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Posted by Jinnistan
5/15/2022 12:27 am
#41

Sorry if it got a little dormant here this week.  I've been with the grandfolk, as Mother's Day coincided with their 70th (!) anniversary this year.  Still trying to adjust back to metabolic normality.


 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/17/2022 6:08 pm
#42

Since it really doesn't deserve its own thread, and this thread is the place for 'hot goss' anyway, I'll just keep dropping the Depp/Heard takes here.

1) Probably inappropriate in this context, but I'm kinda crushing hard on Camille Vasquez.

2) This week's cross-examination is allowing the pattern emerge of the standard playbook of emotional manipulation.  We heard recordings of Heard berating, ridiculing, insulting Depp as "washed up", "sell out", "failure", "a joke", mocking his pretentions as an author, as a father, as "a man".  This dovetails with previous recordings where she calls him a "fucking baby" for not defending himself physically.  Depp then decides that he wants "space".  She taunts him to run away to one of his other 15 houses, and then tries to change the locks on his penthouse (and inviting James Franco over).  And after Depp leaves, Heard sends a barrage of (unanswered) text messages begging him to "come gome" (sic).  The more disturbing evidence is an audio of Depp asking for his space, asking to have time to spend with his daughter, "I'll call you in a couple of hours".  Heard then collapses into tears, "Don't shove me in a corner and poke me with a stick".  Heard's testimony is that her desperation here was because she believed that Depp was actually going to run off to use again and that she was trying to save him.  Somehow, I don't think that Depp was the only one here with a substance abuse issue.

Clustermess, and I know this trial isn't healthy viewing, but maybe I can stop watching whenever I feel like it.


 
Posted by Rampop II
5/19/2022 7:05 pm
#43

Sounds like a classic case of "hoovering."

 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/19/2022 9:21 pm
#44

Rampop II wrote:

Sounds like a classic case of "hoovering."

Speaking of which, Vasquez's questioning on that well-framed photo of Depp's habits: one unlit cheroot in an ashless ashtray, tall freshly poured perspiring glass of alcohol, four cleanly cut lines of cocaine next to a snuffbox marked "J.D.", a plastic tampon applicator for snorting and a driver's license, just so there'll be no mystery.  "That picture.  It's very....neat, wouldn't you say?"

Because drug fiends like Johnny will frequently lay outall his goodies on a glass table, and then decide he needs to go run some errands first.


 
Posted by crumbsroom
5/20/2022 12:10 pm
#45

As stated upthread. I don't really know what is going on in the Heard/Depp trial, but I don't think anyone has to be terribly up to date on all the details to realize an article that was recently posted in the Atlantic is a tremendously bad faith take on the whole affair.

The essence of the article is to reduce what is happening here (ie. the internet turning against Heard en masse) as a mass delusion. People have become fixated (incorrectly) on Depp's innocence (because they are fans!) and Heard's villainy (because she can't be! because......impossible?).

It attaches 'pro-Depp' forces to all sorts of other lunatics who assemble on the internet to swap wild conspiracy theories. There seems almost an implied correlation with anyone who doesn't take everything Heard has said as fact, as being as misguided as QAnoners who are doing their 'research' (QAnon isn't specifically mentioned, but it does cite a bunch of other nonsense people devise online where they are deciphering hidden messages in tweets and other painfully stupid whatnot, and so QAnon seems a convenient umbrella term for this shit). And the ultimate verdit seems to be that anyone who dares to say they are pushing back against Heard because they have concerns how she is giving MeToo a bad reputation, are just using that as camouflage for their anti-woman agenda. It's almost like they've got a brand ready for you if you say anything out of line.

Of course, there is virtually no mention of any of the legitimate problems Heard has had with her credibility on this matter. It's simply taken as a fact that anyone who has any hesitancy at listening to her story, is someone who is beholden to their previous narrative that Depp is a saint above such things as spousal abuse. That these people are the ones incapable of  stepping outside of their predetermined narrative (ummmmmmmm, your article is basically  making the claim that it is straight up blasphemy to even question the veracity of a woman making such allegations, I guess the assumpiton being a false accusation can't possibly happen because you've already determined women don't do such things.....projection much?)

