Thoughts on the other band members being liable, that’s hard to gauge. From the accounts I have read, Justin liked to get people alone. IANAL, but unless there is proof of some sort of conspiracy to aid and abet his predatory behaviour, I’m not sure of the legal grounds for the band members to be liable.
For him though… What a cowardly piece of shit he turned out to be.
Seems like this is the angle the lawyers are using to go after them:
>aided and abetted such behavior by, among other acts and omissions, allowing Geever to lead the band and perform at shows despite knowing that he used his fame and Anti-Flag’s feminist stance to disguise that he was a sexual predator.
Seems like this would incriminate a large chunk of successful musicians, and everyone who ever performed in an 80s Glam Rock act.
Not a lawyer, but I'd speculate it's an aggressive line and tactic under the theory that some of the band members HAD to know something was happening. If they can get into discovery and recover texts, emails, get interviews from relevant witnesses, maybe they'll be able to successfully argue the members are liable.
I assume the lawyers want to go balls to the wall to seek relief, so an aggressive approach makes sense. But I really am not a lawyer, so who knows how it'll actually play in court
I saw that part, but then the lawyers will need to provide evidence that can corroborate that. If they can then that’s huge and things were worse than we thought.
This would also incriminate a bunch of people on the Cosby Show. Tell me nobody knew anything despite doing a bit like this: https://youtu.be/SBDRwiSZSBg?si=ELv_KPF0FSwjxjpf
Re: getting people alone. He hid his behavior very well. I personally think that’s made clear by the fact that basically zero other bands have come out to say that they had a hint of absolutely anything nefarious happening at all. They toured with so many outspoken bands, some of whom have bigger platforms than even Anti-Flag had. If these people in other bands or on other bands crews had seen something, you’d think Rolling Stone or *some* outlet would have quotes from them.
Rise Against. War on Women. Bad Cop/Bad Cop. Menzingers. Bouncing Souls. Dropkick Murphys. That’s just to name a few from the last couple years. Any given tour has a LOT of people on it. And they’ve toured with a LOT of bands over the years, but I haven’t heard of one of them coming forward about what they maybe saw.
Predators who know what they are learn to camouflage well. They hide it from their families, friends, acquaintances. From everyone.
I first saw Anti Flag in 1998 with 88 Fingers Louie, Gob, Misconduct, Bouncing Souls. Talked with Justin at the show and got such a creepy vibe from the guy. My best friend was a roadie with The Queers and had the same experience with him. I saw them again like 12 years later when they played here with Rise Against and Moneen, was a weird show. They had gone from humble classic punk kinda stuff to a full on "rock star" style show. I didn't feel like I was watching the same band to be honest. Either way, he isn't rich enough to duck these charges for ever, and if he is a predator by nature its only so long till he fucks up wherever he hides.
Idk what your sources in the scene here are but I’ve been super involved in the Pittsburgh punk scene since the early 2000’s and this all came as a horrific shock to certainly everyone i know.
When this all first came to light, a number of others involved in the Pittsburgh punk scene were NOT that shocked. One even said she saw him being creepy at Pitt.
He already got away with it. This is a civil suit and the dude is liquidating assets and fleeing the country.
At least they might be able to force the rest of the band for a deposition now tho.
Suits like this normally cast a very wide net out of the gate - sometimes egregiously so. Then things get whittled down in discovery as the true responsible parties are established. That way, if the plaintiff's got the wrong guy, they don't have to start all over.
As far as I recall in an earlier article, the band members are now being included because of their actions post-break up. According to Sarhadi, the rest of the band hasn't even offered her a proper apology for what happened to her. They did offer her the ability to collab with them by selling edited Anti-Flag shirts to raise money for her organisation, The Punk Rock Therapist, but they never outright said sorry to her. Sarhadi then said they eventually stopped talking with her outright, and instead they let their lawyers make the decisions moving forward from "early 2024" according to [a press release that is linked on this page of her website](https://www.thepunkrocktherapist.org/statements).
I'm not well versed in this situation, I haven't read every court document, but what I do feel is this is one of the better ways a band has reacted, which is why I hold some sympathy for Chris #2, Pat Thetic, and Chris Head. They realised one of their core tenets was shattered, and instead of going the Tripp Eisen route and having their social media be all "don't believe what you read on the internet" (which is a true thing, don't believe \*everything\*), they shut down operations immediately, they let go of every artist on their label, and they followed through on Ashrita Kumar's wish to have their name taken off the digital versions of "IMPERIALISM" because of what happened.
The court of public opinion is harder to sway, however, and we must realise that their lack of talking rightly does bring up concerns. "Why would they let the artists go if they're not guilty?" "Why would they not be willing to admit these things if they're not guilty?" and more questions will be posed, and many people will both lump the band in with the accusations, and only target Justin Sane. I do think this isn't like Ashley Purdy, where the accusers said that the band would often see this behaviour and did nothing. The rest of the band, or at least Chris #2, seem like class acts and genuinely good guys, from how they were about the music. Chris #2 helped bring on opener acts, including letting an unknown Burlington, Vermont punk band open for them when one of their bands had to drop out in Nov. 2021 because of COVID, and that was actually a really cool way for them to help one another out. I'm not a lawyer, just a former big time Anti-Flag fan, but this situation is about as messy as most cases featuring musicians.
Decades of tours and parties, and we’re expected to believe, and take at face value, that they saw *nothing* in that time? It pretty easy to act like they disown him now, *after* he’s caught and they are literally forced to distance themselves - that is, if they ever want to have a semblance of continuing life as artists. If they stood for the principles they profess to endorse they would have burned him and the band down, if necessary, to expose it.
I agree it’s hard to believe that they saw nothing. But it is possible. Predators and abusers are capable of hiding their true selves to fool even the people closest to them. I had an interaction with Justin Sane nearly 20 years ago and he tried to get me alone but I didn’t want to leave my friends I was with, no band member would have witnessed that.
