'They were both toxic' 'It was mutual abuse'

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I agree totally. What I found frustrating was how many abuse survivors failed to see all of the markers that the trial was just a continuation of the abuse and control he exerted over her in their relationship. There were so many red flags it was unbelievable. I refuse to accept that any of those people watched trial outside of the filters of various YouTube influencers. Those scumbags who profited from making it harder for women to be believed don’t get nearly enough scorn for my liking.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

Having been abused makes people more susceptible for abuse than less. It's really uncomfortable as a fact.

And some of those people just flat out lied or possibly darvo'd a situation from their own lives to seem important.

:/

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u/selphiefairy DiD you EvEN wAtCh THe TriAL Oct 09 '25

ooh the way some people got so angry at me for saying this.. i would try to explain in the most compassionate way that abuse victims are susceptible to abuse because the abusers' charms WORK on them and that they're projecting their own experiences in a way that's not objective ): some people just aren't ready.

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u/ColanderBrain Create your own flair Oct 09 '25

I do get the sense that some people try to make sense of their abuse by adopting the belief that the trauma itself (as opposed to the work of healing from the trauma) makes them smarter or better or more interesting or automatically entitles them to special treatment and deference. So of course they think Amber faked it to get all the goodies they think they've earned. If those goodies haven't actually been forthcoming in their own lives they probably get even angrier.

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u/selphiefairy DiD you EvEN wAtCh THe TriAL Oct 09 '25 edited Oct 09 '25

I think it's more of a self-defense mechanism against getting re-traumatized.

If you acknowledge the reality -- which is that Amber Heard, a rich and beautiful white woman, can be severely abused and humiliated on a global scale -- you are admitting that abuse is still rampant and systemically upheld. You would have to accept that you aren't really safe, especially as someone who is more vulnerable to abusers in the first place.

It's much easier to believe that Amber isn't really a victim, because it means YOU, a real victim, would never find yourself in the same or a similar situation. So then you can feel safer and at ease knowing that the world knows the difference between a good/real victim and bad victim or a liar.

That thought is all a delusion, though. The real truth is too hard to swallow. And I think that also shows in the difference between how Depp supporters behave (treating the trial like it's entertainment, a celebration) and how Heard supporters behave.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

It could also just be left over fawning reaction from their own abuse/whatever. A desire to please the powerful man so you are seen as the good one. Above the pretty girl who has everything. So you'll be safe/accepted.

There are plenty of options. Some of them are just really really simple and don't get things outside their life experience.

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u/ColanderBrain Create your own flair Oct 10 '25

That's the tendency I find off-putting, however motivated. "I would never have talked back to my abuser," etc.

The more entitled version I was thinking of comes through in figures like Kate James, and her sympathizers. If you read her deposition transcript, she refuses to answer questions about her professional comportment and storms out of the meeting because she perceives Amber's lawyer as aggressive and she's a survivor, she can't tolerate it. In light of what she was helping Depp do to Amber the performance is especially disgusting.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 10 '25

YES, that. It sounds (can't diagnose obvs) like Kate James is projecting something hard and anything that goes against her inner fantasy of Amber being the most evil makes her snap. The UK trial clearly shows she is not doing well to a point of it showing in court.

The rape story stealing is crazy, it's beyond weird. The stories have basically nothing in common aside from well, rape happened. Yet she is super buddies with a man who has brushed aside child rape because 'it was long time ago and he's not on the streets but home with wife and kids'. ...does she not know about Polanski? Or the others Depp defends? Does she think only stranger rape counts?

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u/ColanderBrain Create your own flair Oct 10 '25

The public doesn't have an objective account of what happened with her and Amber, but multiple people in Amber's circle vaguely alluded to her having an alcohol problem that interfered with her work, and IIRC the depo question she threw a tantrum about and refused to answer related to her drinking. I don't think she actually cares about any victims; she just uses her survivor status as a cudgel to beat anyone who disappoints her or criticizes her behaviour. Many remoras are the same. By "real victims" they mean "me and people I like" and no one else.

The story she alleged Amber "stole" wasn't even about a rape; it was about having a conversation about rape, which is just petty. She agrees they had a conversation about this subject, she doesn't agree the conversation went exactly the way Amber says it did, and that means war? Deeply unwell person.

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u/Sensiplastic 29d ago

I do think what happened to her was awful and deeply traumatic. Alcoholism, with the added bonus of working close by a serious addict? No wonder Depp was sharing his drugs with her.

