Camille: In this October 2018 interview you said that you had "donated" your entire divorce settlement to charity. Right? Amber: That's correct. Camille: In fact your exact words were "7 million in total was donated.. I split it between the ACLU and The Children's Hospital of Los Angeles." Right?
Oops: while wind-bagging, I failed to get around to a point connected to Peter's original post: namely, about credibility. Credibility is a key element in this trial. Credibility is also somewhat inherently in question given that both parties are performers. But if Heard insists that "pledged" and "donated" are interchangeable terminology (even though one term reflects a promise and the other term requires the promise actually to have been kept), then it seems entirely likely that "alleged" and "actually happened" may also be interchangeable to her. In this trial, the difference between "alleged" and "actually happened" is huge.
Perhaps Peter and I don't have a disagreement here after all. Pity.
[Amy here. Peter and I have agreed about too much of late that it's almost a relief to have a subject we can really argue about.]
Ho hum.
I don't follow celebrity trials. Prior to the defamation lawsuit and counter-suit, I had never, er, heard of Amber Heard. I knew who Johnny Depp was, of course--he was one of the notable 1980s and 1990s actors who helped represent Generation X to itself, for better or for worse--but have to admit I've never been a fan of his films. By the 2000s, when he began doing escapist fantasy--playing a swashbuckling pirate, Peter Pan, Willy Wonka, etc.--he started to seem self-caricaturing to me and, frankly, a bit washed up. Apparently these films have grossed millions, though, which tells you how little I am tuned into the Zeitgeist.
I'm not entirely sure why the civil trial has elicited so much public interest. Perhaps it's because people are bored with Covid. Perhaps it's because they don't want to pay too much attention to the atrocities occurring daily in Ukraine, or the literal horrors of the nearly daily mass shootings happening in the US. Perhaps it's sheer voyeurism and empty spectacle.
Perhaps it's a misplaced sense of (in)justice, and a projection of people's experiences of having been wronged or abused, or of having not been heard, or of having been falsely accused.
Bingo. I think it's last set of issues. And what a telling set of issues it is.
Plenty of people--mainly on the right--have tried to make the trial into part of a men's rights crusade. Teh Menz, they insist, are the real victims here: victims of a feminist Vagenda of Manocide. Plenty of other people--mainly on the left--have tried to make the trial a reprisal of the 'Me Too' movement.
The problem is that the case and its circumstances and context don't fit either narrative all that well. But we exist in a post-truth world, one in which reality is quickly bludgeoned into the shape of a given set of ideological positions or, if it cannot be forced to fit, jettisoned entirely.
Hence the insistence, by men's rights activists and their fellow-travellers, that Depp is a symbol of the all the ways men are brought down by the women in their lives--even though men are overwhelmingly the perpetrators of violence (against everybody and everything) and women and girls overwhelmingly their victims, and even though, in the US, women's sovereignty over their own bodies is under dire threat.
Even if one is warmly inclined toward the fantasy that men, as a category, are the victims of women, Depp is a problematic symbol of the alleged victimhood of men. In large part this is because, despite his tremendous wealth and power, he has a decades-long history of self-destructive behaviour, including addictions and outbursts that long predate his acquaintanceship with Heard. In short, for a very long time Depp has been a victim primarily of his addictions, not of other people. It does not help that Depp lost a previous civil case against a UK-based media group, in which the court found Heard's allegations of abuse (as reported in the press and hence the subject of the litigation) to meet the civil standard (i.e., more likely than not on the balance of probabilities--albeit a lower standard than the criminal test of "beyond a reasonable doubt;" it is notable that no criminal charges ever appear to have been laid or entertained), and denied Depp's subsequent appeal. Different country; somewhat different common-law system; different defamation laws--but hard to dismiss in the court of public opinion.
Did Depp abuse Heard? I don't know. It does seem plausible, however, that someone frequently drunk or high, and prone to outbursts, might at the very least be verbally abusive to a partner. There was quite a lot of wreckage in their marriage (including, it seems, a temporarily missing finger, and an episode in which someone shit in someone else's bed), much of it substantial enough to be entered into evidence, and it seems plausible that some of it might have been physical. But who was doing the hitting? This question is far less clear--despite being highly pertinent both to the case and to public opinion about it.
As for Heard, how well does she suit the role as martyr of the 'Me too' movement? Not well at all, it turns out. In 2009, as widely reported, Heard was arrested (and, briefly, charged) with assault against her then-partner. The charges were subsequently dropped (reportedly because the parties were both from out of state and the alleged assault a misdemeanor) and the former partner has since said that the entire episode was a misunderstanding blown out of proportion. Heard also, reportedly, has a history of volatile behaviour and outbursts not so unlike Depp's; she has also reportedly been diagnosed with two personality disorders associated (not causally, however) with patterns of domestic abuse.
