What was your position on Amber Heard & Johnny Depp

[Hugge]

I wonder if your feelings have changed since the trial?

I always viewed their situation as mutually toxic - they both abused and were abused. I honestly hated seeing people seemingly enjoying the tearing down and gaslighting of Amber. I think Amber did herself no favours. She’s clearly a narcissist and it was obvious when she was recounting her experiences. Very dramatic and forced. But I still believe she was hurt by Depp.

Johnny Depp has garnered so much good will for just being Johnny Depp. Not to mention the Children’s hospital visits. But multiple things can be true at once. He can be charitable with his time whilst also being an abuser.

Depp may never have hit Kate Moss. But that has no bearing on his relationship with Heard. In some relationships fighting is almost like foreplay. The emotion, passion etc can be addictive. It probably excited them both to fight and make up.

It is accepted Johnny Depp was addicted to both drugs and alcohol. In my experience, alcoholic men can be absolute monsters. I had an abusive father and the anger just came to the fore as soon as he drank.

Amber is back in the news and I just feel very sorry for her. I’m sure she played her part but I’m sure she was also hurt. Just chewed up and spat out.

More eloquent posters have perfectly articulated exactly how I feel

Yeah I don’t think either of them came out if it well and the weird love-in for JD off the back of it was bizarre and unseemly.

Have you seen that clip of him sloshing down red wine and throwing his weight around, smacking doors shut and being generally ominous and threatening? It’s fucking horrible.

60:40 with Depp as the lesser

Exactly.
Angelina is absolutely hammered in articles/forums for not allowing "poor Brad" access to the children. Barely mentioned is the reason why and in the comments it's always Angelina lying (and the teenagers presumably) and Angelina manipulating and Angelina being controlling over the kids. Never Brad being the one at fault.

I think he probably always had tendencies towards alcohol and bad behaviour. But in his relationship with Vanessa he was happier, or there was no circumstance for it all to go to shit.

Whereas with Amber the toxic environment between them was just a powder keg.

I already disliked her because of all the press reports at the time they got together that she’d been very calculated in pulling him.

I think they were both to blame but on balance 75:25 with the much larger bit to Amber. As PP said, play stupid games and win stupid prizes. Plus her open lies in court, and the fact she had a history of abuse where Johnny did not.

Him and Paul Bettany are both disgusting excuses for human beings - i used to like both of their films but haven't been able to watch them either of them again since they discussed what they would do to her.

I believe her and I'm not sure how he came out of it smelling of roses except that he has more money to throw at PR.

I believe her, and think any violence on her behalf may have been prompted by his violence and chronic drug/alcohol abuse.

The trial was vile. It was horrific watching the blatant misogyny be televised, and that should never be allowed to happen again.

Angelina is absolutely hammered in articles/forums for not allowing "poor Brad" access to the children. Barely mentioned is the reason why and in the comments it's always Angelina lying (and the teenagers presumably) and Angelina manipulating and Angelina being controlling over the kids. Never Brad being the one at fault

Almost scary how it was easier to call her a "crazy, lying bitch" than accept that in private Brad Pitt was nothing like his public image. "But he was soooo gorgeous in Legends of the Fall"🙄

Funny, he admitted in an interview that he got drunk every day for 40 years and his almost adult children want nothing whatsoever to do with him. But yeah, she's clearly the "crazy" one!

I used to believe Depp until I saw how the press turned on Blake Lively after Baldoni hired the same publicist that Depp did before the court stuff and the online attacks started.

Both as bad as each other.

Jonny, too rich and mental, surrounded by people
telling him
hes ok

Amber

beautiful but absolutely doo lally crackers x100000000

In these situations it doesn't have to be true it just had to be believed. I don't think we'll know the truth as it probably depends on who you choose to listen to and believe.

Just let them get on with their own lives, what does it matter to me.

I think it's pretty clear at this point that Johnny Depp is not a nice person. Ditto Brad Pitt.

Depp lost his libel case because the judge said 12 incidents of domestic violence had occurred, and that it was fine for him to be headlined as a wife-beater as it wasn't defamatory. That doesn't mean Amber Heard didn't carry out her own domestic abuse on him. I think the truth is probably that they were both abusive physically and verbally towards each other, but she's come out of it ruined and he's come out relatively intact. Funny that.

Brad Pitt is another one where there is third party evidence of his abusive behaviour towards his wife and children, yet no one seems that bothered.