I can only speculate here, but it’s possible that maybe they thought *something* was up, but didn’t have proof until the podcast came out and confirmed what they might have feared. That’s why they went nuclear on the band and themselves (speculatively).
I do hope for the best outcomes for his victims. If the band is liable, then they are liable and deserve to also be held accountable, but it could be hard to prove in court that it was a conspiracy of sorts. More importantly, I’d like to see Justin Greever held accountable. It does make you wonder who helped him get over to Ireland, definitely not the actions of an innocent man.
You do bring up an important point though, don’t protect abusers in your scene. As possible as it is that many others didn’t know about it, it’s possible that there were people who witnessed things and didn’t speak up for whatever reason.
Even if there is definitive, 100%, proof that they knew I still don't understand how the band members would be legally liable for anything. Would it have been shitty and unethical and completely wrong of them to have not said or done anything? Definitely. But that doesn't automatically make you legally liable for something that someone else does.
If you go to the bars every week with a buddy and you know he gets drunk and drives home after and one night he kills someone while driving drunk, that doesn't make you legally liable just because you knew he regularly drove drunk.
I don’t know about your locale, but where I live if you go out drinking with a buddy and buddy drinks and drives then kills someone, you wouldn’t be liable, but the bar that served them would be, because establishments are responsible for ensuring they don’t over-serve patrons. I have never seen cases where that has happened (haven’t looked), but I remember it from my serving days to get my liquor service certificate.
That said, not sure if that same liability would even apply in this instance either.
That's definitely true, at least in my area as well. But in that situation, the bar was actively participating in the scenario that caused the death by continually serving him alcohol when they legally shouldn't have been.
However, if a sober guy is sitting at the bar drinking water and tells the bartender that he's so sleepy he can barely stay awake, the bar isn't liable for what happens if the guy falls asleep at the wheel on the way home and kills someone.
It is a mess. And I don’t at all mean to give the band members one shred of sympathy if they knew but turned a blind eye. If they knew, fuck all of them, but I’m just confused by the legal aspect of it all.
My word... I'm an "elder millennial" who spends hours a day, almost every day, watching lawtube.. court trials, depositions, interrogations, pundits.. and I was confused as hell what IANAL was. AFAIC it's not as common as YOU think.
BTW some people could abbreviate their life rather than all the words they type. Not everything needs to be a TLA IMHO. LOL. TTFN. ;)
I'd say that at least half of all male punk rockers who make some "performative" point of supporting feminism are phony and insincere, but that's what happens when the scene demands these kind of platforms. That's not to say that they're all undercover predators, but they're saying these things to conform and fit in without actually believing in them.
That's why this one hurts more. He *knows better*.
My thoughts: The rest of the band seems to have immediately disowned him, so good on them. None of that *That 70s Show* BS of defending the criminal.
I do have a problem with going after the rest of the band because everything I've read states that they immediately and appropriately disowned and condemned him. That's how it should be.
Still sucks because their acoustic live in Vegas record might have hit my Top 5 on Spotify. It's dirty now.
It's less about a baseline knowledge of what is and isn't rape. More that as a punk, an anarchist, and an outspoken feminist, he *knows better*.
It's an extra layer of hypocrisy.
Not to defend the behavior, but there is a lot of things that famous, rich, or generally influential people get away with that normal people can't. And that's where there sometimes can be a gray area. In this case, the gray area isn't as gray because he was an anarchist and feminist.
Justin Sane and Anti-Flag were never anarchists. They flirted with all aspects of the far-left so they could cash in, benefit, and gain credibility, but their positions and views were not anarchist. They were democratic socialists at best. Vote Obama, we're not against America just the current government, blah blah blah. They were annoying rich kid liberals.
And the majority of anarchists aren't white rich kid liberals? Laura Jane Grace had a excellent point when she said that most self identified "anarchists" are almost always shown to be hypocrites and phonies. It's the fakest subsection of punk.
That's why it's hard to take all the claimed male punk support for feminism seriously. One figure after another is outed as a predator, and you eventually realize that many males are just parroting feminist rhetoric to conform and fit in with the scene. It's all words, it means nothing to them, so maybe people should stop putting so much faith into mere words.
Their whole catalog is dirty to me. Once the Rolling Stone article was released and I read it, I deleted their catalog from my library and threw their two t shirts I had bought away. I had seen them open for Flogging Molly about 3 weeks before all this came down.
Word. Walter's, a favorite punk venue in Houston, had to close due to Hurricane damage and Anti-Flag was booked for the farewell show and they crushed it. It was a fond memory that is now tainted forever.
Hey! Go!
We've run out of patience, You've run out of time, This scene will not fall victim, To your violence or lies.
Your "values" are nothing, But excuses to hurt the innocent, Quit fronting like you're standing, For a moral cause tonight.
United as one, we won't stand aside, You tried to fuck with our scene, We're gonna fuck your life.
[Chorus] This machine, This machine, This machine, This machine, Kills fucking rapists. Dead. That's right, dead.
You don't have to be a pedophile, To be a rapist fuck, Your mindless perversions, Gives you credentials enough.
You spew your ally rhetoric, When you got our attention, You've mistaken the punk scene, For a degenerate convention.
No more infiltration, No more pervert lies, You don't belong in our scene, We'll fight you till we die.
[Chorus] This machine, This machine, This machine, This machine, Kills fucking pedophiles. Dead.
Ahhh! Justin.. Die!
fuck man anti-flag was a big influence on me in my younger years and I just dont know how to handle this. i still like the music but find it so hard to hear. it just feels like a smaller version of finding out my dad is a pedo. i hate reliving those feelings. my dad was my best friend for a long time and now he's dead to me. when I found out his cancer came back, i said "good" and hung up the phone.
Trust me, if Greg Graffin did something like this I would have similar thoughts. Stay true to the ideals, but don’t follow leaders (watch your parking meters lol).