Defenders have described Heard as an "imperfect victim" and challenged (not unreasonable) suggestions that what occurred in the Heard-Depp marriage was, as many commentators have suggested, "mutual abuse." They have, correctly I think, challenged the stigmatizing of Heard's mental illness as an example of "crazy ex" rhetoric often weaponized unreasonably against women.
But here's the thing that matters to me: did Heard abuse Depp, physically or otherwise? About this there doesn't seem to be a great deal of doubt--and in this trial, unlike the 2018-2020 UK case, it has been allowed into evidence. Video and audio recordings of Heard verbally abusing Depp (and admitting physical abuse) seem to not only to exist but to exist in some quantity. [I have questions about why so many recordings exist--Peter and I have been married, and arguing, for nearly twenty years, and I don't think there is taped evidence of a single conversation between us, let alone an argument.] In these recordings, many apparently made by Heard herself, Heard does not strike me as a victim "finally" fighting back but rather as a pure aggressor. To me, as a very distant observer and not (thankfully) remotely eligible to serve on the jury, it seems theirs was a mutually destructive, deeply dysfunctional relationship. I don't know that Depp ever assaulted Heard (it seems clear he assailed her verbally), but it seems fairly clear that Heard assaulted Depp (and definitely assailed him verbally). Me, I would throw out both the suit and countersuit and make no cost award.
How does a jury interpret all this? I have no idea. I also have no idea how an outcome--whatever outcome it might be--will not lead to subsequent appeals and retrials that could go on for years, illuminating little of substance in terms of the public interest.
One thing that does seem very clear to me, however, is that it is laughably wrong for MRAs to claim Depp as a paragon of male victimhood, and a rather egregious error for feminists to "believe Heard" in the name of the #metoo movement.
I agree, absolutely, that there are real if "imperfect" victims of domestic abuse. [I have issues with the idea that a victim must be "perfect"--i.e., non-compliant even unto death; reporting the allegations immediately, even to police prone to labeling assault accusations as "unsubstantiated" even in the face of substantial evidence; having no further contact with the abuser, even if the abuser is a spouse or co-parent or wields economic control over the victim; etc.--but will leave this aside for the moment]. I just don't think Heard qualifies as one--and I think 'siding' with Heard does real damage to the urgent legitimacy of advocating for women victims of assault and abuse.
Ultimately, it seems to me that the voracious public interest in the Depp-Heard trial (about which I have had to do quite a lot of unwanted research in writing this comment, thus undoing my deliberate choice to not follow the trial) is misplaced. It certainly doesn't serve Teh Menz. And it doesn't serve the #metoo movement, or women victims of assault and abuse--either.
Oops: while wind-bagging, I failed to get around to a point connected to Peter's original post: namely, about credibility. Credibility is a key element in this trial. Credibility is also somewhat inherently in question given that both parties are performers. But if Heard insists that "pledged" and "donated" are interchangeable terminology (even though one term reflects a promise and the other term requires the promise actually to have been kept), then it seems entirely likely that "alleged" and "actually happened" may also be interchangeable to her. In this trial, the difference between "alleged" and "actually happened" is huge.
Perhaps Peter and I don't have a disagreement here after all. Pity.
[Amy here. Peter and I have agreed about too much of late that it's almost a relief to have a subject we can really argue about.]
Ho hum.
I don't follow celebrity trials. Prior to the defamation lawsuit and counter-suit, I had never, er, heard of Amber Heard. I knew who Johnny Depp was, of course--he was one of the notable 1980s and 1990s actors who helped represent Generation X to itself, for better or for worse--but have to admit I've never been a fan of his films. By the 2000s, when he began doing escapist fantasy--playing a swashbuckling pirate, Peter Pan, Willy Wonka, etc.--he started to seem self-caricaturing to me and, frankly, a bit washed up. Apparently these films have grossed millions, though, which tells you how little I am tuned into the Zeitgeist.
I'm not entirely sure why the civil trial has elicited so much public interest. Perhaps it's because people are bored with Covid. Perhaps it's because they don't want to pay too much attention to the atrocities occurring daily in Ukraine, or the literal horrors of the nearly daily mass shootings happening in the US. Perhaps it's sheer voyeurism and empty spectacle.
Perhaps it's a misplaced sense of (in)justice, and a projection of people's experiences of having been wronged or abused, or of having not been heard, or of having been falsely accused.
Bingo. I think it's last set of issues. And what a telling set of issues it is.
Plenty of people--mainly on the right--have tried to make the trial into part of a men's rights crusade. Teh Menz, they insist, are the real victims here: victims of a feminist Vagenda of Manocide. Plenty of other people--mainly on the left--have tried to make the trial a reprisal of the 'Me Too' movement.
The problem is that the case and its circumstances and context don't fit either narrative all that well. But we exist in a post-truth world, one in which reality is quickly bludgeoned into the shape of a given set of ideological positions or, if it cannot be forced to fit, jettisoned entirely.
