MONKEY WRENCH

The Batman franchise has never been my cup of tea, but like most things, even if I don't care too much for them, I can find a nugget or two of gold in the proverbial bucket of gravel. In the fairly recent Dark Knight, Alfred Pennywise and Bruce Wayne have this priceless little exchange while discussing the psyche of The Joker:

Alfred Pennyworth: A long time ago, I was in Burma, my friends and I were working for the local government. They were trying to buy the loyalty of tribal leaders by bribing them with precious stones. But their caravans were being raided in a forest north of Rangoon by a bandit. So we went looking for the stones. But in six months, we never found anyone who traded with him. One day I saw a child playing with a ruby the size of a tangerine. The bandit had been throwing them away.
Bruce Wayne: Then why steal them?
Alfred Pennyworth: Because he thought it was good sport. Because some men aren't looking for anything logical, like money. They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.

He's right, of course. Some men want to destroy for the pure sake of destruction. There is nothing to gain, no angle to play, no bridge to conquer. Some folks just like to see everything turn to shit. It is a powerful and anarchic impulse that I don't believe many people have. Those few that do possess it, however, do so with a vengeance. I believe most addicts fit under this category, and probably most serial killers. It is an urge to experience the most aggressive of sensory overloads, and to do so (hopefully, at least) at the expense of something or someone that took care and time to construct. A lot of these types probably don't know this about themselves, and might not want to admit it even if they did. But the truth is, there is something invigorating about watching everything that is supposed to be neat and tidy and orderly become transformed and dominated by the twin gods of chaos and limitless pleasure.

Trent Reznor understood this phenomenon perfectly when writing Mr. Self-Destruct, the opening track on the brilliant Downward Spiral album:

I am the voice inside your head
and I control you
I am the lover in your bed
and I control you
I am the sex that you provide
and I control you
I am the hate you try to hide
and I control you...

...I am the needle in your vein
and I control you
I am the high you can't sustain
and I control you
I am the pusher I'm a whore
and I control you
I am the need you have for more
and I control you
I am the bullet in the gun
and I control you
I am the truth from which you run
and I control you
I am the silencing machine
and I control you
I am the end of all your dreams

Yep, Trent knew of which he wrote. Of course, most people with these tendencies are doomed to die an early death or enjoy the lush accommodations and increased rectal cavity size offered by certain state facilities. As a society, we try to medicate problems like this, and naturally, all that accomplishes is a temporary respite; it is "hidden" in much the same way that Ignorance and Want remain hidden behind the third spirit's cloak in A Christmas Carol.

The only way out of it, I think, is to find some way to control the demon, some way to keep it at bay while still acknowledging and respecting it. Why the fuck would you want to get rid of something that's that much fun, anyway? No, I think the only way out of this pickle is to find some way to achieve what our pussified culture refers to as "balance." How does one make this happen? Don't ask me; if I knew, I would have been able to do so by now. Feisty Icelandic pixie Bjork seemed to have been on to something when she wrote what have to be my favorite lyrics of all time:

we live on a mountain
right at the top
there's a beautiful view
from the top of the mountain
every morning i walk towards the edge
and throw little things off
like:
car-parts, bottles and cutlery
or whatever i find lying around

it's become a habit
a way
to start the day

i go through this
before you wake up
so i can feel happier
to be safe up here with you

it's real early morning
no-one is awake
i'm back at my cliff
still throwing things off
i listen to the sounds they make
on their way down
i follow with my eyes 'til they crash
imagine what my body would sound like
slamming against those rocks

and when it lands
will my eyes
be closed or open?

The image of little Bjork tossing shit off of a cliff early in the morning before her long-suffering, mentally stable, delightfully boring lover even wakes up is a vision of pure joy. She is "wild at heart and weird on top" as Lula would say, and has finally found a way to control the animal within her. She knows that suppression is not the answer, but she also knows that the beast has to be at least placed into some sort of metaphysical grotto if she is to have anything resembling a happy life. Her simian impulses are vomited on to the world below just before sunrise, so she can let the animal out for a bit and then return to the arms of whatshisname, where she can be "safe up here with you."

If you haven't heard this song, give it a listen. Bjork's not your thing, you say? Well then, it's your lucky day, asThe Twilight Singers recorded a beautiful cover of this song on their album of covers, She Loves You.

What Bjork doesn't tell us is how genuinely elusive this cliff is. Some of us search for the fucking thing our entire lives. In the meantime, the need to throw the proverbial monkey wrench into our own lives will continue to torment that fortunate sub-species of human being.