DARVO In Action
In case you have not come across the acronym DARVO, it means Deny Attack Reverse Victim Offender. DARVO is the ugly sister of gaslighting. On the off-chance you are not familiar with gaslighting, or even if you are, here is a short video that explains its history as well as a bit about it.
Both gaslighting and DARVO are used by individuals but increasingly they are used by governments and sundry organisations, including NGOs which are often little more than an arm of the government.
When the victim(s) are not involved, both gaslighting and DARVO are often effective because people don’t bother to research. There is a humorous song about this recorded in 2004: We Only Read The Headlines. If people who read only the headlines are to blame, then what about the people who write them or who propagate false information gratuitously?
This short video gives several recent examples from the United States. The incidents discussed by Democrat pundit Brian Tyler Cohen and snake oil salesman/senator Jamie Raskin actually happened and the facts given are true, but what is missing is context; none of the people involved were victims, and their own behaviour rather than state oppression resulted in their misfortunes.
Now, here is one disgraceful recent example of DARVO. The case of Karmelo Anthony was discussed here in April; the full story can be found at this link, but a very brief recap: Anthony was attending a high school sports meeting at Frisco, Texas where he stabbed Austin Metcalf through the heart after Metcalf attempted to eject him from a tent. Anthony is claiming self-defense, but as the knife was in his bag, he had no right to be in the tent, and could simply have retreated, that will cut no ice with the court, even though a judge has set him free on a $250,000 bond. A grand jury will be held later this month if it hasn’t met already.
While his family has a right to raise funds for his defense, the volume of offensive comments directed at his victim has been sickening, none more so than this petition. This is the archived version; at the time of writing, the original is still up although the number of verified signatures has been reduced from 497 at the time of archiving to 204 on June 22. The site has rejected or ignored at least one request to take the petition down; comments are viewable on the live version, comments which are disgusting and ignorant in equal measure.
Austin Metcalf: a totally innocent victim vilified by grotesque lies.
The claim made in the petition that in Texas, all participants in a felony can be charged with murder if one of them is killed during the act, is true. To take an actual example from another state in the Deep South, in December 2009, Jamie Witherspoon and Eric Baggett each donned a mask and attempted to hold up a Tuscaloosa store. The clerk shot Baggett dead, but it was Witherspoon who faced a murder charge, which was upheld on appeal.
Now apply this to the Karmelo Anthony case, had Austin and Hunter Metcalf attacked Anthony with lethal intent or attempted to rob him, a case could be made out for felony murder against the surviving twin.
Fortunately, for justice if not for Karmelo, there is absolutely no evidence that anything like this happened, and indeed, the authorities have now shown CCTV to the media which confirms that only two people were involved in this incident. Furthermore, this evidence appears to gel with Anthony’s own self-incriminating statements to law enforcement shortly afterwards. Doubtless, the CCTV will be released to the public during or after the trial.
These kind of lies are far from uncommon in murder cases. In November 1986, Satpal Ram murdered a fellow diner in a restaurant but was portrayed as the real victim for years. Although he was paroled, his conviction was never overturned, and shortly after his actual release he was recalled to prison for several more years.
Whenever a woman kills a man, it is a racing certainty that the victim will be portrayed as the real perpetrator. When kept woman Zoora Shah murdered her lover, her first reaction was to Deny; although she didn’t testify at her trial, she insinuated through her counsel that Mohammed Azam had been murdered by his wife. She was convicted on overwhelming evidence, but a gaggle of demented feminist liars managed somehow to get her case to the Court Of Appeal where it was shredded by Lord Justice Kennedy. Deny having failed, it was time to Attack Reverse Victim Offender. She was the real victim because she had been sexually abused by Azam. Heck, what choice did the poor woman have other than to lace his samosa with strychnine?
There are numerous cases like this. Sally Challen got away with murder albeit after spending nearly a decade in prison; Emma-Jane Magson didn’t, in spite of two spurious appeals.
Cold-blooded murderess Emma-Jayne Magson.
DARVO comes in many forms, from the trivial to the monstrous. To avoid it as far as possible, make sure you read more than the headlines, and don’t take an accuser at his or her word. As the man said, trust but verify.