This piece originally appeared in The Present Age, a newsletter on communication, media, culture, and politics in an age of hyperconnection, with Parker Molloy. Subscribe now.
On Wednesday, a Virginia jury found Amber Heard responsible for defaming her ex-husband, Johnny Depp, and awarded her $ 10 million. (He also claimed that Depp was responsible for defaming Heard, but only awarded him $ 2 million.) Officially, it was the conclusion of a six-week defamation lawsuit between two celebrities. In fact, it was the culmination of the biggest explosion of online misogyny since Gamergate, and a chilling view of the future of the Internet.
At trial, Heard told a plausible, evidence-based abuse story. She stated that she and Depp met in 2009 while filming The Rum Diary. She was 23 years old; he was 46 years old. They were both dating other people at the time, but they flirted on stage and came together for shared passions for books, art, and poetry. Finally, they broke up with their respective partners and started dating in 2012.
Depp was sober when they met, but as the relationship deepened, he started drinking again. In his testimony, Heard described that he disappeared for days at a time, and then reappeared as a different person. He accused her of “prostitution” in Hollywood and criticized her for auditioning for roles involving sex scenes. When she didn’t get the answers she wanted, she stated that she turned the tables, threw glasses, and hit the wall next to her head.
The first time he hit her, she said she thought he was kidding. Depp was drunk and maybe cocaine-stricken, she believed, and Heard asked her what her “Wino Forever” tattoo said: the letters were confused and she couldn’t tell them apart. Depp thought he already knew, and his question was a way of making fun of him. He slapped her. She laughed, so bewildered by his response that she thought it must be an expression of her dark sense of humor. He said he slapped her over and over and over again. She fell off the couch as he shouted, “Do you think you’re funny, bitch !?”
He left, then returned, burst into tears, and apologized. “I believed it,” Heard said at the booth. “I thought there was a line I wouldn’t cross again.”
He said he kept his promise for a few months, but the drink, paranoia, and temperament slowly returned. Heard testified that screams turned into pushes turned into slaps turned into punches. On one occasion she said he sexually assaulted her. After he exploded, he would disappear, then return with her sober with a promise and a plan to continue like this. The cycle repeated so many times Heard had a name for these post-abuse periods: “the warm glow.”
But the glow always faded. In May 2014, Heard and Depp flew from Boston to Los Angeles on a private jet. Heard was about to shoot a film with James Franco, a constant source of tension in his relationship because, he said, he was considerably younger than Depp and had made a pass at him in a previous film. Heard had already told his assistant to make sure Depp didn’t see the script for the current project because it involved a love scene.
Heard said Depp arrived on the flight at least drunk and possibly with cocaine. According to his texts to Paul Bettany, he acted as “an angry, aggressor-inducing native in a fucking blackout, shouting obscenities and insulting any shit that comes his way.” According to Heard, he accused her of cheating, followed her when she changed seats, slapped her, and then kicked her when she got up to move again. He finally started howling like an animal and fainted in the bathroom.
Here’s Heard telling the story, if you can stand it.
Heard said the plane crash became the template for the rest of their relationship and that almost all future incidents of violence followed a similar pattern: Depp experienced an external stressor: an explosion. followed by a meeting where his financial advisers told him he had lost millions. another happened after his mother died, and he abused alcohol and drugs. He accused Heard of cheating or harassing him and eventually escalated to push, slap or worse.
If Depp’s behavior was a textbook abuser, Heard’s was a victim of textbook abuse.
Depp then withdrew in denial, his testimony suggested. Almost all of the violence took place when he was drunk or drugged, often missing, and his life was deliberately structured to allow him to never face the consequences of his addictions. His checkbook handled the ruined hotel rooms; his employees calmed his self-made ego; the doctors distributed medicines to make the shoots pass; his celebrity status ensured that he never lost his job.
