What is Love to the Joker?

I recently stumbled on a question on the DC page, and I was going to comment on it, then found myself doing what I usually do, writing way too much for a casual comment.  So rather than do that, I thought I’d address this here.

Question: Do you think the Joker is gay?

At first this is a very “left field” question because just about everyone, even the most causal DC fan knows who Harley Quinn is.  The Joker has to be straight because she’s the Joker’s girlfriend.

Or is she?  In the cartoon it’s all but explicitly stated that the Joker uses Harley as a means to an end, and even when she’s trying to make overt sexual advances on him he pretty much keeps her at a distance.  His relationship towards her goes from playful banter, to neglect, to outright physical abuse at one point nearly killing her.  There’s no indication that they have any kind of relationship beyond that.  He spends at least one episode discussing the “relationship” he and Batman have, but never once addresses his “relationship” with Harley.

Now the problem with trying to pigeon hole the Joker’s concept of sexuality is he doesn’t necessary play by the same psychological rules as you and I do.  Most conventions dictate that for a human to be psychologically sound they need to have a secured source of food, a safe place to take shelter, and a means to let off sexual frustration.  This last part is because there is a huge mess of chemicals that swim through the brain when someone climaxes sexually.  Even the worse of living arrangements are deemed acceptable due to this flood of momentary ecstasy.  But the Joker doesn’t play by those rules necessarily.

The Joker takes shelter in seemingly random locations, usually abandoned factories or carnival locations.  These are not secure or safe.  We don’t really know about his source of food, but he doesn’t strike me as the kind of character to frequent grocery stores or restaurants, especially with a fluctuating income, so he probably doesn’t care about having a secured source of food.  Given that the first two of the trifecta aren’t being met the same way we meet them, chances are he’s given the same kind of attention to the third.

It’s possible that the way the Joker’s brain is wired; these conventions are awkward and uncomfortable to him.  People with Asperger’s or high functioning autism don’t function the same way socially that other people do.

*For the record I am in no way saying the Joker has Asperger’s or autism, it’s just an example.

Physical intimacy for some people is just uncomfortable.  The Joker just appears to have a ramped up version of this where all social conventions are uncomfortable.

We do know one thing that the Joker is always going to return to though, Batman.  He wants Batman’s full attention.  He competes with other criminals and even the Robins to keep Batman’s focus.  So what is a fundamental part of any sexual relationship?  Attention.

We want attention from our partners.  We want to be their entire focus.  Many new fathers go through a period of intense resentment towards newborns because their wives spend so much time focusing their attention towards the baby that the dad goes unattended.  Is this resentment deliberate?  No, it’s entirely subconscious, but it also states what we want on a very basic level.  We want to be our partner’s focus.  That’s what the Joker wants.

So does that mean the Joker is gay?  Not necessarily.  He wants Batman’s attention and it’s likely during the beat-downs, the violence that occurs during apprehension, that the same chemicals that go off in our brains during orgasm go off in the Joker’s brain.  Notice that he always ramps up his crimes, getting bigger and bigger, with a higher and higher destructive toll or body count.  That way the violence will be equal or greater to what he received the last time.  In a sense, the Joker’s crimes are his version of foreplay.  However the real question is, would this be the same if Batman was “Batwoman?”

I theorize yes.  If Bruce had been born Beatrice Wayne and she grew up to be the first Batwoman and delivered the same level of violence towards the Joker, he would have the same response. 

To ask if the Joker is gay is the same as asking if his brain works the same way ours do.  Clearly it doesn’t.  The entire base for his psychology is way off.  Also it’s not like any superhero could replace Batman for him.  It starts with Batman, which is why if Batman were Batwoman, she’d have to be the first hero he faced off against in order to establish that same connection.

Does that mean, since Joker received sexual pleasure from violence, that’s how he sees Harley and when he abuses her that’s his way of having sex with her?  No.  Joker has a clear understanding that violence is violence.  He knows that if he throws Harley or any of his henchmen into oncoming traffic, he’s not having sex with them; he’s trying to kill them.  He doesn’t have sex with violence; he has sex with violence from Batman.  Further in books like “Arkahm Asylum: A Serious House on a Serious Earth” and “The Killing Joke”, he has a clear understand of sexuality, and its corrupted forms such as rape.  He uses jokes and attacks to get a rise of out Batman in these stories, again to illicit the violence he craves.

Well, this certainly has been a dark one.

Thanks for reading.