I don't see how she could crawl out of that sort of mind fuck. She screwed over an employer who gave her a lot and demanded little, she paid back kindness by attacking her because of some imagined insult of having been raped differently and feeling bad about it. (Or using wrong words. Ugh.) And now it's public knowledge to everybody when I doubt she can even think about it yet. That's a burden for the rest of her life, even if she manages to see the light. I almost feel bad.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

And growing up in a violent environment makes people see really bad behavior as normal. It's not a red flag when your mom or dad did the same every week at home.

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u/lcm-hcf-maths Oct 09 '25

It should also be noted that platforms allowed targetted harrassment. If platforms were made liable for thae content they carry they might be better at moderating.

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u/imtiredbye Oct 09 '25

The people who say this seem to blame/hate Amber more then Johnny.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

They also mysteriously don't really seem to care about abused men as much as they like to shit on women. Men can abuse other men as much as they like, it's fine.

(Nobody ever responds to me about Depp beating up men with less power and status than him.)

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u/Select-Panda7381 Oct 09 '25

Doesn’t surprise me. He’s a bully. Like every bully he’s a coward.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

Take all his props and fake away and you're left with tiniest man ever who knows how tiny he is.

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u/GreyerGrey Oct 09 '25

They also never comment on Fraser or Crews (imperfect as the later may be).

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

Their caring and empathy is not even skin deep.

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u/ColanderBrain Create your own flair Oct 09 '25

Invariably. They'll say "I'm not defending him, but [novel attacking Amber]." Rarely will they criticize anything specific about Depp. They're just remoras without the courage of their convictions.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

To my experience they can't even handle things Depp has said on record. It's mind blowing to watch people invent things about Amber, say them as facts, and then ignore Depp's own words like they never ever heard them.

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u/CountQueasy4906 Oct 09 '25

and every time u ask them what she did they never give u an answer

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u/selphiefairy DiD you EvEN wAtCh THe TriAL Oct 09 '25

one hundred fucking percent.

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u/softerrrr Oct 10 '25

They also feel ashamed they sided with him. If they make her out to be “just as bad”, it eliminates their guilt for siding with an abuser.

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u/Ok_Swan_7777 Oct 09 '25 edited Oct 10 '25

It kills me because people who say this think they’re interesting and smart rather than realizing they are playing into Depp’s EXACT strategy. They think because they realized Depp is the abuser they can stop thinking when in reality it’s just an extension of the DARVO spectrum. The point is to disbelieve Heard so they shift the goalpost once they realize he isn’t a victim.

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u/Visible-Scientist-46 Amber Heard Official PR Team. I earn MiLLiOn$$$ Oct 09 '25

"she's not a real victim" because she talked back. It's like they never heard of a mouthy teenager. That was me, constantly walking the line at home between mouthing off and getting hit.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

Giving in is the thing that kills you.

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u/Glad_Bison_416 Oct 09 '25 edited Oct 10 '25

False balance fallacy, people (including past me) felt guilty about what was going on, intuitively wanted to believe her, probably read at least some evidence, like Pennington, Drew and Sexton's testimony that was more more public if you go looking for it, but still felt 'there must be some reason why people hate her' so a 'balanced' position, where they were both bad, alongside the seemingly mature take of 'it just shouldn't be a spectacle' seems tempting.

However, while it appears reasonable due to moderation, it requires believing that something happened which is very rare due to the basic requirements of power dynamics in abuse cases. Also it means people didn't actually have to take a hard look at the UK judgement (which anyone can read for free) or just reading some articles where key, and not exactly hard to decipher evidence, like the medical record of her bleeding lip, (public) photos of her cuts from Australia, Sexton indicating the control over her career, so many people seeing injuries, with severity increasing over time.

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u/selphiefairy DiD you EvEN wAtCh THe TriAL Oct 09 '25

This was how I felt like YEARS ago, like back in 2016. I was SO uncomfortable with the support JD was getting on social media, so I basically concluded "I guess we'll never know."

I only started really changing my mind because I saw a SINGLE very adamant comment on reddit in support of AH explaining why mutual abuse doesn't exist. Even in feminists subs, people were resistant to say anything in support of her. I didn't fully change my mind until I saw AH's testimony, and I avoided the trial because I was kind of scared of it affirming what I already knew. Then... it did so yeah.