Hence the insistence, by men's rights activists and their fellow-travellers, that Depp is a symbol of the all the ways men are brought down by the women in their lives--even though men are overwhelmingly the perpetrators of violence (against everybody and everything) and women and girls overwhelmingly their victims, and even though, in the US, women's sovereignty over their own bodies is under dire threat.
Even if one is warmly inclined toward the fantasy that men, as a category, are the victims of women, Depp is a problematic symbol of the alleged victimhood of men. In large part this is because, despite his tremendous wealth and power, he has a decades-long history of self-destructive behaviour, including addictions and outbursts that long predate his acquaintanceship with Heard. In short, for a very long time Depp has been a victim primarily of his addictions, not of other people. It does not help that Depp lost a previous civil case against a UK-based media group, in which the court found Heard's allegations of abuse (as reported in the press and hence the subject of the litigation) to meet the civil standard (i.e., more likely than not on the balance of probabilities--albeit a lower standard than the criminal test of "beyond a reasonable doubt;" it is notable that no criminal charges ever appear to have been laid or entertained), and denied Depp's subsequent appeal. Different country; somewhat different common-law system; different defamation laws--but hard to dismiss in the court of public opinion.
Did Depp abuse Heard? I don't know. It does seem plausible, however, that someone frequently drunk or high, and prone to outbursts, might at the very least be verbally abusive to a partner. There was quite a lot of wreckage in their marriage (including, it seems, a temporarily missing finger, and an episode in which someone shit in someone else's bed), much of it substantial enough to be entered into evidence, and it seems plausible that some of it might have been physical. But who was doing the hitting? This question is far less clear--despite being highly pertinent both to the case and to public opinion about it.
As for Heard, how well does she suit the role as martyr of the 'Me too' movement? Not well at all, it turns out. In 2009, as widely reported, Heard was arrested (and, briefly, charged) with assault against her then-partner. The charges were subsequently dropped (reportedly because the parties were both from out of state and the alleged assault a misdemeanor) and the former partner has since said that the entire episode was a misunderstanding blown out of proportion. Heard also, reportedly, has a history of volatile behaviour and outbursts not so unlike Depp's; she has also reportedly been diagnosed with two personality disorders associated (not causally, however) with patterns of domestic abuse.
Defenders have described Heard as an "imperfect victim" and challenged (not unreasonable) suggestions that what occurred in the Heard-Depp marriage was, as many commentators have suggested, "mutual abuse." They have, correctly I think, challenged the stigmatizing of Heard's mental illness as an example of "crazy ex" rhetoric often weaponized unreasonably against women.
But here's the thing that matters to me: did Heard abuse Depp, physically or otherwise? About this there doesn't seem to be a great deal of doubt--and in this trial, unlike the 2018-2020 UK case, it has been allowed into evidence. Video and audio recordings of Heard verbally abusing Depp (and admitting physical abuse) seem to not only to exist but to exist in some quantity. [I have questions about why so many recordings exist--Peter and I have been married, and arguing, for nearly twenty years, and I don't think there is taped evidence of a single conversation between us, let alone an argument.] In these recordings, many apparently made by Heard herself, Heard does not strike me as a victim "finally" fighting back but rather as a pure aggressor. To me, as a very distant observer and not (thankfully) remotely eligible to serve on the jury, it seems theirs was a mutually destructive, deeply dysfunctional relationship. I don't know that Depp ever assaulted Heard (it seems clear he assailed her verbally), but it seems fairly clear that Heard assaulted Depp (and definitely assailed him verbally). Me, I would throw out both the suit and countersuit and make no cost award.
How does a jury interpret all this? I have no idea. I also have no idea how an outcome--whatever outcome it might be--will not lead to subsequent appeals and retrials that could go on for years, illuminating little of substance in terms of the public interest.
One thing that does seem very clear to me, however, is that it is laughably wrong for MRAs to claim Depp as a paragon of male victimhood, and a rather egregious error for feminists to "believe Heard" in the name of the #metoo movement.
I agree, absolutely, that there are real if "imperfect" victims of domestic abuse. [I have issues with the idea that a victim must be "perfect"--i.e., non-compliant even unto death; reporting the allegations immediately, even to police prone to labeling assault accusations as "unsubstantiated" even in the face of substantial evidence; having no further contact with the abuser, even if the abuser is a spouse or co-parent or wields economic control over the victim; etc.--but will leave this aside for the moment]. I just don't think Heard qualifies as one--and I think 'siding' with Heard does real damage to the urgent legitimacy of advocating for women victims of assault and abuse.
Ultimately, it seems to me that the voracious public interest in the Depp-Heard trial (about which I have had to do quite a lot of unwanted research in writing this comment, thus undoing my deliberate choice to not follow the trial) is misplaced. It certainly doesn't serve Teh Menz. And it doesn't serve the #metoo movement, or women victims of assault and abuse--either.