Despite rumors, Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, will ultimately not testify in the defamation lawsuit brought by Johnny Depp against Amber Heard (with whom Musk had a brief affair).
Posted yesterday at 7:15 a.m.
We understand him wanting to stay away from this affair which has become a delirious media circus. Elon Musk is also the one who wants to lift Donald Trump’s ban on Twitter, if he manages to buy the social network, where Amber Heard is burned daily like a witch at the stake.
After a week of respite – especially for those who can no longer take this heartbreaking saga – the trial resumed on Monday, and the show even more beautiful. Even if Amber Heard would have all the wrongs, that does not completely explain the outpouring of pure hatred against her. I have rarely seen such a charge, which goes far beyond the banal voyeurism. We take sides as if it were the trial of the century and clearly for Depp. The petition to remove Amber Heard from the sequel Aquaman collected millions of signatures.
I have the impression that there is in this a revenge, even revenge, towards the #metoo movement. Amber Heard is set to become an example that women shouldn’t be taken at their word when reporting their abusers, since there can be “innocent” victims like Johnny Depp. It does not matter if the audio and video recordings showed an inglorious image of the actor.
This lawsuit, requested by Depp in a state where they are broadcast in full, is being dissected every second on TikTok, Twitter, YouTube and Facebook, and it is turning against Amber Heard.
All the clichés of the crazy, hysterical (mostly lying) blonde are brought back to life — mind you, they had never really gone away. I have read even harsher things, even downright filthy comments. We loosen up, let’s say.
For women who have really suffered violence, for those who have denounced or are thinking of doing so, this trial is torture.
PHOTO BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI, ASSOCIATED PRESS
The slightest gestures of Amber Heard are dissected on social networks.
Millions of Internet users scrutinize the slightest movement of the actress’s eyelashes, analyze the quality of her bruises on photos, her emotions, her absence of real tears when she cries. I have never seen so many certified specialists in non-verbal language. She plays comedy, they say, and badly. But isn’t Johnny Depp a comedian too?
Regardless, the tone is with #JusticeforJohnnyDepp, who successfully went from pirate of the Caribbean to hacker of algorithms. His groupies applaud him in court. Men and women thank him for showing the true face of a profiteer surfing on a feminist wave.
Social media has been pro-Depp from the start, and Amber Heard seems to be delivering that lying woman spectacle that many are relishing in, regardless of the serious accusations of violence one hears on the stand.
It is documented that women and minorities are particularly targeted by hate speech on social networks. But this is the price to pay, I imagine, for the freedom of expression so dear to Elon Musk, that he is ready to pay dearly to buy back Twitter, where he wants to bring Donald Trump back.
This president who took advantage of Twitter to encourage a coup d’etat, adored by Christian fundamentalists too, since he carried out the divine mission of appointing the right number of conservative judges to the Supreme Court to be able to overturning women’s right to abortion in the United States.
Meanwhile, the Heard-Depp affair fuels the worst of the people, who have already decided which way the verdict should lean. And no matter what anyone thinks of this case, it looks like an online bonfire. Johnny Depp can laugh in his beard, he knows he has won the battle of public opinion.
Whether she wins or loses this case, Amber Heard is destroyed. And something of the #metoo movement will go down with her, I’m afraid, as she crumbles in the dock.