The Truth about Gender Equality

By Kyle Min

Los Alamitos High School

False accusations, false verdict, mountains of evidence otherwise. These are what Johnny Depp, famous for his role as Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Carribean, had when he was in court after his wife Amber Heard, another actor, accused him of domestic abuse. Hearings occurred throughout the year, but the verdict deemed Depp guilty, permanently damaging his shining career. However, there is an overwhelming amount of evidence that Heard abused Depp, not the other way around. Unfortunately, Depp was fired from acting in the third installment of “Fantastic Beasts” and “Where to Find Them”, and Warner Bros. deemed the evidence irrelevant, while Heard kept her acting career without direct punishment.

A senior from Fairmont Preparatory Academy, Kenneth Yang, stated his opinion on the trial, “If I were to be honest, I feel as if the trial has been concluded without firm evidence if there have been new cases that state Amber has actually abused Johnny. In the case that there is new evidence brought to light, I would personally feel as if there needs to be a retrial with the new evidence implemented in the case as well as the old.”

Sadly, Johnny did not receive a retrial nor did he recover from the incident.

People encourage men to stand up for themselves, but how can they if this is the result? There is a toxic bias that men are stronger than women and thus should not be as emotional as women, leading to greater punishment for men, and leeway for women. This is a serious problem that few gender equality activists call attention to.

In order to achieve gender equality, people must understand that men are sensitive too. Many say that men have greater strength, and thus can overpower a female easily. It does not mean that the men are likely to respond with violence. In fact, it is even more difficult for men as they must hold back their violent intent, while women can release it with little to no repercussion.

A junior from Sunny Hills High School, Ellie Jeong, called for equality in the jury. “I think it’s strictly unfair that Johnny lost even with all the voice recording evidence of Amber physically and mentally abusing him… and I think judges should be more fair about domestic abuse on both sides like not judging based on gender stereotypes, etc.”

As a male, I have to live in constant fear that a woman will commit terrible actions against me and accuse me. I would not be able to defend myself even if I had evidence stating my innocence. In order to solve this, both man and woman must team together to fight these stereotypes to prevent any of these avoidable tragedies. Johnny Depp did not deserve the unjust trial, and neither should others. We can fight for true gender equality and prevent future setbacks for mankind.