Entertainment
The Movie That Created Fiery But Mostly Peaceful Protests
screenwashed (adjective) — When something seen on a screen completely changes how someone thinks or feels, as if their old beliefs were erased and replaced by what they just saw.
By Joshua Tyler
| Published
In 2020, violent protests rocked the United States, devastating major cities. Since then, dozens more have appeared, so many that it almost seems normal.
But it isn’t normal.
Make a list of the most violent protests of the past 20 years, and you’ll find that the majority of them didn’t happen until after 2019. Before that, most protests, even the big ones like Occupy Wall Street or the Tea Party protests of the early 2000s, were just a lot of dudes walking around with signs until it got dark. There were exceptions, like the disastrous riots in Ferguson, Missouri, but those were noteworthy because they were unusual.
Now, violence, particularly from supposedly peaceful protesters themselves, is the norm. A daily occurrence in some cities, a regular seasonal event in others. What changed? In 2019, one movie took theaters by storm and manipulated its most ardent viewers to stop playing nice.
This is the story of how Joker screenwashed Americans into accepting violence as personal expression.
The Story Of Joker
Joker was billed as being about Batman’s arch-nemesis, but it has no true connection to the world of comic books. Instead, it’s a grim character study about Arthur Fleck, a mentally ill, socially invisible man slowly crushed by a city that doesn’t care whether he lives or dies. There are no superheroes, no grand conspiracies, and no redemption arc, just a sad, broken man discovering that the only time the world notices him is when he stops playing by its rules and embraces nihilism.
When Joker arrived in theaters, it was both controversial and a huge box office hit. No movie captured a bigger share of the cultural conversation in 2019 than it did, and theaters were packed with people looking for something edgy, different, and maybe even dangerous.
The Lone Observer
The debate over Joker often centered on whether it might inspire mass shootings or homicides. All of that discussion missed the true danger in the film.
Only one person saw the truth. It wasn’t mass murderers or an increase in individual homicides that we needed to worry about. A few months after Joker’s release, at the start of the George Floyd riots in 2020, master persuader Scott Adams made this observation:
“I’m willing to bet 90% of the protesters have seen Joker. It’s so powerful and well-made that it bounces around in your brain and burrows in, forming a dominant go-to pattern for your thinking.” – Scott Adams
Scott then asked, “Can one movie nudge a young person into violence and anarchy? A bad movie can’t. Even a good movie can’t do that. But Joker can. That movie is next-level, persuasion.”
Joker doesn’t merely depict unrest; it romanticizes it. It does it, using some very specific persuasion tricks.
Catharsis Through Violence
The film presents social collapse as catharsis. Arthur Fleck’s personal breakdown is fused to a citywide explosion of masked demonstrators who burn, riot, and kill. All while the camera treats it like liberation.
That’s what Catharsis is. The release of pent-up emotion through experience or expression leaves the mind clearer by safely discharging feelings that were previously contained or unresolved.
The need for catharsis exists in all of us. It’s an irresistible pull. That can be healthy, prompting reflection, relief, and clarity. But it can also distort judgment, causing people to chase emotional release for its own sake, overreact, or embrace narratives that justify anger, sadness, or guilt just to feel unburdened.
That’s what Joker taps into.
The violence isn’t framed as tragic or cautionary. It’s operatic. The mob becomes the chorus validating Arthur’s transformation. Gotham’s chaos isn’t shown as a failure of civilization, but as a necessary purge.
This matters because culture isn’t created through instruction; it’s learned by association.
Arthur Fleck is introduced as powerless, humiliated, and ignored. By anchoring the audience inside his suffering before any violence occurs, the film ensures viewers emotionally identify with him.
Joker’s Six Screenwashing Tricks
Joker screenwashes its audience by employing six distinct persuasion techniques.
Responsibility for violence is consistently shifted away from the character and onto abstract forces: “the system,” “the rich,” “society.” This trains viewers to see violence as an inevitable consequence, not a moral failure.
- Two, Aestheticization of Chaos
Riots are filmed beautifully. When violence is visually pleasing, the brain associates it with power and release rather than danger or shame.
- Three, Catharsis Substitution
The film substitutes violence for resolution. Destruction itself is the payoff, reinforcing the idea that “burning it down” is a valid emotional endpoint.
Arthur’s transformation is validated not by reasoned argument, but by mass approval. Viewers subconsciously absorb the same validation loop.
- Five, Thinking Past The Sale
The story strongly implies that violent societal collapse is unavoidable. When outcomes feel predetermined, audiences stop asking whether violence is right and start asking only when.
- Six, Meaning Injection Into Rage
Most importantly, the film gives rage a story. Raw anger becomes “truth.” Once anger is framed as insight rather than impulse, acting on it feels justified.
Before Joker, America had a culture in which only truly peaceful protest was acceptable. After Joker, the cultural zeitgeist became one in which violent protest wasn’t just acceptable, it was the only way to be heard.
In the movie, Joker had nothing to say; he just wanted to be heard. And now, being heard is all that matters, not whether or not you have anything worth saying.