What becomes equally galling then, of course, are the comments defending this on twitter. There are people out there who are throwing up their arms at the notion that some people out there are saying that Heard isn't 'believable'. That this is a substanceless argument against her. Which, actually, I think is fair enough, to a degree, as trying to make determinations on a persons internal character by their external behavior is a notoriously tricky thing to do. Humans generally have a dreadful track record of this, and 'believability' should certainly never be thrown into the 'stone cold evidence pile' in any case, pro or against. But....this becomes a bit of a hard pill to swallow when the article they are championing literally starts off with a former fan of Depp, who believes he is guilty here, bemoaning his 'smug expression' on the stand. Which sure seems to be implying Depp's apparently 'smugness' is part of this particular persons case against him. And was an important enough detail that the author includes in in the opening to her article.

Again, I have no idea what I think on this case. Depp is a substance abusing flake and Heard has definitely given me not terribly great vibes. And even if turns out to be completely true Heard is as much of an asshole as she comes across as, this doesn't exclude her from being the victim of abuse. Not even inconsistencies in testimony necessarily point directly to her lying. But when these are the kind of articles that are written in her defense, which don't so much absolve her of wrong doings as much as preemptively shut down any argument that might question her, it certainly doesn't make those defending her in this light look terribly good. It makes the case for (yet again) this being yet another example where everyone must think and act like these people think and act, otherwise you are determined as an enemy. Which used to be the kind of hardline you'd only hear from fringe lunatics of any political persuasion, but now is clearly the mantra of both the left and the right, who have forgotten that sometimes you have to put some work into your thoughts before you start thinking them. Let alone sharing them on a national publication.


 

Last edited by crumbsroom (5/20/2022 12:26 pm)

 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/20/2022 5:52 pm
#46

crumbsroom wrote:

The essence of the article is to reduce what is happening here (ie. the internet turning against Heard en masse) as a mass delusion.

It's unavoidable to notice some of the "en masse" behavior that's troubling. I've been watching clips of the live feeds, but then my 'recommended' box gets filled up with exactly the kind of editorialized versions made by the kinds of RedPill/Gamergate/Men's Rights cunts that can certainly make the case for the author of that article if they were to choose to limit their research to just that. And, no, it doesn't feel great that I'm "siding" with schmucks, but I try to put the blinders on and focus on the facts of the trial and not be swayed by the peanut gallery. But if one is inclined to measure this media phenomenon by the en masse internet response, then, yeah, it's frequently gross. Maybe I'd question why a domestic abuse trial should be a 'media phenomenon' in the first place. Very similar to OJ, who was inflated into such meta-sociopolitical proportions that the facts of his guilt/innocence became irrelevant to what he happened to represent to the various interested parties. There was a lot of racists who were hungry to watch him to hang, but that doesn't mean he didn't do it.

crumbsroom wrote:

And the ultimate verdit seems to be that anyone who dares to say they are pushing back against Heard because they have concerns how she is giving MeToo a bad reputation, are just using that as camouflage for their anti-woman agenda. It's almost like they've got a brand ready for you if you say anything out of line.

Not as if Heard may be using MeToo as camouflage to push her own agenda. I can only speak for myself, but I if I had a habit of accusing the women who have stepped forward to call out the abuse in their industry as self-serving shrews, then that'd be one thing. But Heard is an outlier, and it isn't because I'm a fan of Depp. (I was also a fan of Cosby, Polanski, Spacey, etc.)

crumbsroom wrote:

What becomes equally galling then, of course, are the comments defending this on twitter. There are people out there who are throwing up their arms at the notion that some people out there are saying that Heard isn't 'believable'. That this is a substanceless argument against her. Which, actually, I think is fair enough, to a degree, as trying to make determinations on a persons internal character by their external behavior is a notoriously tricky thing to do. Humans generally have a dreadful track record of this, and 'believability' should certainly never be thrown into the 'stone cold evidence pile' in any case, pro or against. But....this becomes a bit of a hard pill to swallow when the article they are championing literally starts off with a former fan of Depp, who believes he is guilty here, bemoaning his 'smug expression' on the stand. Which sure seems to be implying Depp's apparently 'smugness' is part of this particular persons case against him. And was an important enough detail that the author includes in in the opening to her article.

