BTW: your case on "this" is not JS, it's the the DOM interface (not part of the language). From the point of view of the DOM it's probably right: The element applies itself to a callback function (the event-handler), which is triggered by the DOM interaction. The right question is: Who is the callee?

The JS built-in solution to this problem is "Object.handleEvent". (Since anything is an object, this is a general approach.) Anyway, there is no need to overwrite one of the few predefined variables to store a reference to anything, may it be to "this" or any other.