Believe all women? Even Amber Heard? The Johnny Depp lawsuit raises questions about our approach to assault allegations
Unless you happen to live under a rock, you’ve probably heard of the name Johnny Depp. And if you’ve heard of him, then you’re most likely familiar with his ex-wife, Amber Heard. The former is currently suing the latter over a 2018 op-ed she wrote in The Washington Post. In the explosive piece, Heard claimed that she was a victim of both sexual and domestic abuse. Although Depp was not directly named in the article, his lawyers claim that the Post piece painted him as a violent partner (the pair, who were married for two years, from 2015 – 2016, began dating in 2012). Depp is suing Heard for defamation, seeking $50 million in damages. Heard is countersuing Depp for twice that amount.
Although the trial is still underway, Depp appears to be winning in the court of public opinion. The question, though, is why?
In the aforementioned op-ed, Heard, then an ambassador for women’s rights at the American Civil Liberties Union, wrote the following: “Two years ago, I became a public figure representing domestic abuse, and I felt the full force of our culture’s wrath for women who speak out. I had the rare vantage point of seeing, in real time, how institutions protect men accused of abuse.”
Cast your mind back to 2018, the year the op-ed was published. It was the height of the #MeToo movement. Harvey Weinstein had just been charged with a whole host of crimes; later that year, the Brett Kavanaugh hearings would put Christine Blasey Ford’s recollections of a high school incident on the national stage. The call to “believe women” — encouraging people to accept women’s allegations of sexual harassment at face value — had gained momentum. The dating app Bumble took out a full-page advertisement in The New York Times that simply read, “Believe women.”
Yes, of course, allegations of abuse, be they sexual or otherwise, should be taken incredibly seriously. However, the reflexive call to “believe women” requires a complete suspension of critical thinking. Moreover, the call asks us to assume that the person accused, almost always a man, is guilty. It also asks us to assume, implicitly or otherwise, that all the accusers (usually women) are honest.
Which brings us back to Heard. There is reason to believe that she has been less than honest, and there’s reason to believe that she has lied about Depp.
According to a psychological expert hired by Depp’s legal team, Heard has two personality disorders, Histrionic Personality Disorder and Borderline Personality Disorder. Both disorders are intimately associated with manipulative behavior, including dishonesty. During their relationship, in an effort to cover up the bruises given to her by Depp (the actor has admitted to accidentally head-butting her in a drunken state), Heard, according to her attorneys, carried around a Milani All-In-One-Correcting Kit. This particular claim appears to be a blatant lie. The kit wasn’t released until long after the couple had separated.
Two core symptoms of BPD are anger and aggression; empirical evidence suggests a strong link between BPD and physical violence toward partners, as well as “criminal behaviors that embody externalized violence (e.g., property damage), and, on very rare occasion, murderous behavior,” according to Dr. Randy Sansone, a registered psychiatrist.
This is not to suggest that all people with BPD are violent aggressors; not at all. But it does help paint a clearer picture of what a person like Heard may be capable of. She has, it’s important to note, been accused of severing Depp’s finger; furthermore, she has openly admitted to hitting her ex-husband. Depp’s legal team even produced an audio recording of the actor telling Heard that he is a victim of abuse, and that he intends on telling the world. A rather unbothered sounding Heard responds by saying: “Tell the world Johnny, tell them Johnny Depp…I, Johnny Depp, a man…I’m a victim, too, of domestic violence. Let’s see who believes you.” Do these sound like the words of a respectable human being?
Now, let’s be clear, Johnny Depp is not a saint. But the actor has had his name dragged through the proverbial mud; he has been ridiculed and condemned. Depp has even been called a “wife-beater” by The Sun, a prominent British tabloid. Before the trial, according to Andrew Esquire, a legal expert who has been following the case closely, “the buzzword remained ‘toxic masculinity,’ without consideration that equally ‘toxic’ aspects can exist within femininity as well.” But now, he told me, “as Amber Heard’s lies and deceptions lay bare to the world, the objective reality can no longer be suppressed.” “Women,” he said, “have the capacity for deceit and some choose to exercise that capacity for deceit at the expense of men. Whether this hurts a particular narrative is irrelevant to the truth.” For Johnny Depp, added the lawyer, “this trial should not be about a legal conclusion or monetary damages. This is a trial to repair his reputation.”
Indeed. Depp has found himself lumped in the same category as despicable men like Harvey Weinstein and Bill Cosby. Once a leading Hollywood star, he is now a pariah, positively toxic. What happened to the old adage, innocent until proven guilty? It’s entirely possible that we have gotten this horribly wrong, and that Johnny Depp is in fact the victim.
Writer – Mac Ghlionn is a psychosocial researcher and essayist.
CREDIT: Daily News
