why I've come up confused about Heard v Depp

I’m not going to pretend I have poured over the footage from the trial between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard. I haven’t. But what I have consumed over the last three days is the commentary from people responding to the verdict.

Depp was awarded $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages in his defamation suit. Heard had $2 million in compensatory damages (in response to the fact Johnny Depp’s lawyer called her abuse allegations a hoax) but $0 in punitive damages.

Since Wednesday, when the verdict by a jury of seven, five men and two women, was reached, I have read articles, tweets, and comments from people who all seem to have a different view on the outcome of the trial.

End of #MeToo

For many, this trial means the end of the #MeToo movement. A bleak outcome for women. It adds fuel to the fire of misogyny and dissuades women from coming forward about their abusive partners. A huge backwards step for women.

This is the view of my echo chamber. Most of the people I follow on social media are in some way or another, feminists. They have been and will continue to fight for the empowerment of women following a long history of patriarchy that pushes them down, drowns them out. They are activists, authors, barristers, charities, and researchers who have devoted their lives to women. So when they say something, I listen and often agree. And they’ve pretty much unanimously stated that the outcome of this trial is bad for women, not just for Amber Heard.

I hear them. And on so many points, I concur.

But as I have researched these last few days, I’ve intentionally looked for views is opposition to this one.

Men are abused too

Men are abused too, and this case has brought awareness to the fact that a man can be the victim. Men most certainly can be on the receiving end of abuse from a partner. In the UK in 2019, there were 786,000 men who experienced domestic abuse. It happens. And it isn’t talked about enough. When I used to work in a domestic abuse office, I remember getting police reports through of men who were brutalised by women they lived with. But they rarely accepted support services, perhaps because of the stigma of being a man abused by a woman. This stigma shouldn’t exist.

Also in the UK in 2019, 1.6 million women experienced domestic abuse. That’s a heck of a lot more. And figures have risen during the pandemic. The truth is, women suffer more at the hands of men than men do at the hands of women.

Amber Heard is not the voice (or at least not the only one) of women who have been abused

What I didn’t expect to see in the comments of tweets was women survivors of domestic abuse saying they couldn’t identify with Amber Heard. If they had pushed back as Heard did, they would have been killed by their abuser. I read how they could never have forked out the money to have fought in the first place, even if they wanted to, because they aren’t made of green like Heard. They said they were glad justice was served – that a jury decided Heard was a liar. I’d expected to hear from men about this case – the ones who think men are the victims in life, not women (sob) – but I didn’t think I would read an outpouring of women domestic abuse survivors voicing their support of the verdict.

Women lie

No shit Sherlock. I’ve read this view from lots of men (and women, but mostly men). Of course, women lie. People don’t tell the truth. I don’t know enough about this case, and I certainly don’t know enough about Amber Heard, to comment on her honesty. But I think it is a crap response to this trial. This is not a takeaway point.

False allegations about domestic abuse are very rare. Women hardly ever lie about abuse. From Women’s Aid: “The Crown Prosecution Service released the first ever study of this in 2013, and concluded that false allegations are even more infrequent than previously thought. In the 17-month period that the study examined, there were 111,891 prosecutions for domestic violence, and only six prosecutions for making false allegations.”

If people come away from this trial dismissing women when they say they have been abused, that is going to be horrifically damaging for women. I hope this doesn’t happen. We have to keep talking about this: Women should be believed when they disclose abuse, not brushed under a rug, because there are few women who will make up abuse.

Murky Waters

I wanted to come up from my reading with a concise opinion. I would have liked to agree completely with one side or the other. But I just can’t at this point. It was such a messy trial that should never have been televised.

The toxic relationship of two people was openly broadcast to the public, a decision that could potentially have swayed the judgment of the jurors following the huge social media commentary. Why a judge would allow for that is beyond me. Only in America, it seems.

I want to support Amber Heard entirely as a woman. She is a victim from my seat. An imperfect victim. But she also perpetrated abuse by the sounds of it. Was that abuse a response to the abuse she suffered by Depp? Very likely. I want to support her, but I can’t deny that there are women who are abusive as well. Maybe she was one of them. There are women who should be deemed as guilty in a court of law for abuse toward a partner. Was Amber Heard one of them? I can’t tell.

My first inclination isn’t to support Depp, a rich powerful man, who will continue to be rich and powerful. But was he given justice in this case? I can’t tell.

Misplaced Attention

What makes me sad about this whole case is how it has taken away media attention from more important, pressing issues.

As I read about this verdict, I was also writing about famine in Somalia. I can’t feel much sympathy for either Heard or Depp, millionaires, when I’ve just written about millions of children on the brink of death. I just can’t.

And what about abuse victims still suffering, without any power, any fame, and money to protect them? Where are they in this discussion? Who is fighting for them? Who is empowering them? Giving money to them? Advocating for them?

I’ve come out confused, not settled. What I know is that the #MeToo movement cannot end here. It cannot, for the sake of women.