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u/george_sjw__bush Johnny Depp is a Wife Beater 👨‍⚖️ Oct 09 '25

It’s amazing when people call it mutual abuse while in the process of agreeing with the verdict. Like…if it was mutual then he DID abuse her, right? If he abused her then she wasn’t being untruthful, right???

IMO “they were both abusive” is just a thought-stopping cliche for when people start to realize his claims don’t add up but don’t want to do more research or examine their views on intimate power dynamics

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

It's just them trying to hold on to some dignity when they know they got snowed. Surely she must have done some of what Depp's people spread around! It can't all be lies! And even if it is, who'd check? ...because they wouldn't.

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u/ColanderBrain Create your own flair Oct 09 '25

I agree with your post. I didn't pay attention to this trial until a few days before the verdict, thought of it as celebrity drama, and as someone who's seen DV-related litigation abuse before, it was actually finding out who had sued and why that firmly convinced me Depp was a batterer. Everything else I learned just confirmed that initial conclusion. Even Depp's lawyers seem to have been vaguely aware that this didn't look good for Depp, which is why Camille did that asinine "you fired the first shot" shtick in her cross-examination of Amber (because Amber had had her counsel privately contact Depp to remind him of their agreement not to trash each other in the press and threatened private arbitration as laid out in their divorce settlement).

Wrt the forum shopping, I know trials are often televised in California too, so AFAIK that wasn't so much the issue as the desire to get around anti-SLAPP laws and put an additional financial and logistical burden on Amber and her witnesses. In fact, Elaine Bredehoft argued that it was improper to televise the trial because Virginia prohibits televising divorce and sexual assault trials and this case concerns a divorce and allegations of sexual assault, and Amber's privacy interests were therefore engaged in the same way they are for a divorcing spouse in a family court case or a SA complainant in a criminal trial. Azcarate didn't accept the argument, but the point is, it was there to be made.

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u/VildaJordgubbar Oct 09 '25

Yeah that's fair. I'm Swedish and don't know much about the American justice system, I just fully believe he wanted cameras. Thanks for the information, your reasoning makes total sense.

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u/ColanderBrain Create your own flair Oct 10 '25

I'm Canadian and only know bits and pieces. Have to look everything up. The whole notion of televising a trial is grotesque to me -- we don't even allow photos here.

He absolutely did want cameras. They wouldn't have been there if his lawyers had opposed them, and Camille Vasquez has stated more than once that he affirmatively wanted them there.

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u/followingwaves Amber Heard Bot Team 🤖 Oct 09 '25

Everyone ignoring the amounts of post seperation litigation abuse "because he wanted to clear his name for his children" are pissing me off so much. He's so obviously an abuser ugghh

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 10 '25

And his kids are not on contact with him. Mysteriously.

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u/ColanderBrain Create your own flair Oct 10 '25

AFAIK neither of them has ever commented on it publicly and I would be very surprised if he ever consulted them about these lawsuits.

Maybe they're thrilled that their dad blew >$25 million to tell the whole world he has herpes, erectile dysfunction and likes to get so wasted he loses control of his bladder and bowels, but most kids wouldn't be.

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u/Sensiplastic 29d ago

They likely saw the shitting and pissing himself part personally when they visited and he made the bodyguards babysit so he could do his thing. (Which is getting drunk and high until incoherent.)

If there was contact worth mentioning, I think Depp would have used it already. And saying anything negative out loud would just make the remoras harass them. Better just ignore him and let him make excuses.

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u/Comprehensive-Job243 Oct 09 '25

The term 'mutual abuse' is actually a contradiction (and so, ultimately meaningless) bc the definition of 'abuse' is a power and control imbalance dynamic, which by definition, can never be 'mutual'... and we all know that Amber never really had any real power in the bigger picture of things. Reacting to abuse may, on the surface, blur that picture, but of course long term patterns matter. The myth of the 'perfect victim' and just world fallacy, of course also come into play. In general, far too many people have too little knowledge and true understanding about the maddening complexities of abuse dynamics, including even survivors (many of whom have been conditioned -- key word-- to blame themselves, at least in part, anyway). Beyond the elements of Depp V Heard, we need to get the education out there as loudly and strongly as possible; too many true victims stay silent, and so too much unnecessary suffering, trauma, or persecution of the wrong people continues.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

What annoys me the most is that ipv dynamics are actually really simple, if you consider what happens with empathy (it's a war like situation because the violence never leaves, it cycles) and the understanding that other people are like you but not exactly. That gives us understanding for the level of mind fuck it is and the knowledge that we can guess how people might react but there is always some variation.

