When the verdict came down in the federal trial of music mogul Sean "Diddy" Combs last July, the jury convicted him on two minor counts of transporting women for prostitution and acquitted him of the most serious charges of sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy. This outcome followed testimony from Cassandra "Cassie" Ventura and other witnesses, along with extensive evidence presented in court.
Cassie testified about a decade of abuse, describing how Diddy beat her, controlled her with drugs, and forced her into degrading "freak-off" sex encounters with sex workers. Witnesses, including a makeup artist, escorts on Diddy's payroll, and rapper Kid Cudi, corroborated parts of her account, with Cudi describing an incident where Diddy allegedly firebombed his car for dating Cassie. A hotel security guard testified that Diddy paid him $100,000 to "bury" the surveillance video showing Diddy kicking and dragging Cassie in a hotel hallway.
Despite this evidence, Diddy's defense team cast doubt by spinning the assault footage as a lover's quarrel, pointing to text messages in which Cassie said she loved him, and portraying her and other accusers as jilted opportunists caught in "toxic but consensual" relationships.
That argument landed because it resonated with a society steeped in sexism, misogyny, and patriarchy and was further reinforced by capitalism's obsession with individual choice and responsibility.
In the American imagination, shaped by neoliberal ideology, every person is believed to be an autonomous actor with free will, fully accountable for their decisions. That lens makes it nearly impossible for jurors and the public to understand how coercion works. We've been trained to believe coercion is always a gun to the head. But in many cases, coercion is financial dependence, career threats, emotional manipulation, and the looming threat of violence from someone who holds more money, power, and status than you. Yet in a culture where "choice" is worshipped, victims are asked why they didn't just leave, as if walking away from a relationship with an obscenely wealthy mogul who controls your finances and your career is as simple as stepping out the door.
Our society struggles to recognize sexual violence unless it conforms to the most extreme, stereotypical image of assault. In Cassie's November 2023 civil complaint, which Diddy settled the day after she filed for $20 million, she described how hotel rooms were deliberately supplied with "baby oil and Astroglide" and how Diddy instructed her to "pour excessive amounts of oil" over herself while forcing her to engage in sexual acts. Federal agents later uncovered around 200 bottles of baby oil and 900 bottles of lubricant in Diddy's homes, alongside weapons, drugs, and other paraphernalia tied to the so-called "freak-off" parties.
Social media quickly filled with memes and jokes about Diddy and baby oil, making light of Cassie's trauma. After the verdict of Diddy's trial was announced, groups of his supporters celebrated the verdict by pouring baby oil over each other in jubilation, right outside the courthouse. We saw the same kind of jokes and antics when Chris Brown infamously attacked Rihanna in 2009, in the aftermath of Tina Turner's 16-year-long abusive relationship with Ike Turner, and in countless other high-profile domestic violence incidents.
It's the same mentality that led so many to ridicule Megan Thee Stallion when she spoke up about being shot by Tory Lanez or to smear Amber Heard in her legal battle with Johnny Depp for not being a "perfect victim." This reflex is especially strong when the accused is a beloved celebrity. In Cassie's case, many in the hip-hop community, including legendary DJ Funkmaster Flex, blamed Cassie for the abuse she endured.
This cultural minimization seeps into everyday discourse. It shapes how abuse is discussed, joked about, and dismissed. And because the carceral system is born from and embedded within this same culture, it cannot possibly rise above it. The cultural conditioning that ridicules survivors online is the very sort of bias jurors bring into the courtroom. How can we expect justice to be achieved by a so-called "jury of peers" when those very peers are steeped in these beliefs?
Diddy was ultimately sentenced to 50 months in prison (with credit for time already served) on two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution. Many are celebrating that he, at least, got time. The judge's sentencing remarks acknowledged that Diddy was "physically, emotionally, and psychologically" abusive to women. But the symbolism of the judge's statements does not change the material realities. Because what happens when Diddy returns to the same spaces and the same industry that propped him up and enabled his violence?
Tory Lanez is currently in prison for shooting Megan Thee Stallion and yet industry titans like Drake and fellow abuser Chris Brown have repeatedly expressed their support of Lanez. LeBron James shared a video of himself bumping Lanez's music in his car. The prison system offers a short-lived disruption. But it does very little to dismantle the cultural, institutional, and structural supports that enabled the abuse in the first place. The entertainment industry is filled with men known for violence against women who continue to be celebrated—Dr. Dre, Mike Tyson, and plenty of others.
This is why Diddy will likely return re-branded, re-accepted, reified as a "comeback narrative." He'll be invited to industry events, podcasts, interviews. He'll be recast as a victim of "cancel culture." As long as the systems that allow powerful individuals to abuse with impunity remain intact, those who are powerless will continue to be victimized.
Celebrity trials involving domestic violence like the Diddy trial and many others that came before continue to show us why true justice can never be achieved as long as we rely on a "justice" system built to protect the powerful and uphold the status quo. While a few abusers are publicly labeled and condemned through the courts, they are the exception that proves the rule. Far more often, the system bends to shield the powerful and punish survivors.
We have to ask: How many survivors watch what Cassie and the bevy of other high-profile victims endured—the grilling on the stand, the online harassment, the jokes at her expense—and conclude that speaking up about their experiences will only retraumatize them? The vast majority of sexual assaults already go unreported. This toxic cultural climate ensures many will stay unreported.
Donald Trump, a man accused of sexual misconduct by over two dozen women, holds the highest office in the American government as president and has faced minimal fallout for his actions. He was infamously caught on tape bragging about sexually assaulting women ("grab 'em by the p—-y") and a civil court found him liable for sexual abuse—yet he paid no real political or personal price. Similarly, Brett Kavanaugh was elevated to the Supreme Court despite multiple allegations of attempted rape in his youth. Bill Cosby's initial criminal trial ended in a hung jury and, even after a later conviction, he walked free on a technicality despite dozens of women's testimony. R. Kelly was protected by industry enablers for decades while he preyed on underage girls. Diddy himself currently has more than 100 allegations of sexual misconduct. Each case is different, but what they have in common is that for the rich and well-connected, "law and order" is flexible and forgiving.
Sexual misconduct is the second-most-reported form of police misconduct, after excessive force, which means the people tasked with investigating sexual assault are often perpetrators of it themselves.
The carceral system was created to work this way and we see that in the origins of policing with slave patrols. It was meant to manage and control those populations, and to protect the interests of the propertied and powerful.
What we can learn from the Diddy trial, and countless episodes like it about the prospects for justice is that we will never see real justice as long as our society is governed by the intersecting systems of capitalism, patriarchy, white supremacy, and imperialism. These systems create the conditions for most of the violence and harm that people experience, and then shield the perpetrators, especially if they are atop the hierarchy.
Achieving justice requires dismantling the very systems that perpetuate inequality and violence because as long as those hierarchies exist, the powerful will always find ways to skate by and the oppressed will always be the ones policed, punished, and left unprotected.
The Diddy trial's outcome was a reminder that the carceral state cannot be reformed into fairness because it was never designed for fairness in the first place.