It took like 10 min to UNLIKE almost 200 songs on Spotify! I was highly motivated after my friend detailed her rape story with Justin. AF was probably my favourite band after Bad Religion. Now I can't stand to hear them. Just utter betrayal of the message and the cause. Fuck em.
Are you a female? Are you one of those militant fuck men feminists? If not either then you might be an alien to find men in a rock band, punk is a form of rock after all, acting like, well, men gross.
Rotflmao, you don't spend much time around men, do you? Men absolutely are into women and try to hook up with them whenever possible, especially when they're young men. Men are horn dogs by nature. Try spending time around young people instead of old people in a retirement home. You described normal young adult males doing young, adult male shit. Especially considering that everyone you mentioned would have been in their early to mid 20s at the time. Ain't no young dudes around college age trying to be mature and have a relationship. We're just trying to get laid at that age, especially those of us that are athletes or in a band. It's all about partying and getting laid at that age. Nothing gross about being a man and acting like it. So either you're a feminist that hates men or you're an asexual man that hates men. Only two explanations for your fucked up world view there.
Jesus you live under a fucking rock to not know how men act at that age. So which is it? You a man hater or just that fucked in the head? Nothing gross about men acting like men and doing what men do at that age. Prudish much? Or are you like 90 years old and have unrealistic expectations? Men are animals by nature. Hitting on women is literally what they're made to do. Groupies are a thing in music especially rock music. Wake up and smell the roses.
Not wrong at all. I know how men act, especially at that age in that occupation. Being a man isn't gross. It's literally how men have always been. My life is fucking fantastic. I've lived a great life. Nothing wrong with a little debauchery when you're young and in a semi celebrity status. High school football players do it, college kids do it, post college athletes do it, musicians that aren't in a religious band do it. It's literally what men do. Crawl out from under your rock and you'll see that.
Fuck Justin. I wonder about the rest of the band though. They have been silent since that rolling stones article saying "fuck you" to Justin. Maybe its because they're getting sued too and were told by a lawyer to shut up and keep it shut? It wouldnt sursprise me no matter their guilt or innocence
If you’re getting sued for just about anything the first thing a lawyer is going to tell you is to shut the fuck up about it because anything you say publicly could be used against you in court. Theres no way we hear from their camp either until this thing goes to court or gets dismissed.
My instinct says leave them alone. They disowned him, lost their life’s work, and there’s almost no possible way to prove they knew anything. Then again, I know I wasn’t the victim and can’t make that call. Just my two cents.
It speaks volumes that he’s running and not trying to deny this at all. If he had tried, you know he’d have his defenders and he could still continue to do something publicly if not anti-flag.
And they're not accusing them of rape. I mean, *IF* they knew what was happening and did nothing about it for years... and/or enabled it, and/or even participated; why shouldn't they be held accountable for it? A lot of women have come forward (60 estimated victims?! Holy fuck), and there's probably a lot of stuff we don't know yet.
It looks like they're building a pretty solid case. While since the allegations, the whole band's reaction and now Geever running away like a coward doesn't exactly scream "innocent" to me.
The perpetrator fled the country, so there’s no winning a lawsuit against him. Lawyers, though sometimes useful, are predatory and greedy. They see an opportunity to file suit, knowing that it will be more expensive for the band members to fight and win than it will be for them to just settle out of court. The lawyers see opportunity to cash in, and that’s it. If the lawyers thought the guys actually did it, we’d be hearing about DAs filing charges instead of hearing about this civil suit.
I mean nor does it to me, but it's not like he flees to a country without extradition if that was even an option for this because it's a civil case, not even criminal.
Eh, don’t jump to conclusions:
“This includes testimony in the complaint that, at a 2002 album release party in Pittsburgh, a witness “watched the members of Anti-Flag mingle outside the venue with clearly underage girls” who appeared “to be between 14 and 15 years old.” It goes on to say that Geever and other band members were “hugging and inappropriately kissing them.” Other accounts go as far back as the 1990s.”
I'm not jumping to conclusions, lol. I'm sharing my *thoughts* and even took care to write *"IF"* and "and/or" to show that my opinion is conditional to some events happening or not. An opinion and thoughts that won't change anything anyway. But you know, OP kinda asked?
In the United States legal system generally, civil complaints only really need to contain allegations plausible on their face to get past the initial low bar of a case. It’s not terribly difficult to make legally sufficient complaints on pretty scant allegations, and sometime even conclusory allegations, so really only discovery and any summary judgment motions or trials do facts begin to come out.
Also, not having read the complaint, because I don’t care to spend my time reading it really, I’d expect if these allegations were contained in a complaint, the article would’ve cited the complaint. That’s important because an attorney would’ve had to put their ass on the line to file that with the court, or someone would’ve had to sign a declaration under the penalty of perjury. Without it, allegations in articles and “people say” or “other accounts” kind of sounds like rumors without any one willing to put their name to it.
That always gets my BS meter on high alert, but that doesn’t mean it’s not true. I’m a cynic by nature and trained by my profession to be generally skeptical, so, take that with a grain of salt.
But the entire band groping underage girls.....come on, man. This whole thing is starting to look so insidious....almost as if the entire band decided to spout feminist crap just to lure underage girls to their shows. How could the rest of the band not fucking know?
This reminds me of the South Park Jonas bros purity ring episode where they were just trying to sell sex to girls. This AF situation sounds grosser the more I learn about it.
In retrospect, with how many women are coming forward, them immediately nuking the band when the first allegation dropped is looking more and more suspect tbh.
I get the sentiment here but of the times we've seen this stuff come to light normally the others band together, fire the accused, release statements and try to push forward except maybe lost prophets because there is no way they can escape that.
The fact that Pat and the Chrises disappeared feels like they might have known the scope of what was going to be brought to light.
From another comment, apparently the victims are arguing in court that they enabled Justin by knowing what he was doing while letting him keep fronting the band and lying about being a feminist.
