When it comes to domestic abuse, it bears pointing out the fact that domestic abusers do exactly that—they abuse their partners, (intimate partners, significant others, family members, spouses)—and it’s a type of bullying behavior that starts early. In effect, they are abusing someone they perceive as belonging to them, and there is very much a sense of possessiveness and ownership present.
You can see this in every way that Heard shows microagressions such as pulling Depp away from interviewers and/or fans. in short, she fits the profile of an abuser far and away better than he does.
Microagressions and body language such as microexpressions are important. The flash of disdain, anger, annoyance, all of the above across her face are what he reacts to in every clip. There are times when he seems to flinch at a sudden movement she makes, but this never happens the other way around. These small expressions and actions belie the underlying mood, and it is what as her victim Johnny Depp would learn to read and respond to as he does in these GIFs. It is a common victim tactic to try and gauge the mood and level of aggression in their partner to try and minimize what’s to come.
Moreover, she admits in her own oped that she was also abused at a very early age, which is a common indicator of someone who winds up being an abuser themselves later in life. If true, this cannot be ignored.
But before we get ahead of ourselves, it bears pointing out that domestic abusers abuse their partners because it is in established pattern of behavior. Janae Rice was likely not the first woman that Ray Rice ever laid hands on. Abusers prey on their domestic partners time and time again, not only in a cycle of abuse for each individual partner, but visiting that same damage on partner after partner throughout their relationships.
Thus one of the first red flags for me in the case of Johnny Depp was when his partner of 14 years, his first wife, and even former fiancée Winona Ryder all stepped up to say that he was not that type of person at all and they never suffered at his hands. These are women who are independent of him, no longer in a relationship or in anyway forced to be connected to him, and therefore have no impetus to lie for him. Abused domestic partners, once they are away from their abuser, do not have any compunction about protecting them any longer as they did when they were in the relationship.
Amber Heard on the other hand does have a history of domestic violence. Her situation is even more compelling because it took place in a public venue. She grabbed her ex wife at the airport terminal in Seattle, effectively breaking her necklace, and struck her. This was witnessed by an officer who then took her into custody. In the aftermath, Heard claimed that the officer was simply homophobic and misogynistic. Even Heard’s partner at the time covered for her, saying that it was blown out of proportion. In the end, the DA dropped the charges, as they were not residents of the area. What’s extremely ironic about Heard’s wild accusations in this case is that the arresting officer was actually herself a lesbian activist. But more importantly, that is the first time to our knowledge that Amber Heard skated on actual domestic abuse charges. To date, and in stark contrast, Johnny Depp has never been charged.
At a point the litmus test is this – – out of the two of them she has been charged with domestic violence, and out of the two of them he is the one who got put in the hospital at the hands of the other. Ultimately it comes down to the simple fact that A) she is a woman and B) she got there first with the accusations before he could.
The above GIF is from the television show Overhaulin where Johnny had her most prized possession, a cherry red Mustang completely revamped for her. This was her reaction to what he did. No fear. No victim in the history of domestic abuse will do this to their partner and expect to not have repercussions later.
When it comes to what type of abuser she is, there are a few kinds. She seems to be the predatory type. Her low impulse control and virtually no remorse are the biggest telling factors. In the hour-long audio where she berates him for leaving every time she wants to fight, and admits that she always “takes it to the limit” and gets physical, she shows no accountability whatsoever not only for her actions, but for how he feels about them. His feelings on the subject do not come into play at all. The language is also incredibly significant, because she projects everything onto him; while Johnny is saying, “we can’t do this anymore“ her language and word choice projects everything onto him with no culpability on her part.
There is also the fact that in these audio clips, she applies every single type of abuse and either commits them in the recording itself or admits and acknowledges that she has done them on other occasions. In audio clips when she calls him “fat, washed up, old” and says no one will want to hire him, it is the belittling of emotional abuse. But the psychological damage that she does as well is in the audio where she is intimidating him out of reporting and claiming his status as a victim. “Tell them Johnny, tell them that I, a tiny woman, did this.“ She says those things to illustrate the fact of bias in society in believing the man is capable of being a victim. There is intimidation in the fact that she uses that bias to talk him out of stepping forward. But she goes further to imply that he’s gay for running to his security guard Travis, and in one clip even tells him to go “fuck him and get him to save you.“ Interesting talk for someone who professes to be bisexual, and an LGBT advocate to boot.
The psychological intimidation in all this is married with emotional abuse in intimating that he is either weak, gay, or incapable of dealing with the onslaught of what she’s done to him. Insinuating that he is somehow gay/weak for running to his security guard for protection instead of fighting back is also a homophobic dig from someone who is supposedly an LGBT activist. This is very significant. It still goes a ways toward proving that her activism is in fact fake activism, and she does not truly care for the issues that she purports to be in favor of.
And all of this comes on top of the physical abuse that he has endured not only from the Australia incident, but other incidents that they reference in the audios as well. During her video deposition she acknowledges (to the lawyer who asks her) that the hour-long audio is in fact her and Johnny talking. Through that audio we hear that she chased him into a bathroom, forced her way through the door, and hit him in the face. She wants to argue over the semantics of whether it was a slap or a “proper punch“ and implies the distinction is important, as if any strike or blow that you inflict on your spouse would ever be OK. At one point, when Johnny starts to protest too strongly and stand his ground, she orders him to take a Xanax. At that point it is not only physical abuse because she’s coercing him to drug himself, but psychological as well again because it is indicative of the fact that she wants him compliant.
This and several other things come up in the audio. But she also unconsciously admits in her video deposition that she has abused her sister as well. She tries to say at one point that she was protecting her sister from Johnny, but knowing her tendency towards projection it is more likely that it was Johnny trying to get in between a fight between her and her sister Whitney. At one point the lawyer for Johnny Depp‘s team makes a very pointed question and asks if she has ever hit her sister. She sidesteps the question and instead of answering in the negative, she avoids it all together. Interrogation and questioning 101: refusing to answer the question is typically answering the question in the affirmative.
It is my very strong belief that she probably has gotten in fights with her younger sister and bullied her as well. Again it typifies domestic violence exhibit a pattern of behavior of abusing someone they feel belongs to them – – in this case sibling abuse is by definition also domestic abuse. The sad case however is that her sister has likely normalized this behavior.
There is a point early on in the hour-long audio where Amber additionally accuses Johnny of “splitting“ every time she has an altercation with him, and she views it as not “fighting for the marriage“ or “fighting for the relationship.“ There has also been testimony that her friend Io hit her friend Raquel at Amber and Johnny’s wedding. And in doing so, even gave himself a nickname, glorifying in their violence. This trio of friends exhibits extremely toxic behavior, as well as Whitney being thrown into the mix, in thinking that violence towards each other is perfectly normal and may even be a way of expressing love. How broken.
But the fact that the friends she associates with, the family that she has, and even the partners that she’s abused in the past normalize her behavior exacerbates the problem. It has made her a ticking time bomb for anyone else, as she has skated the consequences seemingly every time. And as well, she seems to be surrounded by people who think nothing of her behavior and even find it perfectly acceptable. And in light of all of this, it is no wonder that she has come to this point.
A special thanks as well to incredibly average on YouTube for his additional diagnoses of these sources. It is he who compiled the videos linked on these past couple of posts, and he’s diagrammed most of the evidence put forth thus far in Depp’s defamation case.
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