I'm going to preface this essay with a few rules. Yes, there are rules! For reading and commenting on a wattpad essay barely scraping past the 2k word count! I know! I'm writing this with capitalized words and punctuation to convey how serious I am! And will be dropping my phone upside down in the sink for the next two hours because I'm afraid of talking about this on here!

I'm discussing domestic abuse and sexual assault as it pertains to this trial. I am discussing it in relation to victim blaming and in reference to typical arguments used to silence survivors. This may be triggering. You are not obligated to read. I'm writing this essay and posting it publicly on the platform where I have the biggest following because this topic is important to me, I'd like to clear out any Depp supporters from my mutuals and I've said all I can say on my personal social media at the consequence of my real life relationships already. I am, however, intentionally posting it in a place where you can easily scroll by if you're tired of hearing about this trial after it's been at the forefront of every app since April. I'm tired too. This is the first and last time I'll bring this topic here.

I believe Amber Heard. I have believed Amber Heard since the UK trial. I, like domestic violence experts, do not believe and will not entertain any insinuations of "mutual abuse". If you comment anything resembling "they're both bad/no one should take sides/who cares either way" I will mute you happily. I don't care about perfect victims. I don't care if a victim hits their abuser back, I don't care if at some point after being abused so long they begin to hit first, I don't care if they call them horrible names or threaten them or yell. I refuse to hold the things a survivor has done to survive at the same level of scrutiny and judgment as the things their abuser did to make them that way in the first place. If you consider these equally immoral acts, mute me yourself. I don't want you on my account.

I am not here to respond to or correct flagrant misinformation and misogyny. If I see a comment about anything that has already been proven untrue or was never proven beyond a disturbing myth in the first place, I will mute you. I will not entertain questions on misinformation regardless of whether those questions are asked in good faith. It's August. If you're engaging in discourse surrounding this case at this point, I expect you to know what you're talking about. It's incredibly irresponsible to engage otherwise considering this has probably been the biggest smear campaign of the last decade. I will mute any comments claiming Amber Heard abused her ex-girlfriend, committed manslaughter in high school, defecated in Johnny Depp's bed, snorted cocaine in court, faked having a baby, or any other disproved rumour spread by Depp and his following in an attempt to complete his goals of global humiliation. You are spouting Qanon levels of conspiracy and indulging an abuser's wishes and you should be embarrassed.

If you do have an opposing view and are offended by my lack of interest in having a friendly disagreement, to far better written articles, the UK court documents, and a few popular threads detailing the information revealed in the unsealed documents and other info that has led to the sway in Depp's support in the last week or two (or has been the reason for Heard's support in the last few years, including mine). Feel free to read those to understand why I won't engage in the discourse anymore. It's all out there, there's hardly any reason for me to be arguing it.

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So, what have we learned? In the six weeks this trial proceeded and in the months following? Because it seems to me it hasn't been much of anything, and I think that's largely because the majority of people cannot and refuse to admit they partook in the litigation abuse of Amber Heard and the widespread mockery of her sexual assault and domestic violence testimony as backed by over ten witnesses and copious evidence. I think people are scared to reconcile with the fact that most abuse survivors don't have the evidence Amber Heard had. I think it's scary to be an abuse survivor and to not have the evidence Amber Heard had. To look at the millions of people who didn't believe her and have to sit with the knowledge that if they don't believe her, there is no way they'd believe anyone else. Because who else has that? Who else has over ten witnesses? Who else has photos and videos and texts and phone calls and therapy notes and expert doctors and a basic outline events that can be proven by contemporaneous messages and metadata in a court of law? Who has an abuser with a documented history of violence, two ex-girlfriends who can attest to it, and one who retracted her defense? Who wins in a UK court and has their abuser's plea for appeal denied by two additional judges and still isn't believed? This is an anomaly. That kind of evidence is insane. And she has all of it because Amber Heard did everything we ask victims to do.

She fought back. She texted friends and family. She called. She talked to her therapist. And finally, she left and filed a restraining order. And she was punished for the things she did, and punished for the things she didn't. Why are there so many bruises? Why aren't there enough? Why didn't she leave? Why didn't she stay and help him with his addiction?—and when she followed his doctor's orders—why did she stay and help him with his addiction? Why all the diary entries and therapy notes? Why no medical reports? Why no photos of her after being sexually assaulted? Why did she fight, if she was so afraid? Why did she take it, if it was so bad? Why didn't she do enough. Why did she do so much. The truth is no one wanted to believe her, so it didn't matter either way. Johnny Depp is a beloved figure, and a man, and once upon a time he was even attractive, so people would rather believe the evil, conniving woman created a massive, years-long conspiracy against our favourite drunken Disney pirate than undeniable proof of just how terrible a man he must be to have all that against him. We had to invent Amy Dunne in real time rather than face the boring reality that men abuse women all the time, and the scarier reality that those abusive men can be men we like and their victims can be women we don't.

Now we're caught in the beginning of a turning tide, and before the inevitable wave of people posturing themselves as perfect and revising history to either claim they were manipulated by Johnny Depp or that they stood by Amber Heard the whole time, what we have now is a great big toothless nothing. "My biggest flex is I never sided with either of them." "This is why I minded my business." "I never cared either way. They're just celebrities." "Are we still talking about this?" Well congratulations to you on being completely useless, I hope you got a nice pat on the back for it!