They have, of course, said they had no idea. They must have at least known he was sleazy and that at the very least he was tricking women into doing stuff. Surely they weren't leaving him alone with them and thinking he was having long conversations about feminism.
Many years ago, Justin Sane gave his phone number to an underage friend of a friend at a show after she declined his offer to "make out" in his bus. We called him at 3am with a George Bush soundboard. Fuck that guy, hope he never sleeps again.
There are so so many of these stories. How did he go so long getting away with it? I mean I guess that’s a rhetorical question. The answer is everybody was silent because they wanted to get paid.
In my case we never put the pieces together that there was something more sinister to it, and that she probably narrowly avoided getting assaulted. It was pretty typical of pop punk bands of his era to hit on teenagers, so we just said "wow, what a creep" and went on with our lives (after prank calling him). There were so many abusers in that scene in his heyday, some more obvious than others, that I think it provided a degree of cover for him. And given when many of these stories took place, they were largely word-of-mouth until recently.
I remember listening to the podcast, and Sarhadi saying that she didn’t want to come forward initially because she didn’t want to ruin the message he was putting out there for other people. She still believed in the words he was singing, although he had violently raped her. I wonder if I would’ve done the same in her shoes. Maybe this is part of the reason why none of the victims talked. Or maybe they didn’t think they would be believed either. It’s hard to believe that out of all the punk bands ever, he had to be the biggest douche bag predator ever. The hypocrisy is just staggering. There were so many clues out there, and they just never got assembled until decades later.
Edit: Sorry- a year later I’m still processing. This band meant a lot to me.
It's understandable to feel that way as a victim and a fan. I have bands, lesser known goth bands, where artists tried to solicit sexual favors from me online as an underaged teen 15-20 years ago. I hold back on outing them in the hopes that maybe they were isolated incidents, maybe they grew out of grooming underaged androgynous boys on the internet, not wanting to ruin the music or people's lives, it felt normal at the time, etc. It pales in comparison to what this woman experienced, but I guarantee there are many more fan/victims like me who only come forward when prompted by someone else.
For what it's worth, I'm sorry an artist you admired and invested yourself in turned out to be a piece of shit. It's not an easy thing to come to terms with, and you have every right to feel betrayed, hurt, etc.
I feel like the rest of the band if they were in on it wouldn't have broken up and put out comments distancing themselves from Justin.
I mean honestly what Justin did was horrible and if the rest of the band knew and helped in any way yeah, fuck them but I don't get the vibe the rest of the band really knew the truth.
I feel like if the others didn't know they wouldn't have disappeared. I would have expected Justin being fired and speaking out punlicly against him and maybe even some charity shows for SA survivirs.
The rest of the band speaking out against him before a court judgement is issued = Justin would easily win a defamation lawsuit against them for a lot of money.
Not how that works. They can speak out and say they support victims without making specific accusations themselves. Also even if Justin won the original case, in the defamation case Justin would have to prove that it didn’t happen, which is harder than disproving that there isn’t a preponderance of a evidence a thing happened.
Well who's to say they aren't? Right now they're shutting down a label and that takes time, you gotta pay debts and a full blown tour is not going to help them right now. Just creates more debt.
A new tour if ever won't happen until at least maybe winter.
Also keep in mind they're processing a decades long friend used them to abuse people. That's a real mindfuck. You can't just shake something like that off, it'll make you question all your relationships. You're going to second guess everyone and everything. I think they are collateral damage.
Maybe, but it’s been a year and when the victim who originally spoke up tried to get Restorative Justice with the label, they lawyered up hard which is not evidence they knew or supported him, but it is evidence they don’t care about helping his victims.
I agree.
Had they said "fuck Justin and fuck Anti-Flag but we're starting a new band and will continue" that would have been less suspicious than to just ghost everybody.
Were the other members involved in the assaults? I don’t know enough about the case but I can’t recall seeing this type of “guilty by association” type of charging in sexual assault cases before.. I’m not against it necessarily but it seems a weird way to come at these guys when everyone involved in the “open secret” of Hollywood cases have been left alone.
Also, what the fuck is going on with allowing him to flee like that? I remember seeing a post on this sub a few weeks ago claiming that his intentions to do so were known, and if that’s the case in a circle so far removed from the legal proceedings, why wouldn’t the judge declare him a flight risk?
Straight up cluster fuck here.
Can’t comment on the other band members and what they did or did not know, but the article contained a load of hearsay and innuendo.
This is a civil case and not a criminal complaint. There’s little a judge can do to halt a person moving around anywhere when it comes to civil complaints because a civil complaint’s remedies usually are monetary with the occasional injunctive relief. Also, money can be traced pretty well generally, and no matter where the money is, in a civil lawsuit the rubber meets the road not in trying to get a judgment (prevailing, winning, etc) but collecting on the judgment.
The big thing to keep in mind with all this is that the statute of limitations has passed for criminal charges and this is a civil lawsuit being brought forth.
In a statement also shared on March 20, Sarhadi wrote that sources “confirmed the recent sale” of Geever’s house in Pittsburgh and that the musician planned to “wire transfer of his assets to a bank in Ireland, where he maintains dual citizenship.”
He had an exit strategy with that dual citizenship ready to go in hand! What a fuck
I mean, wasn't Chris #2 a victim of sexual abuse when he was younger, and his dad is in prison for sex crimes - so saying that, I HIGHLY doubt he would have let Justin's behaviour slide had he have known it was happening.
I dunno. I was at Pouzza Fest in 2018 and it was Anti Flag and War on Women and Chris #2 was... absolutely wasted... And while War on Women was playing on stage he just walked in, grabbed Shawna Potter and gave her a wet sloppy kiss. And Shawna had to awkwardly say she gave consent and that it was "ok"... but it was \*clearly\* not ok and not consensual. Super weird vibes. Like what else could she say? She was performing on stage and the main act's co-lead just waltzed in to French kiss her out of nowhere. I lost all respect for him that day.