I can see 'smugness' as a trigger. If I were representing Depp, I may have advised, "Hey, maybe don't show up in court looking like a Juarez Pimp." His vanity definitely adds to a sense of his being controlling and entitled.

But my issues with Heard are less about her "external behavior". I may joke about her "dead-eyed stare", but these are just jokes. Her actual credibility is very much in question based on what is the substance of her testimony and evidence.  In fact, some of her testimony appears to be tantamount to perjury.  One of the key pieces from her cross-examination this week was concerning the divorce settlement that she testified that she donated to charity.  (This is significant to her claim that she had not profited at all from the divorce.)  Turns out, not so much.  Now, whether it's an example of external behavior to watch Ms. Heard repeatedly conflate having "pledged" the donation to actually paying the donation, I think, exposes a willingness to deceive.  (It's like Seinfeld's bit about reservations, "Anyone can take a reservation, but it's whether you can hold a reservation, because that's what a reservation is.")  The context of this particular deception is relevant to the motives of why she wrote the WaPo op-ed, long after the divorce settlement was finalized to the signed satisfaction of both parties, which motive is at the heart of Depp's lawsuit.

crumbsroom wrote:

Again, I have no idea what I think on this case. Depp is a substance abusing flake and Heard has definitely given me not terribly great vibes. And even if turns out to be completely true Heard is as much of an asshole as she comes across as, this doesn't exclude her from being the victim of abuse. Not even inconsistencies in testimony necessarily point directly to her lying.

As I mentioned above, I do think that a few of her inconsistencies do show deception.  But the more damning stuff from the past week have been in the audio recordings played in court, which I mentioned in a previous post, showing Heard berating and taunting Depp, specifically focusing on his career and manhood.  And I'm not defending Depp for laying hands on her or any woman.  I'm only pointing out that if he did, it's probably because she was being an asshole, and maybe even because she was laying hands on him, ie "I was hitting you, not punching you".

crumbsroom wrote:

It makes the case for (yet again) this being yet another example where everyone must think and act like these people think and act, otherwise you are determined as an enemy. Which used to be the kind of hardline you'd only hear from fringe lunatics of any political persuasion, but now is clearly the mantra of both the left and the right, who have forgotten that sometimes you have to put some work into your thoughts before you start thinking them. Let alone sharing them on a national publication.

I agree, and I'm avoiding the tribal instincts here, and it's why I feel pretty disgusting engaging in it.  I'm definitely, and somewhat unapologetically, fascinated with the case itself, but I have no interest in taking part in the 'water cooler' corner of internet/twitter commentary.  Let's face it.  This is pretty much the new Blue Dress/White Dress of the season, and a lot of people have the memories of goldfish so they keep playing these sports every year.


 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/21/2022 1:39 am
#47

Can we agree that the prospect of 1994 hot sex between Ellen Barkin (circa-Bad Company) and Johnny Depp (circa-Don Juan DeMarco) is scaldingly intriguing? 

Christ-in-fondue can't we get a sex tape for that?


 
Posted by Rampop II
5/21/2022 3:06 am
#48

Jinnistan wrote:

Christ-in-fondue can't we get a sex tape for that?

I'll buy that for a dollar. 

"The jury requests more Dramamine."

Seems like we've also long lost sight of the fact that this is a defamation suit brought by Depp, since it seems to have morphed in the public eye into a criminal prosecution of Depp for domestic abuse. 

Last edited by Rampop II (5/21/2022 5:36 am)

 
Posted by Rampop II
5/21/2022 5:30 am
#49

I'm imagining a movie loosely based on this, from the jury's perspective; they're growing increasingly sickened by this prolonged and detailed squelch through the bowels of ghastly dysfunction. With every passing day they are more pissed about having to be there, and grow increasingly resentful towards the plaintiff and defendant themselves, whose toxic personalities and pathologically pyrrhic shitshow of a lifestyle landed these twelve defenseless civilians in this damned jury box. The plaintiff and defendant aren't specifically Depp and Heard, but kindred specimens of such obsessive celebrity dysfunction. The overwrought jurors eventually begin scheming on how to just off these people, or get them killed somehow, mostly in order to bring and end to the torturous ordeal, but also because the jurors really can't stand these people, and are becoming increasingly eager to dispatch them. 
I should go to bed. 

