>>91408218You forgot the third one, which was so popular Alex Ross did a short story "debunking" it.
Basically Joker is not insane, but basically was a super-bored, super-smart sadist mob boss. After killing and scheming his way to the top of Gotham's underworld, he realized he could no longer engage in the sort of petty murders and crimes that amused him so much.
The Red Hood ID was created explicitly so he could kill and maim for fun until his encounter with Batman got him thrown into a chemical vat and disfigured him.
In retaliation, Joker came up with the whole "insanity" gimmick. Basically since Batman disfigured him, Joker would torment Batman by constantly getting found insane in court, so he would never face the consequences for his actions. The lawyers who argue for his insanity defense, are the same army of lawyers he used as a mob boss.
The "debunking" came with the reveal that the report revealing this about Joker, was written by Harley Quinn prior to Joker seducing her. Meaning Joker lied about it as part of his seduction of Harley or Harley wrote it and filed it away in Arkham's records in order to mess with Batman's head over how Joker kept bullshitting him for YEARS.
As for Spectre; it should be noted that it wasn't Spectre himself that said that Joker should not be held responsible for his crimes but Hal Jordan as Spectre and even then, only after Martian Manhunter told him Joker is not to blame.
When Hal first became the Spectre, he started ranting about wanting to punish EVERYONE who did evil regardless of the mess that would make. So MM forced Hal into Joker's head without telling him who it was and they met non-insane Joker, who was the sad and pathetic comic that was seen in The Killing Joke. It was stated that Joker's true sane self is buried so deep into Joker's head that it was like he was buried alive in an underground cell. When Hal realized that he had been talking to Joker, he backed down.