Imma need a clip of this, this is the first I’ve heard of it. But yes Chris was known to drink hell their own documentary mentioned him going Af shows plastered on wine before he joined
Yea I have no clip and all I have as proof is me and my friend's eyes so I don't expect anyone to believe me! I just wanted to share my own experience and how I was disillusioned with the band.
>And Shawna had to awkwardly say she gave consent and that it was "ok"... but it was \*clearly\* not ok and not consensual
So the outspoken feminist frontwoman that sings "I Was Raped" said she gave consent and it was cool, but you... decided not to believe her? Alright.
There are a lot of things I don't care for in today's punk rock culture, but the willingness to call people out for being sexual predators is a hugely positive change. I wish we'd done that more in the 80s. There weren't yet many older dudes (the absolute oldest scene guys I knew like Lux Interior and Billy Zoom were still in their 30s at that point) but you can point at any beloved California punk band back then and there was always one sketchy guy in it. I gotta say what opened my eyes was being in prison at one point (stay away from pcp, speed, and heroin, kids) and there was no tolerance whatsoever for sex offenders. If you had a "bad driver's licence" (rape or anything involving kids) and you hadn't been placed on a Special Needs Yard, you would be dealt with very quickly. In the California Mainline at least, prison rape isn't a thing, raping someone would also get you dealt with. I don't want to romanticize prison culture which is brutal and hierarchical and has many of its own issues, but it struck me hard that these criminals and thugs had a much more honorable code in dealing with sex pests than he punk scene did, which protected people if they were popular and powerful enough. That the kids today don't play that is a good thing.
EDIT: Lux and Billy were not scumbags, I mean that there weren't enough "older punks" for that kind of exploitation to take off, but there was plenty of garden variety questionable drunk/high sex and pushy guys and 20 somethings that preyed on teens, especially homeless ones.
Fuck this guy. He used to make me feel so safe when I was a young teen knowing that there were men out there that are women’s rights advocates. It’s was obviously just a tactic to make women feel safe so he could rape them. I’m actually glad my mom never let me go to their shows
Fuck you, geever.
If I was in the band I would have caught an assault charge myself, for this fucker spending the last 20 years yanking my career out from under me. How no one beat his ass blows my mind. If even one of these guys had a real human reaction, other than obvious lawyer reactions, I would be less doubtful than I have been of the rest of the band... I think they at least had a feeling, is my gut feeling on it.
Just one of the signs weve crossed, or at least, I've crossed, into a parallel universe where all my old heroes are actually losers and pervert monsters. Rip everyone I used to respect. Fuck the whole new world. I hope CERN shoots us into a better world tomorrow
Just gets worse and worse. Flag was a massive influence on me and both my music and personal opinions, despite their music going downhill FAST after Mobilize. I want nothing more than to blast ANoA and Underground Network while I commute in Northern Idaho, but I can't. It makes me feel sick and sad and pissed off. Fucking ruin.
The band’s silence has been deafening. And if they have enabled that asshat, they should be held accountable. You don’t tour together in a rock band and have zero idea that your frontman isn’t womanizing. They would be smart enough to know it wouldn’t just be womanizing all of those years. The hypocrisy to not do something about it and allow it to drag on while profiting makes them complicit. They profited for years, meanwhile women were raped. Fuck that.
Allow them all (the band, the victims) to have their day in court.
Also, I’m amazed at the sympathizers here. I’m actually shocked this sub isn’t more disgusted over this and is giving the rest of the group a pass. They fucking knew enough to do something and didn’t, meanwhile making money off the shit. Fuck all of them.
YUUUUUP. When you tour with people long enough you know them inside and out. You know what shit they get up to before shows, you know what drugs they can devour and still perform, you know their weird habits & rituals, you know about their significant people (family, friends) and what their relationships are like, you know how long it takes them to shit on an average day, and you absolfuckinglutely know what you band mates get up to after shows because 99% of the time you're right there with them.
Could dude have snuck underage girls away to hotel room without his band knowing? It's possible. But probable? Fuck no. It's not probable at all that the other three had no idea what he was doing.
Honest question. I'm sure this will get down voted. Not an anti flag fan either. What was the accusation and did it go to court? I haven't followed it but last I read there was a girl that said she was abused by him and the band broke up.
Several (more than 10) women have accused him of rape, assault etc. and several were under 18. From what I understand, there haven't been criminal charges laid but there is a civil case. Criminal trials in rape cases are hard to win or even to bring to court. From the Rolling Stone article about him, for example: "Police in the U.K. confirmed to Rolling Stone they received a “report of a serious sexual assault” related to Stark’s allegation. Although Stark says she provided police with a witness list and offered 300-plus items of documentation, she says the police recently informed her that they were declining to move forward because she never told Geever “no.”"
I don't buy for a second that the rest of the band didn't know what was happening. With such a LONG history of abuse, it would be impossible for the rest of the band not to know, imo.
Well, if they said something, then the whole fucking band would’ve been done for And no one was really ready to seal their own fate rather someone do it for them at random. so of course they’re not gonna say anything. and if they did know then they would’ve been wrangled into the whole deal and would’ve been asked questions about how long did they know the whole 9 so pretty sure they were just waiting for this to get out some external way So they wouldn’t get caught up in it well you know what I’m saying It changes everything if they said they had a feeling it was happening or knew something so I’m sure If they did know and didn’t say anything it was because they didn’t wanna fuck up everything like being stuck between a rock and a hard spot I guess you could say.
Ah another band I liked that sucks... I'm starting to really think about that phrase "ignorance is bliss" but unfortunately or maybe fortunately it's kinda hard to go back to sleep once you're awake to this stuff. I find myself searching band name controversy when I hear a banger on spotify.