The Case Against Joker’s Power Of Persuasion
Those without an understanding of persuasion say audiences are smart enough to separate fiction from reality and can’t be affected by what they see in screen. If culture can be changed by a single movie, then why didn’t the movie V for Vendetta have a similar effect?
A movie like V for Vendetta could never achieve the same effect because it frames violence as symbolic, ideological, and abstract, not emotionally personal. V is not an everyman the audience inhabits; he’s a mythic construct with clarity, planning, and moral certainty. His actions are presented as an allegory, not catharsis. The film creates distance through stylization, speeches, and overt political philosophy. This keeps viewers analyzing rather than identifying.
Joker is a totally unique piece of screenwashing because of the way it collapses that distance, rooting chaos in intimate humiliation and emotional grievance, making mass violent release feel personal, spontaneous, and psychologically relatable rather than theatrical or ideological.
Was Joker’s Impact Intentional?
I think it’s important to say here that it’s not clear if plunging America into endless violent riots was the intent of director Todd Phillips when he made Joker. Little is known about Phillips’ personal political views; he refuses to be categorized.
It’s possible Philips’s goal was something besides the one he achieved. Indeed, the movie’s sequel suggests he wasn’t entirely happy with the effect his first movie had on its viewers. Joker 2 attempts to undo much of what the first movie did, revealing Joker as a fraud and his followers equally so.
Of course, Joker wasn’t solely to blame for a cultural shift towards violence. COVID lockdowns created a powder keg, and irresponsible media coverage lit it. But would things have gone as badly as they did, and continue in that direction for years after, if Joker hadn’t been there, at that exact moment, to condition rioters in advance?
Watch one of the riot scenes from Joker. Then watch any Portland, Oregon protest and ask yourself if what you’re seeing is organic or just Joker cosplay.
Joker didn’t invent violent protest. But it did something arguably more influential: it made violent protest feel understandable, beautiful, and emotionally correct. Once culture grants moral permission, reality tends to follow, no manifesto required.
Congratulations, fiery but mostly peaceful protestors, you’ve been Screenwashed.
Entertainment
Moon phase today: What the Moon will look like on April 23
We’re almost at the First Quarter which means the Moon is almost half illuminated. Each night it gets a little brighter, and this will keep happening until the Full Moon when the reverse will then occur and each night it will appear less.
What is today’s Moon phase?
As of Thursday, April 23, the Moon phase is Waxing Crescent. Tonight, 41% of the moon will be lit up, according to NASA’s Daily Moon Guide.
If you’re looking at the Moon with just your naked eye, you should be able to catch a glimpse of the Mares Serenitatis, Tranquillitatis, and Fecunditatis. If you have binoculars, the Mare Nectaris and Endymion and Posidonius Craters should also come into view, appearing from halfway up the Moon to near the top. And, finally, with a telescope you’ll see all this plus the Apollo 11 and 17 landing spots, and the Rupes Altai.
When is the next Full Moon?
The next Full Moon is predicted to take place on May 1, the first of two in May.
What are Moon phases?
NASA says that the Moon completes a full orbit around Earth in about 29.5 days, during which it passes through eight stages. Although the same face of the Moon is always turned toward us, the portion illuminated by the Sun shifts as it travels along its path, producing the familiar cycle of full, half, and crescent shapes. These variations are referred to as lunar phases, and there are eight altogether:
New Moon – The Moon is between Earth and the sun, so the side we see is dark (in other words, it’s invisible to the eye).
Mashable Light Speed
Waxing Crescent – A small sliver of light appears on the right side (Northern Hemisphere).
First Quarter – Half of the Moon is lit on the right side. It looks like a half-Moon.
Waxing Gibbous – More than half is lit up, but it’s not quite full yet.
Full Moon – The whole face of the Moon is illuminated and fully visible.
Waning Gibbous – The Moon starts losing light on the right side. (Northern Hemisphere)
Third Quarter (or Last Quarter) – Another half-Moon, but now the left side is lit.
Waning Crescent – A thin sliver of light remains on the left side before going dark again.
Entertainment
Tinder responds to viral video about tricking facial scan
Earlier this month, journalist Christophe Haubursin published a YouTube video called “Something very weird is happening on Tinder.” In the video, which has over 1.5 million views as of this publication, Haubursin described a way to workaround to Tinder’s Face Check feature — the facial recognition that is now required for all U.S. users as of Oct. 2025.
What Haubursin and his interviewees discovered is a bunch of profiles that appeared normal, but the last photo on each profile was…off. It was usually a digitally-altered image of a different person in a weird scenario, like on a billboard or in a Victorian painting. And if someone matched with this person and asked about the image, they dodged the question. Instead, they asked to move the conversation to WhatsApp, where it became clear they were romance scammers.
But how did they evade Face Check? Haubursin found that Tinder and Hinge, both owned by Match Group, only need one photo for the facial recognition software. So these people may be the actual person in that odd image, and able to pass the face scan. Then, they could grift images of other people from the internet to use for the bulk of their profile.
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Tinder didn’t respond to Haubursin’s request for comment, but it did respond to Mashable’s.