In 2014, Heard said he was the only person in her life who told her the truth about her anger and her drug problem: the “lesbian camp counselor,” as she once said. memorably, which ruined his fun and reminded him of what he did. he had spent the nights he did not remember. He resented her more and more because she treated him like an addict and an abuser, something her mind would not allow him to accept. Her text messages for her were apologetic, but her messages for everyone else were not regretted.
“I’m out. I’m done,” he wrote to his sister after the plane crash, a period in which Heard gave her the silent treatment: “His actions have added more drama than necessary … that’s what people say falls off the wagon … has happened to a Many of my friends … their wives keep calling them. “
If Depp’s behavior was a textbook abuser, Heard’s was a victim of textbook abuse. She tried to fix it, launching more and more desperate attempts to make him detox. He finally started taking faint photos of him in hotel rooms and nightclubs, evidence that he could show him the next day to show that he had a problem.
“I loved her,” he told the booth. “It simply came to our notice then. And the other thing was horrible. “
In the last year of the relationship, a kind of learned impotence took over. “I would try to defend myself,” he said. “I would pull back; I would take her away from me.
“I would call him and call him. I would call him ugly names.”
As their marriage broke up, Heard testified that Depp became even more addicted to drugs and alcohol, disappeared for longer periods, and returned with even more paranoid accusations. Heard became more and more fragile, rolling his eyes at his strange denials about his addiction and ignoring his empty promises to get sober.
The last drop was a series of growing incidents in which he disappeared for almost a week, then arrived late and drunk at his 30th birthday party, and then exploded. In the middle of his last argument, Heard testified that he threw his phone at him and hit him in the cheek. She filed for divorce the next day and a restraining order a week later.
Heart’s story is extraordinarily unremarkable. Every rhythm of his narrative (the honeymoon period, the relentless climbing, the apologies of the first day followed by the denials of the second day) follow well-established patterns of interpersonal violence.
Heard’s narration also matches almost all available evidence, even evidence against her. In 2018, Depp sued British tabloid The Sun for calling her a “women’s hit”. To defend himself against the UK’s notoriously harsh defamation laws, the tabloid called on Heard to provide evidence to corroborate his claim.
He identified 14 incidents of violence during his four-year relationship with Depp. I won’t go over them one by one (I recommend you read the UK ruling), but I’ll give you an overview of the types of evidence you presented to support your testimony.
Photos: Heard’s injuries and the damage Depp caused to his homes are well documented. Heard took pictures of her in the later stages of the relationship and her wounds appeared on at least one picture of the red carpet. The LA Times report the day he filed his removal order indicates that he arrived in court with visible bruises.
Contemporary Communications: Both Heard’s and Depp’s texts on their relationship confirm their basic pattern of events. From the first incident of violence, Heard told his friends and family about his jealousy, his attacks, and his denials. The UK trial includes a text from Depp’s assistant after the private jet explosion that reads: “When I told him he hit you, he cried.”
Depp’s texts also confirm the outlines of his account. Both trials have featured numerous texts in which Depp admits to becoming a different person when he is drunk or drugged. “My illness somehow crept in and caught me,” he said in a message to Heard. “Of course I hit and show ugly colors to Amber on a recent trip,” she read a message to a friend. His sister sent a message to Depp, telling him, “Stop drinking. Stop the cake. Stop the pills.”
Heard had more evidence in his favor than the vast majority of victims of abuse in widely accepted Me Too cases.
Witnesses: Many people saw Heard with bruises, cuts and missing pieces of hair. Depp employees testified to the damage it caused to their homes and hotel rooms. Heard’s acting coach said he needed to schedule a longer session with Heard to help her overcome the trauma of the relationship; a make-up artist said she helped cover the bruises.
The latest alleged incident of abuse, in which Depp allegedly threw his phone at Heard, was witnessed in its entirety by his friend at the other end of the call. Two other friends stated that they saw him act aggressively towards her on one occasion and her sister confirmed another. (He also testified at the U.S. trial that Depp once removed his dog from the …