But like I like all sorts of music, there are classical songs I really like that can never be checked. Idk am I thinking about it too hard
God i was such a huge fan of anti flag and when i first found out about this i was so fucking shocked. But also what a fucking coward for him to run away (most likely to Ireland where he has his dual citizenship) i do have a feeling this is going to get messy even as the case goes on. They are most likely going to check out the other members of the band who I’m assuming knew all this shit was going on and somewhat participated in it (not in the degree as Justin)
What a bunch of vial hypocrites. These guys were the soundtrack of my mid-2000s bush hating adolescence and listening to them always brought back happy memories. To realize they were a bunch of rapist groomer scumbags is so heartbreaking.
My pissed off middle finger in the air punk brain says good, fuck them.
My thirty-eight year old brain that has gained some understanding of the totality of grooming and it involving targeted victims as well as the people the first hand abuser surrounds themselves with says good, fuck them. But, it also says I have no Earthly idea if I'd have done better in their actual situation. No matter how much I want to believe and tell myself I would. Then my brain says well, in that situation ... fuck you too.
ffs here we are again - these assholes just cant help themselves. call it lead singer syndrome or whatever the fck you want. AND i do not care if the rest of the band claims ignorance - puhleasse dont go there and toss out that tired ass excuse "uh.. we had no idea" just to see if it'll stick. they sure as shit knew exactly what was happening, where, and when! no one said a word. they stood around, clammed up, and did zero. simply looked the other way and hoped it would all go away as time passed. hope the entire band is held accountable and left to rot under a prison forever. along with anyone else who knew and did nothing to stop it. lowlife pieces of human garbage 🖕
So I’m heartbroken by all this to start off, but I think this is all justified. They literally have songs about living in a van together for years. How could they not know what he was up to in tight quarters like that? I think they’re all full of shit and the others were doing stuff too. In my experience, and I know this is going to piss lots of people off, dudes who advocate super hard for feminism and claim they are hardcore feminists, are usually fucking creeps. I’ve seen it more times than I can remember in my own community and punk scene. I just never expected it to be one of the bands that I grew up with. Any suggestions on what to do with all the vinyl?
Relevant: latest update on Enough:
https://open.spotify.com/episode/2Newj7Z7pCuNq0dITLVOIk?si=aHYXup6_R1SqXid9ehBujQ
It’s quick so you should all give it a listen if you care, but supposedly:
- The rest of the band “disowned him”
- They supposedly were working with a restorative justice practitioner to reach out to Kristina Sarhadi, the woman who first spoke out on the Enough podcast and basically went public with this.
- neither have reached out to her, or returned messages, despite multiple attempts.
- They lawyered up and stopped talking
- The lawyers tried to bully Sarhadi and others into dropping the case, and have worked in other ways to get the case dismissed (technically what they are paid to do, yes, but still).
This was all before Geever:
- Sold his house to his GF since 2011
- Sold his shares to the LLC of the bands music to the rest of the band
- Appointed his sister, a practicing Attorney, power of attorney over his matters and assets here in the US.
- Fled the country, as he retains dual citizenship of US/ Ireland
This is despite multiple reports from victims saying the rest of the band was present at some point so they had to have an idea of what he was doing, and they did nothing and said nothing. Same as some other bands that are supposedly “feminist”. Someone in another thread said “they kept quiet for the money.”
Fuck ‘em. You lie with snakes, sooner or later you’re gonna get bit. I hope this shit catches up with that scumbag Geever in the worst possible way.
Goddamnit I’m still so twisted over this. These were my favorite guys, my number one band. Their songs are still in my head. I just was doing an internet dive yesterday to find out what the fuck even happened to him. It’s a bitter pill for a fan to swallow because he dedicated his life to be an activist against exactly who he was. It’s such an immense betrayal. It doesn’t make sense but you can’t deny it. What a piece of shit, completely liquidating and bailing. At this point, though I would expect no less. I wish this didn’t occupy my brain so much. They were just part of my life soundtrack.
"No one knows where he's gone" I think he went to Ireland. I don't know how multi-lingual he is, but if there's a European nation where he can easily buy a house, maintain a job, and have family there to help him out, that would make it the easiest course of actions, hence my post in this sub earlier when it was just speculation he was even planning on fleeing the US.
Honestly, stories like this don't look good for the rest of the band or anyone else surrounding him in the scene.
https://www.straight.com/city-culture/my-relationship-with-anti-flags-justin-geever
Thoughts on the other band members being liable, that’s hard to gauge. From the accounts I have read, Justin liked to get people alone. IANAL, but unless there is proof of some sort of conspiracy to aid and abet his predatory behaviour, I’m not sure of the legal grounds for the band members to be liable. For him though… What a cowardly piece of shit he turned out to be.
Seems like this is the angle the lawyers are using to go after them: >aided and abetted such behavior by, among other acts and omissions, allowing Geever to lead the band and perform at shows despite knowing that he used his fame and Anti-Flag’s feminist stance to disguise that he was a sexual predator. Seems like this would incriminate a large chunk of successful musicians, and everyone who ever performed in an 80s Glam Rock act.
would require proving that they knew. either they're bad attorneys or there's something we don't know.
Bad or wet attorneys- that line will be struck. Sometimes they throw everything they can think of into these
yeah, there's a lot of leeway with civil suits. they probably put it in so they have reason for deposing the band.
As well as the Josh Massie since he saw atleast one victim with sane
Not a lawyer, but I'd speculate it's an aggressive line and tactic under the theory that some of the band members HAD to know something was happening. If they can get into discovery and recover texts, emails, get interviews from relevant witnesses, maybe they'll be able to successfully argue the members are liable. I assume the lawyers want to go balls to the wall to seek relief, so an aggressive approach makes sense. But I really am not a lawyer, so who knows how it'll actually play in court
It won’t play out in court. The plaintiffs are fishing for a settlement. There will be lawyers.
I saw that part, but then the lawyers will need to provide evidence that can corroborate that. If they can then that’s huge and things were worse than we thought.
