Depp v Heard Audio Book Demo
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EnglishVoice Age
Middle Aged (35-54)Accents
North American (General)Transcript
Note: Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and may contain errors.
On April 26th, 2022. Clinical and forensic psychologist, Shannon Curry took the stand at the Fairfax County courthouse in Northern Virginia. She had been hired as an expert witness by the plaintiff actor Johnny Depp in a highly publicized defamation lawsuit he had brought against his ex-wife actor Amber Hurd following the disillusion of their brief marriage, Hurd had publicly accused Depp of physical and emotional abuse. Her statements according to Depp were untrue the machinations of a vindictive ex with an unstable personality and he contended that she had irreparably damaged his reputation and thus his future financial prospects. Curry testified that after having evaluated her for 14 hours over the course of two days, she believed that the defendant met the criteria for borderline personality disorder or BPD. The current edition of the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of mental disorders or DS M describes this disorder as a pervasive pattern of instability of interpersonal relationships, self image and effects and market impulsivity that begins by early adulthood and is present in a variety of contexts. Would you agree that a disproportionate degree of women are tagged with a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder. Hurd's counsel asked Curry under cross examination. No, that's not quite right. Curry replied, 75% the way you phrased it is not quite right. Tell me, tell me what's right. Ok. So there are more women who have been diagnosed with bipolar than men. It's more prevalent in women. Curry said, and trauma can cause borderline personality disorder, can't it? No, never. Right now, we know there are people who have sustained borderline personality disorder who have sustained childhood trauma. Curry said there are also people who have borderline personality disorder who have had no childhood trauma. So like most personality disorders and really like most mental health issues in general, there seems to be both a biological component. In this case with borderline personality disorder. The research tends to support a genetic component and possibly a neurological component. And then there is also possibility of an environmental component triggering those genetic markers. Through Curry's testimony. Depp's lawyers hope to portray Hurd as innately irrational, hysterical as a person who sought to defame her ex husband out of a predisposition to act crazy rather than as a participant in a toxic dynamic for which Depp might also be held legally responsible. The jury's acceptance of this narrative was tangibly expressed a couple of months later when they determined that Hurd owed Depp $15 million in compensatory and punitive damages while Depp who heard it countersued, owed Hurd only $2 million in compensatory damages. Almost everything Curry had said in her testimony was incorrect. Yet while Hurd's counsel pushed back, some, no one was prepared to fully defy Curry's presumed authority over psychological illness. And the version of reality that she presented was in full accordance with mainstream views on BPD. Never mind the questionable legitimacy of giving a personality disorder diagnosis to someone after having known her for only two days. Never mind Curry's dismissal of the rate of women versus men diagnosed with BPD well documented in the DS M and elsewhere. Never mind that Curry had mistakenly used the phrase bipolar disorder when she meant to say BPD, betraying a common confusion among mental health providers that often leads to those diagnoses being conflated and misapplied. Never mind, Curry's flagrant misrepresentation of scientific evidence. Contemporary research suggests that at most, 40% of the variance in borderline cases can be attributed to biological factors leaving 60% to the environment. Perhaps most of all, never mind, Curry's unequivocal denial of the relationship between BPD and trauma. Given the media frenzy that it erupted around depth. He heard even a conservative estimate would suggest that tens of millions of people heard that particular exchange spoken by a doctor under oath and trauma can cause borderline personality disorder. Can't it? No. When depth V heard began, I had already been working on this book, an attempt to reconsider the chronically misunderstood and much maligned borderline for a couple of years. This book began on a scale more intimate than that very public trial. With a comment made by a patient in my private psychotherapy practice, who I refer to throughout this book is Anna, everything I've read about what it means to be borderline describes people at their most extreme. Anna said why she asked were people with BPD never depicted in a state of change of growth, innumerable books and articles on other conditions found in the DS M like depression, anxiety and explicitly trauma based disorders highlighted the process of healing and recovery. Did BP DS exclusion from this company mean, the condition really could not be treated. This has not been an or my experience of the disorder even though or perhaps because my approach to working with her fell outside the present mainstream of psychology. I am a psychoanalytic psychologist. This means some things you might expect. I have a couch in my office and see some patients three or four times a week and others you might not. I don't oblige anyone to lie down during sessions and in fact, discourage many patients from doing so, especially those who I think would benefit from staying grounded in the reality of the session in the back and forth of words and facial expressions. I don't tell patients what to call me most settle on Alex though some stick with doctor Chris even after knowing me for months or years, often this speaks to how a patient thinks of the power dynamic in our relationship. Are we equals on a first name basis or I am a quote unquote doctor? Are they my client or my patient? I tend to use the terms interchangeably though I prefer the latter for its association to someone in pain, seeking help. The former has always struck me as too sterile and business like to describe psychotherapy as I understand it.