Oh ffs
All this shit about ‘the power.’ This isn’t a secretary who was abused by her boss. JD is the “top” of celebrity fame. Women literally throw themselves at these men …. And I mean THROW themselves. You’d be absolutely staggered at what they do … bribe doormen/concierges/ agents to get them close and literally refuse to leave.
It’s actually not hard to say no to ‘top’ celebrities and I say this a moderately attractive women (at the time) with no money or fame etc. who happened to be around at the time. It’s not a romcom .. you say no and they (their lackeys) move on instantly to the 10000000 of women in the queue who are as equally attractive as you. Amber Heard was not a no money, no power woman. She was pretty and doing ok but she saw he opportunity and fucking relentlessly chased down a drug addled married man and fucking wore him down until he gave in. Everyone saw it. That doesn’t excuse him (although its interesting that on MN only women are allowed substance abuse problems- men who have them are just scum) and once she’s got him and raised her profile from bit part actor to someone who got more prominent roles she then decided she didn’t like it.
She is not a victim. She set out to get what she wanted. It didn’t work out as she wanted

I actually think he was having a midlife crisis breakdown and getting together was just a symptom of that.. if it hadn't been her it would have been another girl. I think his addictions were already getting out of hand and she was someone he could party with so he went off with her thinking he can do what he wants now.
And of course it all went to shit with no one to put the breaks on.
I don't think it was down to her, I think he had inevitably reached a point in his life when it was gonna spin out of control for him. His kids were nearly adults, his looks were fading.. I just think he was able to keep a lid on his lifestyle more when he first married Vanessa and had kids.. but yeah he's always had issues and that tends to come to a head in middle age with drinkers etc
And I think amber has BPD. A symptom of which can be 'splitting' putting someone on a pedestal until they trigger you and become a villain. Very difficult to look at things in shades of grey for people with bpd sometimes. I think she probably started off thinking they were bonnie and Clyde, sid and Nancy.. some romantic rebel soul mates... then at some point switched to thinking he was her abuser and oppressor. I think she probably believed both these things at the time she believed them, utterly.
I don't think she was capable of seeing they were mutually toxic and I think she went for him in the press because she was genuinely in a lot of pain and switched to believing he was evil. I don't think she had mich insight into her own addiction issues or behaviour.
I don't think she would have even been in that situation tho if she hadn't been vulnerable due to her bpd.
The power dynamic is obviously disgusting. Whatever she's done he has always had the upper hand. I don't think he was the malicious villain she ended up thinking he was. However he always had the upper hand just by the nature of his age, his wealth, his popularity.. i think they are both very flawed people who were mutually abusive but my sympathy is more towards her as I do think she was far more vulnerable. The way she has been treated in the aftermath is beyond shocking.
And it makes me wanna vom the way he is idolised.

Omg yeah.. the relentless hazing of Blake Lively at the moment is nuts. So much on all social media. I really sit there thinking 'who is this that's so interested in getting everyone to hate Blake lively at the moment and why?'
The Hollywood publicity machine is properly scary. I actually feel quite sorry for anyone caught up in it.

I was sitting a lunch with 2 collegues male and female (early 30s). We were talking about it, and the female collegues asked me if I believe he was "innocent". I laughed and said not in a million years. The male collegue was taken aback and said she was abusive to him, and we both said yeah but he was also abusive. It really meant a lot to him that Johnny was the vicitm in this situation.

He is repulsive. This is a really interesting take on the defence tactics used by JD’s US legal team.

Yeah I think Blake Lively and her "florals" in a film about domestic abuse was incredibly tone deaf, but of all the shit put out about her none of it was actually that bad. She was a bit snappy with a reporter and talked over people a bit, and I can imagine was a pain in the arse, but that isn't abuse and probably even close to "toxic" beahviour.

The film isn't really about domestic abuse though.. it's not some serious film at all.. it's a romance. Colleen hoover writes romance and quite a lot of it is completely morally fucked. I'm not against that, I think it can be fun and she can write what she wants.. but let's not pretend this film was something it wasn't it's camp trash akin to 50 shades of grey or Flowers in the Attic. The domestic violence on it is thinly covered porn. "Oh no the two really hot men are fighting over me!!" "He's just so obsessed with me that he's driven to violence!" It's absolute fantasy. It's not gritty realism. I say this as someone who has experienced domestic violence. And I also say his as someone who enjoyed the film for the nonsense it was.
So I just think it was bizarre the way people came for Blake Lively over the way she promoted the film. It really isn't a deep film. Her name is Lilly Blossom Bloom and she owns a florists.. and that sets the tone there.
I found it so odd that people were trying to give out that it's been some ground breaking comment on domestic violence. It's like saying Flowers in the Attic is a serious film about child abuse.
I don't think Blake was tone deaf at all.

You seem very invested

I think they were both abusive but she definitely manipulated the situation. The fake bruising, the photographing/filming the situation to prove her narrative (a truly abused woman would be too scared/traumatised to think of filming stuff in the moment). The "pledging" to donate the money that never happened, the shitting on the bed.

He's not innocent but she wasn't the completely blindsided victim she tried to portray. A lot of the time she knew what she was doing/almost relishing in filming/photographing it to suit her own narrative.

My position?
Why should I care about them?
I can't understand how posters can invest so much emotional energy in this

a few posters have said that how he treated past partners is irrelevant . Obviously theres always a first time but wasn't calling past partners to testify to show there was no pattern of violent behaviour in previous relationships ? I also didn't think that witnesses such as Kate Moss can choose whether or not they want to give evidence or am i wrong ?

I think both lied at trial. Both were violent no idea who was violent first but its a good thing for both that the relationships over .

Just interested in having a discussion. So many wider issues come in to play - role of media, misogyny, power dynamics, gender bias etc