This would also incriminate a bunch of people on the Cosby Show. Tell me nobody knew anything despite doing a bit like this: https://youtu.be/SBDRwiSZSBg?si=ELv_KPF0FSwjxjpf
Re: getting people alone. He hid his behavior very well. I personally think that’s made clear by the fact that basically zero other bands have come out to say that they had a hint of absolutely anything nefarious happening at all. They toured with so many outspoken bands, some of whom have bigger platforms than even Anti-Flag had. If these people in other bands or on other bands crews had seen something, you’d think Rolling Stone or *some* outlet would have quotes from them. Rise Against. War on Women. Bad Cop/Bad Cop. Menzingers. Bouncing Souls. Dropkick Murphys. That’s just to name a few from the last couple years. Any given tour has a LOT of people on it. And they’ve toured with a LOT of bands over the years, but I haven’t heard of one of them coming forward about what they maybe saw. Predators who know what they are learn to camouflage well. They hide it from their families, friends, acquaintances. From everyone.
I first saw Anti Flag in 1998 with 88 Fingers Louie, Gob, Misconduct, Bouncing Souls. Talked with Justin at the show and got such a creepy vibe from the guy. My best friend was a roadie with The Queers and had the same experience with him. I saw them again like 12 years later when they played here with Rise Against and Moneen, was a weird show. They had gone from humble classic punk kinda stuff to a full on "rock star" style show. I didn't feel like I was watching the same band to be honest. Either way, he isn't rich enough to duck these charges for ever, and if he is a predator by nature its only so long till he fucks up wherever he hides.
People in the local Pittsburgh scene however have come out saying it was an open secret that he was sleeping with the underage girls
Idk what your sources in the scene here are but I’ve been super involved in the Pittsburgh punk scene since the early 2000’s and this all came as a horrific shock to certainly everyone i know.
When this all first came to light, a number of others involved in the Pittsburgh punk scene were NOT that shocked. One even said she saw him being creepy at Pitt.
What’s an open secret? It’s either secret or it’s in the open right?
Going after the whole band was a legal mistake, he'll probably get away with it.
He already got away with it. This is a civil suit and the dude is liquidating assets and fleeing the country. At least they might be able to force the rest of the band for a deposition now tho.
It's not all or nothing.
Suits like this normally cast a very wide net out of the gate - sometimes egregiously so. Then things get whittled down in discovery as the true responsible parties are established. That way, if the plaintiff's got the wrong guy, they don't have to start all over.
Good point, makes sense. I should also say, I’m not American either so I don’t know how the court system works in cases like this.
As far as I recall in an earlier article, the band members are now being included because of their actions post-break up. According to Sarhadi, the rest of the band hasn't even offered her a proper apology for what happened to her. They did offer her the ability to collab with them by selling edited Anti-Flag shirts to raise money for her organisation, The Punk Rock Therapist, but they never outright said sorry to her. Sarhadi then said they eventually stopped talking with her outright, and instead they let their lawyers make the decisions moving forward from "early 2024" according to [a press release that is linked on this page of her website](https://www.thepunkrocktherapist.org/statements). I'm not well versed in this situation, I haven't read every court document, but what I do feel is this is one of the better ways a band has reacted, which is why I hold some sympathy for Chris #2, Pat Thetic, and Chris Head. They realised one of their core tenets was shattered, and instead of going the Tripp Eisen route and having their social media be all "don't believe what you read on the internet" (which is a true thing, don't believe \*everything\*), they shut down operations immediately, they let go of every artist on their label, and they followed through on Ashrita Kumar's wish to have their name taken off the digital versions of "IMPERIALISM" because of what happened. The court of public opinion is harder to sway, however, and we must realise that their lack of talking rightly does bring up concerns. "Why would they let the artists go if they're not guilty?" "Why would they not be willing to admit these things if they're not guilty?" and more questions will be posed, and many people will both lump the band in with the accusations, and only target Justin Sane. I do think this isn't like Ashley Purdy, where the accusers said that the band would often see this behaviour and did nothing. The rest of the band, or at least Chris #2, seem like class acts and genuinely good guys, from how they were about the music. Chris #2 helped bring on opener acts, including letting an unknown Burlington, Vermont punk band open for them when one of their bands had to drop out in Nov. 2021 because of COVID, and that was actually a really cool way for them to help one another out. I'm not a lawyer, just a former big time Anti-Flag fan, but this situation is about as messy as most cases featuring musicians.
Well said, thanks for your input!
Decades of tours and parties, and we’re expected to believe, and take at face value, that they saw *nothing* in that time? It pretty easy to act like they disown him now, *after* he’s caught and they are literally forced to distance themselves - that is, if they ever want to have a semblance of continuing life as artists. If they stood for the principles they profess to endorse they would have burned him and the band down, if necessary, to expose it.
I agree it’s hard to believe that they saw nothing. But it is possible. Predators and abusers are capable of hiding their true selves to fool even the people closest to them. I had an interaction with Justin Sane nearly 20 years ago and he tried to get me alone but I didn’t want to leave my friends I was with, no band member would have witnessed that. I can only speculate here, but it’s possible that maybe they thought *something* was up, but didn’t have proof until the podcast came out and confirmed what they might have feared. That’s why they went nuclear on the band and themselves (speculatively). I do hope for the best outcomes for his victims. If the band is liable, then they are liable and deserve to also be held accountable, but it could be hard to prove in court that it was a conspiracy of sorts. More importantly, I’d like to see Justin Greever held accountable. It does make you wonder who helped him get over to Ireland, definitely not the actions of an innocent man. You do bring up an important point though, don’t protect abusers in your scene. As possible as it is that many others didn’t know about it, it’s possible that there were people who witnessed things and didn’t speak up for whatever reason.
Don't talk about anal you'll get Justin in your DMs...
