10 Most Disturbing Things The Joker Has Ever Done

5. Read Kant... And Found It Funny?!?

Joker chair Batman Endgame
DC Comics

Now this is just plain wrong.

This one-panel cameo from a 1987 Swamp Thing comic really tells us everything we need to know about the Joker. While a scientist is studying the inmates of Arkham Asylum, he views each of them in their cells through CCTV. The writers only had a single panel to show just how much of an uncaring, maniacal sociopath the Joker really is, so they portrayed him doing the unthinkable:

Reading Kant's Critique of Pure Reason... and laughing!?!

Wow. Just wow. Of course Joker is a fictional character, but the fact that anyone could find humour in the very tome that tore down empiricist and rationalist philosophy while laying the foundation for German idealism and the destructive potential of Marx and Nietzche's radical philosophy... The thought is almost chilling.

And as if that wasn't enough, this cameo makes it very clear that Joker thinks AIDS, a horrific plague that has ruined millions of lives, is "hilarious". Jerk alert!

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Jimmy Kavanagh is an Irish writer and co-founder of Club Valentine Comedy, a Dublin-based comedy collective. You can hear him talk to his favourite comedians about their favourite comics on his podcast, Comics Swapping Comics.