I am. And I am.
I'm a victim of child (domestic) abuse which started as a teenager, sexual abuse, rape, stalking and sexual abuse. I discovered I was traumatized at a later point in life and had 18 months of EMDR therapy for cPTSD. It was life-changing and life-enhancing. I watched the streamed court sessions in the beginning as I have a fascination with big US legal cases - I've watched them before - and we don't get an opportunity to watch them here.
I withdrew some time ago from watching this trial or participating in the threads. Heard and Depp are both hideous, but I pity both. I know how child abuse can make a mess of a person. I'm disappointed that she's been proven to be a pathological liar. I'm disgusted by the way he speaks about women, goes through his life vandalizing everything surrounding him and everyone still seems to be in thrall to him. I also sense there are powerful forces behind the drive to shut women up. I don't think, as a PP suggested, that women don't necessarily want to believe other women lie. That's a naive assumption. What does trouble me is that society as a whole is (demonstrably) far more comfortable with the idea that women lie 'about the big stuff' than that men - any men let alone the Hollywood icons they love to revere - is capable of horrific abuse. There's a precedent for this. And the abuse levelled at Heard, when both she and Depp have been proven in court to have behaved disgustingly, is far greater than any censure imposed on Depp. It's horribly, obviously, unfair. Still, I suppose while they're gunning for this woman's jugular at least Meghan Markle will get a few days off.
The tone of this thread is horrible, and has descended into people being openly hostile to those whose views don't concur with their own. That's disappointing. The earlier threads were much more factual and informative. There's also a hell of a lot of projection going on here. From the experiences I've listed above, it should be clear I know being the victim of abuse sucks, that trauma and PTSD are horrible conditions to navigate through life. But victims don't always respond in the same way. Frankly, I find the idea that I should be hanging my head, crying, and 'behaving as a victim should' profoundly offensive. The idea that if you don't do this things, you're not a 'real' victim, is repellent. Likewise, being a victim of trauma doesn't mean I get to dictate what being a victim of trauma is universally like, or that I get to dismiss someone's situation because they didn't respond or handle it in exactly the same way I did.
It's shit, and I'm sorry (yet again) so other many women have, like me, been through such awful trauma at the hands of men. But this case isn't about you, any more than it's about me.