care and support that might have been meted out in a more equitable society.
It’s these themes – and the attendant backlash against an uncaring ruling class – that seem to be resonating with protest movements across the world. In Chile, protesters are revolting against the right-wing government whose policies have pushed the cost of living out of reach for many of its poorer citizens; in Beirut, they are are demanding the removal of the entire ruling class, which is seen as corrupt and incompetent; in Catalonia, they object to draconian sentences doled out to leaders of the independence movement by the Spanish government, and in Hong Kong, they’re pushing back against increasing Chinese oversight.
It seems these protestors see parallels between the film’s themes and their own struggles. “Protests come after a period where people feel that they are excluded, they’re marginalised, they are actively silenced or ignored in different ways,” says Aidan McGarry, lecturer in international politics at the University of Loughborough with a specialism in the aesthetics of protest movements. “The cultural artefacts and iconography make them feel that they are part of something – it shows solidarity.”
In Joker, Fleck unwittingly becomes the figurehead of an anti-government protest movement, pointedly declaring himself “not political”. But it’s the film’s lack of commitment to a set of political beliefs that might have primed it for appropriation. “In some ways, it opens itself up to interpretation,” says Mattias Frey, professor of film and media at the University of Kent. “It’s almost like a blank screen where you can project your own preoccupations.”
When a pop culture symbol isn’t tethered to any particular political demands, it becomes fluid. Famously, the Occupy movement didn’t have any set demands, it was more about raising awareness about economic inequality and the risks of precarity. “The V for Vendetta mask is synonymous with the Occupy movement, but at any protest, anywhere in the world in the last ten years, somebody is selling these masks,” says McGarry.
All protest iconography is a form of shorthand – a way of quickly communicating what you’re all about. But it’s likely protesters aren’t entirely straight-faced in their co-opting of pop culture icons. “There’s definitely mocking elements there,” says Umut Korkut, professor of International Politics at the Glasgow School for Business and Society. But deploying a dash of humour in protest materials also has a more serious side. “If you humourise this thing, you show that there’s an absurdity to it,” says Korkut. “If you can depict the authorities’ political ideology as absurd, you’re taking away their claim to legitimacy.”
Humour can be a powerful tool in the protest arsenal. Korkut uses the example of the protests in Gezi Park, Istanbul in 2013, which attracted three million people. Instead of covering the protests, state-controlled media aired a penguin documentary. The next day, people came to the protest dressed as penguins, and the animal became one of the most recognisable symbols associated with the movement.
Aside from having the functional purpose of concealing the wearer’s identity, masks from films and television are visually striking and invite public and media attention. “It’s something that you would have seen in an entertainment framework, but that is now in a political framework, and hence the protest becomes entertaining,” says Korkut. In Joker, Money Heist and V for Vendetta, the public don the masks as part of mass protests, meaning it’s also a case of life imitating art.
Right now, these masks have appeared around the world in different protest movements – united only by the desire to challenge the ruling political class. “The thing with this iconography is that you don’t necessarily have to all speak the same language in order to understand what is being communicated,“ says McGarry. “When images of what is happening in Beirut are shared in Chile, for example, where there are also protests, they know exactly what is going on. There’s an element of resonance.”
It’s a way of displaying international solidarity. The penguin symbol from the Gezi Park protests showed up in protests happening around the same time in São Paulo, Brazil, despite being completely unrelated.
But symbols can have multiple meetings, and with Joker in particular, it’s impossible to ignore the title character’s violent behaviour in the movie, and the link to a mass shooting. In 2012 in Aurora, Colorado, a gunman killed 12 people and injured many more in a cinema screening while wearing a Joker mask. Despite evidence that the killer wasn’t inspired by the character and just happened to buy the mask in the cinema, the association lives on.
Some protesters in Hong Kong have distanced themselves from the use of the character. On the online protest site LIHKG, one commentator described the Joker as “the symbol of the resistance and the spiritual leader of the rebels.” However, posts such as these attract downvotes on the site, according to CNN. By contrast, a popular post reads: “I hope that everyone will stop using Joker to describe Hong Kong, as it will only bring negative results, no matter on the global publicity level or on the personal level.”
By donning the Joker mask, are protesters endorsing the character’s actions? “I think it’s actually for the symbolic value,” says Frey. “It becomes a symbol that’s divorced from the original meaning – they’ve kind of excised all the evil stuff, the crazy stuff, in some ways.”
“On some level, we identify with the Joker, in the sense that he’s someone who has a purpose,” Frey continues. “In this film, he’s given a reason – he’s bullied. I think if you asked the audience ‘do you sympathise with blowing up the world?’ they would probably say no, but some of the radical energy – this rage against the establishment – obviously does appeal to them.”
Was the Joker always destined to become a mascot for masses? “In some ways, it’s surprising,” says Frey, given the character’s previous incarnations. But the 2019 film was successful in moulding complexity into both the Joker, and the world that created him. “He’s a symbol of the oppressed, the downtrodden, the ignored, the abused,” says McGarry. “But the mask also carries a warning – basically, ignore me at your peril. I will strike back.”
