The Censorship of Identity.
“What do you get, when you cross a mentally ill loner, with a society that abandons him and treats him like trash? I’ll tell you what you get — you get what you f***ing deserve! BANG!”
- Arthur Fleck, The Joker (2019)
Individuality is a powerful thing.
To be yourself in a world that constantly wants otherwise is a tremendous feat.
Fahrenheit 451 (1966) directed by François Truffaut, and The Joker (2019) directed by Todd Phillips explore two worlds wherein individuality is suppressed and censored in distinct ways.
The films emphasise how the suppression of personality and the human condition can create contrasting implications: settlement and chaos.
The clash between these polar consequences represents the fragility of individuality, and the powerful implications of censoring what makes someone, someone.
Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopian narrative that entails the government employing firemen to burn books; condemning novels for their ability to ‘make people unhappy’. Montag, a fireman, is infatuated by the state’s perception that condemning books makes people ‘alike[, as] the only way to be happy [in the eyes of the government] is for everyone to be made equal’. Clarisse, Montag’s neighbour, questions him about ‘why he [chose to be a fireman, claiming that his choices] don’t make any sense.’ As the film progresses, Montag starts reading books; finding a sense of identity, before he is reported by his partner for reading.
Truffaut exposes the state as pulling the strings of censorship upon their puppet that is society.
In Fahrenheit 451, people who read books are stripped of their liberty — as it isn’t just books that are burned by the state — but the individuality of readers.
Montag finds his true identity through immersing with the imaginative wonder of novels. Albeit, his individuality is censored and neglected through the government prohibiting the novels that give him meaning.
This neglect parallels that to other readers in Truffaut’s dystopia, such as the old lady who burns herself in her library.
‘I wish to die as I’ve lived’.
The final words of the old lady symbolise a death encapsulated by neglect and oppression.; She lived a life where her identity was constantly suppressed by censorship, and died as she was surrounded by firemen who wanted to burn what gave her meaning: books. In both aspects, she was neglected by the state, and her qualities as a human were censored.
The individuality of readers in Truffaut’s world is built through creativity and exploration through novels, and the film paints a picture of disenfranchisement.
A frightening image emanating the censorship of identity.
The Joker is unique in its take on censorship.
From a first glance — a maniacal neo-anarchist that fantasises death doesn’t exactly shine with sophistication.
Nevertheless, Phillips explores the story of Arthur Fleck — a poverty-stricken comedian with a mental illness of unconditional laughter. As the narrative envelops, Arthur recognises that society doesn’t ‘get it’ — ‘that the worst part about having a mental illness is people expect you to behave as if you don’t’. Throughout the film, we see Arthur getting ignored, abused, and beat up — as his identity and his emotions are disenfranchised.
Arthur is disenfranchised by a relentlessly uncompassionate society that isn’t ‘civil anymore’.
Arthur is a man who is struggling in life and needs help, and his social worker is an uncaring parallel to the world; personifying society’s neglect of Arthur’s individuality.
When Arthur’s mental health program is being cut, he expresses his frustration through voicing to his social worker that she ‘[doesn’t] listen’ and ‘wouldn’t get’ ‘what it’s like to ‘think [your] life was a tragedy’.
Arthur is failed to be recognised and understood by society, ensuing in the neglect, disenfranchisement, and censorship of who he is.
Truffaut and Phillips portray the outputs of the censorship of individuality in contrasting forms.
In Fahrenheit 451, Montag and Clarisse find closure from the state’s censorship of their identity through settling down in the outskirts of the city, where readers memorise, recite and personify novels.
Settlement is depicted as an output of censorship, indicative of a ‘happy ending’.
In this sense, Truffaut idealises hope: as the protagonists reach settlement despite a looming authoritative state that strangles individuality.
In the Joker, society’s repeated puncturing of his identity drives Arthur over the cliff of civility, as he is submerged by an ocean of chaos and nihilism.
When a wall street trio mock Arthur’s mental illness and beat him up, he kills them and runs home frantically, ashamed of what he did.
As the narrative unfolds, Arthur’s violent outbursts transition from self-defence, into revenge against those who ridiculed and humiliated him. Among others, Arthur kills Murray Franklin on his live show for censoring his identity; as the only reason he was ‘invited… on the show…[was so that Murray] could make fun of [him].’
At the point when Arthur asks Murray to ‘introduce [him] as Joker’ his identity is entirely consumed and bequeathed to madness, igniting anarchy throughout Gotham in the process.
Phillips explores the violent sea of chaos and anarchy cascaded from society’s censorship of Arthur’s identity through humiliation and neglect.
Arthur and Montag’s stories depict a tale of two worlds, painting the powerful implications of neglecting individuality, and the fragility of identity through the contrasting consequences of censorship: settlement and chaos.
We should accept and empower individuality, not disenfranchise it.
In today’s social environment, identity censorship is the most prominent shadow on intellectual freedom.
Whether it be the humiliation and neglect of LGBTQI rights, the centuries of disenfranchisement and systemic racism against African Americans, or media monopolies thwarting and consuming identity,
individuality is censored in our society.
While the dystopian censorship painted by the two films hyperbolise the consequences of censorship, they send a strong message — envisaging the future of what is to come if we continue to disenfranchise identity.
Earlier this year, the Vietnam government were exposed for teaching young people that being gay is a ‘disease’, stigmatising sexual orientation through discriminatory means. In Vietnam, a lot of pressure is put on students to be straight — as the government continues to bend the natural identity of children to fit their obscure norm; threatening homosexual individuals with violence, expulsion, or medical treatment.
What’s more, the United States of America is a global empire built upon the subjugation of the black body. An ethos of plunder and slavery has excluded and victimised African Americans for over 400 years. Even the time at when you’re reading this sentence, the USA resembles a modern Jim Crow, where systemic racism kicks those crumbled by poverty outside the confines of freedom. A world where institutionalised racism censors the identity of African Americans, restricting them access to bastions of opportunity like healthcare and education; disenfranchising their individuality, bending it to encapsulate a forced cycle of crime.
Parallel to Gotham in The Joker, 2020 saw the United States of America bleed with conflict. Riots, protests, outrage were the directly proportionate consequences of censorship, as more of the world came to understand the systemic disenfranchisement of black identity.
Individuality is censored, even in western democracies, as the government silently thaws away at the livelihoods of black people, creating an illusory sense of equality.
In Australia, my home country, the Murdoch Press controls 70% of our print media. They set the political agenda, such that if you want to know the news tomorrow, simply read The Australian today. Not only do they own 70% of print media, but their views that continually smear the Labor Party and Unions — institutions that have brought us free healthcare, advocated for free education, and got Australia out of the GFC untethered — are mimicked by most media corporations in the nation.
The constant pressure cooker that is Australia’s political-media atmosphere is an imminent threat to individuality — as Murdoch’s lust for power places pressure on Australians to conform to what the vast majority of the press says.
We live in a dystopia that consistently wants us to conform to expectations; censoring our identity quietly as corporations and governments usurp power from the minds of their followers.
We live in a dystopia; let that sink in.
Identity is a powerful thing.
The Joker (2019) and Fahrenheit 451 (1966) illustrate the suppression of personality. The two films encapsulate the contrasting implications of settlement and chaos, polar consequences that characterise the fragile nature of individuality.
Truffaut and Phillips envisage the future of what is to come if the world continues to disenfranchise identity.
That future is now.