Yes, we're still talking about it. And to be honest, I can't think of anything more fucking spineless than watching the media and your friends and your family and everyone on the planet apparently (because holy shit everyone was taking part in this) mocking an abuse victim in the most vitriolic surge of misogyny I've ever seen with total indifference and months later, when things finally start to look up, going "are we done now?" It's mind-blowing to me that people are genuinely positing themselves as more intellectually evolved for this stance. I sincerely, honestly (like really) hope that you are never put in a position where your abuse is documented and relived on camera in front of millions of people and your abuser wins because a jury decided you made them uncomfortable while recounting your abuse. And that win is celebrated. You become one of the most hated people alive. People call it activism for male victims. It sets a precedent that causes thousands of women to retract their cases against their abusers out of fear of losing just like you did, meanwhile other celebrity rapists—emboldened by the man you now owe millions of dollars to—are going back to court to sue their victims for defamation. Because your devastating loss served to prove that they can. And finally, finally, there is almost a degree of vindication when the consensus starts to change after the damage has already been done, but a great majority decide to scrub their hands of the discourse—of their participation in your abuse—and say it was mutual. You're both just as bad as each other. This is equal. This is fair. Stop complaining and just shut up already. We're bored now.

This is your elevated, holier-than-thou, feminist conclusion? Really? That's pretty pathetic. And sure, separate for a moment that there was a real person on the receiving end of all this abuse, and that she'll never forget the way the world treated her. Let's remove Amber Heard from the situation altogether and just think about the precedent set by Depp's win. The sentences from Heard's op-ed that were decided in court to be defamatory were these three: (1) "I spoke up against sexual violence — and faced our culture's wrath. That has to change." (2) "Then 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." (3) "I had the rare vantage point of seeing, in real time, how institutions protect men accused of abuse." Nowhere is Depp named. Nowhere is the word "abuser" used, just "men accused of abuse." Nowhere does she name herself a victim of abuse, just states she became a figure representing domestic abuse, which she did. Note she doesn't use the word violence to describe what she's become a representative of, and since abuse can encapsulate psychological abuse as well, even the proud "mutual abuse" believers should have no reason to find this ruling fair. The first sentence, which was the title of the op-ed, wasn't even written by Heard. It was written by an editor from the Washington Post. So this is the big crime? This is what abuse victims aren't allowed to say? I don't know about you, but in a political climate where reproductive rights are at stake and the last chance for many to abort an unwanted foetus is to plea not to be forced to bear the child of their abuser, I find the precedent set by this trial that even talking about your abuse can be considered defamation a lot bigger than just "some celebrity drama." You are not smarter than anyone concerned with this trial because you haven't thought about its larger consequences.

I'm grateful people are speaking up now rather than later. I'm grateful idiotic Depp fans leaked the documents that are now leading to his own cultural demise. It feels overdue but it feels good. It almost makes me believe there's some positive karma out there in the universe. But it doesn't change what happened to Amber Heard, and it doesn't change the lasting effects her violent abuse by the internet will have on other victims coming forward. That harm can't be undone. They can't unsee the way she was treated. So again I'll ask, what have we learned? If you participated in the jokes, if you blindly sided with Johnny Depp, what have you learned? As moraya.carrey on tiktok put it, what do you believe in? What tenets of feminism matter to you? What are you going to do to prevent yourself from gleefully falling prey to misinformation again just because the person accused of a heinous (but completely plausible) crime is a person you happen to like? If you believed Johnny Depp because of a twitter thread, and you ceased to believe him and turned to Amber Heard's side because of another twitter thread some months later, what is the backbone of your beliefs? How malleable are you and your morals? I'm not saying that in condescension, I'm saying it because we talk so frequently about how it's possible for someone to fall down the right-wing pipeline or believe in Qanon or Andrew Tate or false statistics that appeal to their insecurities, and yet look how many people did exactly that because it was Johnny Depp and they liked Pirates of the Caribbean when they were a kid! As if the GOP didn't tweet celebrating his win, as if The Daily Wire (Ben Shapiro's outlet, by the way) didn't spend thousands of dollars on anti-Amber Heard propaganda! This was the right-wing pipeline, and a lot of self-proclaimed leftists need to be asking themselves how they sided with it and how to make sure they never do again.

It's a good thing if you feel bad. Seriously. That's called a conscience and I'm glad you have one. Now do something with it.

Here are some articles I recommend reading for more on the trial:

https://internetprincess.substack.com/p/whos-afraid-of-amber-heard

https://www.readthepresentage.com/p/johnny-depp-amber-heard?s=r

https://andbytheway.substack.com/p/we-dont-want-to-believe?s=w

Here are the UK court documents/transcripts (these are long—like, hundreds of pages long—but worth reading if you're invested in better understanding this case):

https://www.nickwallis.com/depp-trial

Here are well-constructed and easy-to-read threads:

https://twitter.com/k4mil1aa/status/1554512251058409478

https://twitter.com/cocainecross/status/1553506807766663169

https://twitter.com/GeorgeOrWhale/status/1539309156485713920?s=20&t=upMHXYIsZgwJf_sfuIyRfQ

https://twitter.com/IvanaE/status/1532086076084568067?s=20&t=72OTaQDpcLl3Rb3J6qIrnQ

And finally a link to the tiktok I referenced by Moraya which I thought was especially concise:

https://twitter.com/mafsbrainrot/status/1556518329552367617

And to be very very very clear, I believe you. Whether you believe Amber Heard or other survivors or whether my stance upsets you, if this has hit home for you even in the slightest way, I believe you, and I'm sorry. Thanks for reading.