Last edited by Rampop II (5/21/2022 5:42 am)

 
Posted by crumbsroom
5/21/2022 7:43 pm
#50

Jinnistan wrote:

crumbsroom wrote:

The essence of the article is to reduce what is happening here (ie. the internet turning against Heard en masse) as a mass delusion.

It's unavoidable to notice some of the "en masse" behavior that's troubling. I've been watching clips of the live feeds, but then my 'recommended' box gets filled up with exactly the kind of editorialized versions made by the kinds of RedPill/Gamergate/Men's Rights cunts that can certainly make the case for the author of that article if they were to choose to limit their research to just that. And, no, it doesn't feel great that I'm "siding" with schmucks, but I try to put the blinders on and focus on the facts of the trial and not be swayed by the peanut gallery. But if one is inclined to measure this media phenomenon by the en masse internet response, then, yeah, it's frequently gross. Maybe I'd question why a domestic abuse trial should be a 'media phenomenon' in the first place. Very similar to OJ, who was inflated into such meta-sociopolitical proportions that the facts of his guilt/innocence became irrelevant to what he happened to represent to the various interested parties. There was a lot of racists who were hungry to watch him to hang, but that doesn't mean he didn't do it.
.

I'm not saying that I don't believe the vast majority of people making a ruckus online about being pro-Depp are probably saying all sorts of vile things, not only about Heard but women in general. I'm sure they are. Actually, without even looking for any of it, I can say I'm virtually certain of this.

My issue is more this particular article's tactic of seeming to push any skepticism towards Heard's account towards the mechanizations and motives of these bottom feeders. These days it's not only that every thing becomes an us vs them if we don't agree across the board, but it is also if you are designated as a 'them' you are also the worst of the worst. Or at least are in some kind of cahoots with them. And it's this total inability to acknowledge any kind of gradation between dissent or disagreement that was really rubbing me the wrong way.

Like, is this particular story the one people want to be pushing all of their chips in on. Because, as you've stated, for me this also seems to be the outlier to the vast majority of these abuse cases. Like, even in the case the Depp has done some of these bad things, at the very least it looks like this toxicity was very much flowing both ways. And that seems to be the best case scenario for those who are taking Heard at her word all down the line.

 

Last edited by crumbsroom (5/21/2022 7:45 pm)

 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/22/2022 5:27 pm
#51

crumbsroom wrote:

My issue is more this particular article's tactic of seeming to push any skepticism towards Heard's account towards the mechanizations and motives of these bottom feeders. These days it's not only that every thing becomes an us vs them if we don't agree across the board, but it is also if you are designated as a 'them' you are also the worst of the worst. Or at least are in some kind of cahoots with them. And it's this total inability to acknowledge any kind of gradation between dissent or disagreement that was really rubbing me the wrong way.

Exactly.  The OJ comparison is relevant because I don't remember any mainstream examples, definitely not high-brow sources like The Atlantic Monthly, of someone making the case that anyone who thought OJ was guilty must be at least a latent racist.  Surely there were many people who factored their perception of race into their assessment of his guilt/innocence, and that's an intriguing enough subject to explore, but someone blanketly claiming that the entire trial was racist gaslighting?  It shows a relative degradation in our lifetimes, and maybe you could attribute this to the then-infant internet, but I think there are other social shifts involved.

The blue dress/white dress is a glib example, but we're dealing with a glut of glibness.  Sometimes, I can't possibly believe that some crappy wedding photo, which has all of the appearance of being taken by accident but inexplicably posted on Facebook, just spontaneously became a media phenomenon and tribal controversy because suddenly everyone forgot everything they understand about photography and the limitations of color integrity (and this is especially true for people in the media, who know better by trade - lighting, makeup, 'color correction' processing -  but still peddled this stunt in perplexed delight) and decided to draw a Mason-Dixon line in the sand.  Why?  Because it was fun.  Everyone wanted to take part in the fan-duel schism.  But this reflex has been trained in a Pavlovian manner, and now this is how the internet responds to any particular controversy.

We're stuck in binary thinking - either/or, us/them, good/bad, monster/god.  There's little sense that people are incomprehensibly complex and defy easy, simple judgment.  But we've become accustomed to expecting simplicity and simple answers, almost helplessly.  I really resent, and actually pity, those who insist on imposing their simplicity onto the rest of society, but the bigger disappointment is seeing that society has increasingly chosen to adopt these simplistic expectations.

