Batman, Elon Musk and the framing of San Francisco

Despite San Francisco’s relatively low crime rates, the city has become a major political target for conservatives. The city’s critics portray the city’s ills — including homelessness and drug addiction — as the natural consequence of California’s Democratic governance (ignoring the fact that Republican states have higher rates of both crime and drug addiction).

Recently, conservatives like Elon Musk have compared San Francisco to Gotham, arguing that San Francisco needs a Batman-like figure to fix its problems. In an op-ed for the San Francisco Chronicle, FrameLab co-author Gil Duran examined why wealthy reactionaries like Musk have latched on to the Caped Crusader as a symbol of a vigilante approach they see as necessary to address drug addiction, poverty and crime.

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(Click to read: “Batman Failed Gotham. He and the rest of the billionaires can’t fix San Francisco, either”)

Gil writes:

It’s easy to understand why these rich men fetishize Batman. The character is an alter ego for Bruce Wayne, a billionaire who uses his extreme wealth to subsidize a campaign of extrajudicial violence against alleged criminals. His privilege enables him to live outside the law. In the dystopia of Gotham, the richest man in town can act out his fantasy of becoming judge, jury and executioner.

But there’s a big problem with calling for a Batman-style approach to social problems.

First, Batman’s 85-year campaign against crime in the fictional dystopia of Gotham has failed to deliver results. Crime in Gotham only seems to get worse, despite Batman’s campaign of lawless brutality.

In addition:

Vigilante justice has a cruel, murderous and unheroic history. It manifests as lynch mobs and KKK knights rather than noble Caped Crusaders and Dark Knights. Its violence resembles the senseless murders of vulnerable Black men like Banko Brown and Jordan Neely more than Batman’s wham-bang-pow punchouts of the Joker and the Penguin.

Why it matters: We’ll be hearing a lot about San Francisco’s problems as we head into the 2024 election. By pushing vigilante comic book justice as a solution to addiction, crime and poverty, reactionary figures like Musk are revealing a dystopian vision for the future of the nation.

FrameLab is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.