3 Things About Joker

1. In the film, Gotham was experiencing a strike by sanitation workers. This actually happened in New York City in 1968 when 7000 sanitation workers went on strike after the Mayor thumbed his nose to their demands for better pay. In just a couple of days, New York City was already drowned in garbage. The stench became unbearable and rats could be seen even in the more posh parts of the place. The city then declared a State of Emergency!

The Mayor still held out, but a few days later, with 100,000 tons of trash now uncollected, the sanitation workers finally won. That changed the collective attitude towards garbage men. These people are actually doing an important job. Today, sanitation workers can earn up to USD70,000 annually (with all perks and overtime thrown in). “They keep the city running”, it is said.

Now, think about those days during public holidays, especially when 2 or more holidays coincide with each other and rubbish goes uncollected at YOUR housing area. Is it a pleasant feeling? Yes, it’s a dirty job, but a very important one.

Unfortunately, even after a very serious lesson learnt in NYC, the world is still stuck in a system that rewards bullshit jobs over the ones rendering critical services. (To know more about bullshit jobs, google it). Why are teachers and nurses still low on the pay scale, when agents of capitalism who merely manipulate money and don’t really create anything, get rewarded handsomely? 

What’s stopping us from just saying, from this day on, teachers, nurses, the army etc, will be paid more than these greedy bozos? Because they don’t have degrees and MBAs? Really? That’s more important than teaching our kids to be good, knowledgeable human beings and saving our lives? 

2. Extreme self-bias, lack of empathy and plain ‘ol ignorance will literally kill society. Self-bias in a sense that all I care about is my own perspectives and beliefs, and that’s the end of it. Stuff like mental illness means nothing to you and it’s not really your problem. 

There is no need to find out more about this mumbo jumbo cos really, people should just toughen up and not bother society with it. And of course, it goes just beyond that. What do we really know about the people who live across the street? Are we the ones oppressed or the ones doing the oppressing? 

The badge of self-entitlement comes from this severe lack of perspective, driven by nothing but dogma. I’ll have 10 of these, you can have 2. I don’t really care if you need 5. It’s all about me, really. 

3. Capitalism can’t solve problems that capitalism itself created.