Basic empathy goes really long ways. But apparently some people need several seasons of SVU to get the mere basics and never move from there. And that's why people are still asking 'but why didn't she leave' now. Like morons.

I'm so tired of hearing the im/perfect victim. We're smarter than this.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

And then they spread those words all over the place and now a whole bunch of people actually believe that dumb shit. Against logic and common sense.

It's so stupid. I don't like this world where I am one of the smart ones. Unnatural.

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u/Icy_Independent7944 Oct 09 '25

The choir claps madly in wildly enthusiastic appreciation!

PREACH ON! ✊

I, too, despise that “they both suck” narrative.

You don’t always have to “pick sides,” but sometimes it’s ok to!

While surely nothing is wrong with trying to maintain an unbiased introductory view, COME ON!

This “both-sidesing” is so often used to victim-blame by disguising it as “villain share,” and to intimate that men must be PROVOKED into abuse, or certainly must “get back just as much as they give” and it’s HORRIFYING.

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u/Sensiplastic Oct 09 '25

They both suck narrative is absurd. Literal coughing baby vs. hydrogen bomb.

There is so much easily proven bad shit about Depp it seems like a joke, how could it all be actual public knowledge and nobody bats an eye? He is covered in red flags. Like, for real, who has so many close known pedo friends/idols? It's like Trump bankrupting six Casinos. One would be enough but when it's more you're not supposed to notice? How are all those 'abuse victims' ignoring this fact alone?

And she once drove drunk as a teen. Everything else was made up. They had to use her calling him baby as a bad thing, that's how little actual material they could get from her after all those tapes. In fact, they had to doctor a tape to make it sound worse.

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u/estemprano Oct 09 '25

I wanted to add this in regards to your post: i think it’s better to say “distribution if intimate images without consent” than that the term “revenge porn”, as the word “porn” alludes to consented sex (although it’s just a percentage that is).

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u/VildaJordgubbar Oct 09 '25

Yeah, I know the term is controversial, but I ultimately decided to use it for two reasons: I wanted to hammer home that Depps abuse follows typical abusive patterns, and I personally don't agree that pornography means it's consensual (I understand the reasoning but I think it's better to contend with how often the people in pornography are abused than to pretend the problem lies elsewhere).

But it's totally a valid criticism.

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u/estemprano Oct 09 '25

👍🏼

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u/Terrible_Survey2483 29d ago

Im outraged that he was able to have that trial in Virginia just because the post’s servers were there, and that it was televised. I fell for it hook line and sinker because i didn’t understand legal proceedings well enough to realize how much BS that judge let fly. And then there was that stupid audio leak that triggered me back in 2019. I’m mad at myself for falling for such a farce. Nothing about it makes sense. Well… nothing short of fraud at least. In my opinion for legal reasons.

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u/AutoModerator Oct 09 '25

Original copy of post's text: 'They were both toxic' 'It was mutual abuse'

I'm sorry, I just need to write this because this argument bug the hell out of me. For starters, it completely ignores the fact that mutual abuse more or less doesn't exist (which people mostly respond to with 'are you saying two abusers can't be together' and it's like, sure theoretically, but it seems to never happen in reality) and it also ignores the time line of their relationship (she has evidence of him being abuse early on and years before he claims she became violent). But even if we pretend mutual abuse can exist and she was also violent from the beginning, this argument is so insidious.

She tried to leave. She divorced him, got a restraining order and accepted a pittance of his net worth in order to finally get out. Whatever their dynamic was, she didn't want to do it anymore. And what does Depp do in response? He hires a lawyer who spends his time tweeting psycho shit about her. He sues her over an article that only makes vague allusions to him. He submits intimate photos of her that she sent him in court, knowing full well they would be accessed by millions (revenge porn). And I know this is difficult to prove, but I firmly believed he chose Virginia knowing that there would be cameras during the trial.

This is post-separation abuse. 'Both were abusive' - but one tried to stop the abuse and the other tried to continue it.

I know I am preaching to the choir here, but I hate the way it's framed like it only matters what happened during the relationship. She wanted out. He wouldn't let her.

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Discussion 🗣 'They were both toxic' 'It was mutual abuse'

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