Last edited by Jinnistan (5/22/2022 5:28 pm)


 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/26/2022 10:22 pm
#52

Ooof.  Not a good day for Amber.

Or week, really.  But the recent issue to emerge was from yesterday, when a TMZ producer testified to two things: that the "cabinet abuse" video was sent, "from source" (meaning Heard), to TMZ the day before she was to appear in a court hearing to get a restraining order against Depp; and that "her team" notified TMZ of the courthouse and time so that they would have photographers on scene, including instructions specifying which side of her face to photograph in order to capture her bruise.

Today, Heard denied both claims, assering that she has no idea how the video (taken on her iPad) had gotten to TMZ or how it happened to be selectively edited to remove footage of her staging the device and chuckling at the end of it.  As for instructing the papparazzi on where and how to photograph her injury, she responded, "What actual survivor of domestic abuse would do that?"

Which is a pretty good question.


 
Posted by Rock
5/27/2022 10:49 am
#53

Clicked on the thread in the other place by mistake, saw a certain poster asking to clarify basic definitions as usual and clicked out immediately. Still not sure to what extent that person is doing a bit.


I am not above abusing mod powers for my own amusement.
 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/27/2022 8:51 pm
#54

Rock wrote:

Clicked on the thread in the other place by mistake, saw a certain poster asking to clarify basic definitions as usual and clicked out immediately. Still not sure to what extent that person is doing a bit.

I'm not familiar with the word "slappy" used as a term for promiscuity.

Anyway, the end is nigh, and this will all be over with soon.  We'll be free from this national nightmare to spend more time....*checks Congressional headlines*.....on reforming mental illness


 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/27/2022 10:21 pm
#55

Depp has an uncanny way of turning into Alan Arkin on ocassion:  "Don't tell me what it feels like to be poanched!"


 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/27/2022 10:29 pm
#56

Lots of end-of-the-week random thoughts:

Watching tonight's Jeopardy, there was a clue about 'mind-reading', saying that it will soon be a reality due to advances in fMRI technology, but the kicker was that it added an ominous "and it cannot be stopped".  Sounds like a threat.

On a positive note, while host Mayim Bialik is the type of intellectually insecure busybody who would doubtlessly drool over the prospect of looking into other people's heads, it's somehow less threatening to consider that anyone dumb enough to hawk pseudomedicine like Neuriva or write books on the totally-sane science of homeopathy is likely to make any inroads on such an elusive breakthrough.  Best stick with the crystals, Blossom.


 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/27/2022 10:33 pm
#57

(And I'm also a little sore about the clue about the city of Babylon being a synonym for corruption.  I mean, I understand, from the privilege of Judeo-Christian bias, why that is the case, but since I've read a bit since Sunday school about the actual Sumerian/Akkadian/Mesopotamian/Neo-Babylonian cultures, I just think it's a pretty quaint slur to hold onto.  Maybe possibly worse than Seuss' chinamen?  Because they looked silly, but not evil.)

(btw, it was a geography category, not one about the Bible.)

Last edited by Jinnistan (5/27/2022 10:36 pm)


 
Posted by crumbsroom
5/27/2022 11:46 pm
#58

Jinnistan wrote:

Rock wrote:

Clicked on the thread in the other place by mistake, saw a certain poster asking to clarify basic definitions as usual and clicked out immediately. Still not sure to what extent that person is doing a bit.

I'm not familiar with the word "slappy" used as a term for promiscuity.

Oh, that poster.

My ire sometimes forgets about that poster.

Too busy being annoyed with all of the other ones.

Someone should just soak that whole place in gasoline and burn it to the ground with a lit fart.






 

 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/27/2022 11:54 pm
#59

Still amusing how offended Stirch and Agripp got when you suggested the possibility of diluting the purity of the Royal Family.


 
Posted by Jinnistan
5/27/2022 11:57 pm
#60

Also offended at me when, appro The Favourite, I pointed out the speculation from Queen Anne's letters that she may have had a lesbian relationship with a couple of her courtiers.  Nothing about the textual facts, just the thought of it is clearly blasphemy.

Last edited by Jinnistan (5/27/2022 11:57 pm)


 


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