“We’re aware of the concerns raised about our Photo Verification and Face Check features. In recent weeks, we’ve taken action to strengthen our Photo Verification badging logic, including requiring greater consistency across profile photos and additional reviews to achieve higher confidence in cases that warrant extra scrutiny,” a Tinder spokesperson told Mashable. “Face Check, our more recently launched verification system, builds on Photo Verification to help confirm accounts belong to real users. We are committed to continuously improving and investing in our systems to keep Tinder safe and authentic for our users.”
Mashable Trend Report
Mashable also recently spoke with Hinge’s Chief Product and Technology Officer, Ben Celebicic, about this, as Haubursin also replicated this on Hinge (which began implementing Face Check after Tinder). Celebicic hasn’t seen Haubursin’s video, but he did say that there’s a constant battle between trust and safety teams and policy-violating actors.
“They’ll find new ways,” he said. “We’ll find ways to prevent them from accessing the platform.”
There’s not going to be a single product the team builds that will fully prevent people from bypassing our solution, Celebicic continued. He said they have a big team working on these issues, and they’re in tune with new ways bad actors try to penetrate the platform and work to fix them.
Around one-third of Hinge’s workforce is dedicated to trust and safety, the app told Mashable, and Match Group invests $125 million annually in this area.
Trust and safety is a major concern for dating apps. In Sept. 2025, two senators sent a letter to Match Group CEO Spencer Rascoff, urging him to do something about romance scammers on the platforms. In Dec., a class-action lawsuit against Match Group claimed that a serial rapist was allowed on Tinder and Hinge after several women reported him.
Facial recognition scans have boomed recently thanks to the influx of age-verification laws, which require a robust method of proving someone’s age in order to access certain content, usually explicit content. These methods include uploading a government ID to a platform, using a credit card, or in other cases, scanning your face. But, like with Face Check, people have found workarounds to evade the scan and see the content they want to see.
Entertainment
The Unhinged, Raunchy 80s Robot Sci-Fi Almost No One Saw
By Robert Scucci
| Updated
When I fired up 1987’s Robot Holocaust on Tubi, I was expecting a Mad Max-style scenario with a bunch of clankers running amok and wiping out humanity. Instead, I got a weird, loincloth-laden odyssey where the most expensive special effects are red lights, and the villain is basically a giant, walking, talking Dr. Zoidberg from Futurama. I know I’m being anachronistic by comparing a 1987 film to a character that didn’t exist until 1999, but that’s the comparison I’m making, and I’m sticking with it.
Let me have this, because the other reality I have to live with is that this movie is pretty rough. There are barely any robots, and what transpires hardly qualifies as a holocaust. The male-to-female buttcheek ratio sits at a clean 50:50, and the nudity isn’t even the good kind. Everybody’s wandering around in punishing heat all day, so you just know the smell is so bad you can almost taste it.
It’s Listed As A Sci-Fi But It’s More Of A Fantasy Quest
The best way to describe Robot Holocaust is an ill-fated cross between Mad Max and the original Star Wars trilogy. You’ve got a ragtag group of city-dwelling slaves living under the thumb of the Dark One, with his laws enforced by Torque (Rick Gianasi), the robot who looks like Zoidberg.
These wasteland slaves are trying to overthrow the Dark One, and their plan mostly involves a lot of unsexy walking as they run into enemies, obstacles, and, occasionally, robots.
Leading the charge is Neo (Norris Culf), a New Terra drifter accompanied by his C-3PO-esque companion, Klyton (Joel Van Ornsteiner). Along the way, he links up with Deeja (Nadine Hart), Nyla (Jennnifer Delora), Bray (George Gray), and Kai (Andrew Horwath), all of whom are fed up with the Dark One’s evil machinations and willing to trudge half-naked through asphalt and overgrown wasteland to do something about it.
Alliances and wills are tested, but the goal stays the same. Our heroes, and there are too many of them to really invest in, especially given their almost aggressive lack of charisma, need to find the Power Station where the Dark One resides and wipe out him and his goons once and for all.
Amateur Hour, But Not Without Its Charm
While Robot Holocaust mostly plays like a college film project with no budget, I can appreciate what writer-director Tim Kincaid was going for with limited resources. Most of the exterior shots look like people wandering around the outskirts of NYC, and most of the interior scenes feel like they were filmed inside a Spirit Halloween. A lot of my enjoyment came from the production notes I made up in my head, like, “Places, everybody! This fog and these fake spiderwebs set us back $25, making it the most expensive scene we’re shooting!”
That said, I’ve got to give the cast credit for committing to the vision, even if they’re reaching pretty far to get there. The robot costumes actually look decent from a distance, but the illusion falls apart in the close-ups, which we get way too often.
At the end of the day, Robot Holocaust is perfect home-viewing material. It’s only 79 minutes long and packed with a healthy dose of camp. It doesn’t make much sense, and when the primary antagonist is finally revealed, it’s basically just a guy dressed like an egg. For that reason alone, it’s worth a watch because it’s just so random.
As of this writing, you can stream Robot Holocaust for free on Tubi.
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