Because of the effects of Stockholm Syndrome during her time as a psychiatrist interviewing The Joker in Arkham Asylum, Harley Quinn finds herself in an abusive relationship with him. And while she does commit crimes with him, it’s to try to impress him. Calling him “Puddin’” reinforces that she does not want to lose him even though he made her like this. Because she is a woman she falls into the “woman committing violence” stereotypes.

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Harley herself may believe the stereotype, but it is unclear. Paula Ruth Gilbert in her paper “Discourse of Female Violence and Societal Gender Stereotypes” put forth several questions we will explore:

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Given a pervasive cultural belief in the virgin-whore duality, do most people believe that women cannot be violent or that they cannot be as violent as men? When a woman is violent, however, why are we so interested in and fascinated in her case, labeling her as either mad or bad? …What pushes a woman to violence and against whom? Who is responsible for the violence that women do?

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For Harley, most people in her universe believe her to be violent, sometimes even the same level of violence as her sweetheart, The Joker. She is a tragic character, but when Joker hurts her, it’s him asserting his control because violence is about control. In the case of labeling Harley as mad or bad, it’s a little bit of both, but for reasons that have not a lot to do with her and a lot more to do with the conditions of Stockholm Syndrome and gaslighting.

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Her Stockholm Syndrome is deeply ingrained; however, she still wants to feel empowered. When Joker does not allow that, she must rely on Poison Ivy to give her the empowerment she craves. Harley feeds off Joker’s love and praise, so when she does not get it or Joker hurts her, we see her feel like a failure in his eyes, though she is not in the eyes of Poison Ivy. Austin writes that “The idea of female empowerment, in any context, seems to frighten men, so when women attempt to wield positions of authority, they are frequently faced with oppression.” This explains why Batman also finds her dangerous.

 

She has good plans, even coming close to killing Batman in Mad Love. She lures Batman out and pretends that she has mended her ways, sending him a cry for help via police tape. In the tape, she removes her jester’s cap and thus disconnects herself from the Joker, but using her own methods to get what she wants. She almost succeeds in her plan because she struck out on her own to kill Batman, but did it under a motivation to please the Joker, who wants to be the one to kill Batman.