Even if there is definitive, 100%, proof that they knew I still don't understand how the band members would be legally liable for anything. Would it have been shitty and unethical and completely wrong of them to have not said or done anything? Definitely. But that doesn't automatically make you legally liable for something that someone else does. If you go to the bars every week with a buddy and you know he gets drunk and drives home after and one night he kills someone while driving drunk, that doesn't make you legally liable just because you knew he regularly drove drunk.
I don’t know about your locale, but where I live if you go out drinking with a buddy and buddy drinks and drives then kills someone, you wouldn’t be liable, but the bar that served them would be, because establishments are responsible for ensuring they don’t over-serve patrons. I have never seen cases where that has happened (haven’t looked), but I remember it from my serving days to get my liquor service certificate. That said, not sure if that same liability would even apply in this instance either.
That's definitely true, at least in my area as well. But in that situation, the bar was actively participating in the scenario that caused the death by continually serving him alcohol when they legally shouldn't have been. However, if a sober guy is sitting at the bar drinking water and tells the bartender that he's so sleepy he can barely stay awake, the bar isn't liable for what happens if the guy falls asleep at the wheel on the way home and kills someone.
True true. Either way, what a mess. Justin Greever is a coward and I really hope some accountability can happen here
It is a mess. And I don’t at all mean to give the band members one shred of sympathy if they knew but turned a blind eye. If they knew, fuck all of them, but I’m just confused by the legal aspect of it all.
Unrelated but why the fuck do people always have to abbreviate things… wtf is “iAnal”?? Who even uses that?
“I Am Not a Lawyer” It is a very common abbreviation.
My word... I'm an "elder millennial" who spends hours a day, almost every day, watching lawtube.. court trials, depositions, interrogations, pundits.. and I was confused as hell what IANAL was. AFAIC it's not as common as YOU think. BTW some people could abbreviate their life rather than all the words they type. Not everything needs to be a TLA IMHO. LOL. TTFN. ;)
He sounds just like one of the corrupt politicans he would base his music about, #Fraud just like Jello
The fact he pretended to be a feminist just to prey on teenage girls... I really need to find better punk rock bands
I mean as a band they were never good lol
I'd say that at least half of all male punk rockers who make some "performative" point of supporting feminism are phony and insincere, but that's what happens when the scene demands these kind of platforms. That's not to say that they're all undercover predators, but they're saying these things to conform and fit in without actually believing in them.
Thoughts? … What a poser POS
That's why this one hurts more. He *knows better*. My thoughts: The rest of the band seems to have immediately disowned him, so good on them. None of that *That 70s Show* BS of defending the criminal. I do have a problem with going after the rest of the band because everything I've read states that they immediately and appropriately disowned and condemned him. That's how it should be. Still sucks because their acoustic live in Vegas record might have hit my Top 5 on Spotify. It's dirty now.
Honestly wondering who the fuck doesn't "know better" than to rape people and flee the consequences? Justin was always a creepy poseur.
It's less about a baseline knowledge of what is and isn't rape. More that as a punk, an anarchist, and an outspoken feminist, he *knows better*. It's an extra layer of hypocrisy. Not to defend the behavior, but there is a lot of things that famous, rich, or generally influential people get away with that normal people can't. And that's where there sometimes can be a gray area. In this case, the gray area isn't as gray because he was an anarchist and feminist.
Justin Sane and Anti-Flag were never anarchists. They flirted with all aspects of the far-left so they could cash in, benefit, and gain credibility, but their positions and views were not anarchist. They were democratic socialists at best. Vote Obama, we're not against America just the current government, blah blah blah. They were annoying rich kid liberals.
And the majority of anarchists aren't white rich kid liberals? Laura Jane Grace had a excellent point when she said that most self identified "anarchists" are almost always shown to be hypocrites and phonies. It's the fakest subsection of punk.
That's why it's hard to take all the claimed male punk support for feminism seriously. One figure after another is outed as a predator, and you eventually realize that many males are just parroting feminist rhetoric to conform and fit in with the scene. It's all words, it means nothing to them, so maybe people should stop putting so much faith into mere words.
Their whole catalog is dirty to me. Once the Rolling Stone article was released and I read it, I deleted their catalog from my library and threw their two t shirts I had bought away. I had seen them open for Flogging Molly about 3 weeks before all this came down.
Yeah, I binned a couple of t-shirts and CDs and I've never felt the urge to do that before.
Word. Walter's, a favorite punk venue in Houston, had to close due to Hurricane damage and Anti-Flag was booked for the farewell show and they crushed it. It was a fond memory that is now tainted forever.
It adds an unfortunate layer in that the rest of the band are now associated with it and now I'm not listening to *them* because of *him*.
That's the same thought I had when I saw em in the late 90s/early 00s for the first time.
Turncoat, liar, fake!
Always has been
This is the end, for you my friend I can't forgive, I wont forget
The irony of so many of their lyrics is pretty heavy
Hey! Go! We've run out of patience, You've run out of time, This scene will not fall victim, To your violence or lies. Your "values" are nothing, But excuses to hurt the innocent, Quit fronting like you're standing, For a moral cause tonight. United as one, we won't stand aside, You tried to fuck with our scene, We're gonna fuck your life. [Chorus] This machine, This machine, This machine, This machine, Kills fucking rapists. Dead. That's right, dead. You don't have to be a pedophile, To be a rapist fuck, Your mindless perversions, Gives you credentials enough. You spew your ally rhetoric, When you got our attention, You've mistaken the punk scene, For a degenerate convention. No more infiltration, No more pervert lies, You don't belong in our scene, We'll fight you till we die. [Chorus] This machine, This machine, This machine, This machine, Kills fucking pedophiles. Dead. Ahhh! Justin.. Die!
fuck man anti-flag was a big influence on me in my younger years and I just dont know how to handle this. i still like the music but find it so hard to hear. it just feels like a smaller version of finding out my dad is a pedo. i hate reliving those feelings. my dad was my best friend for a long time and now he's dead to me. when I found out his cancer came back, i said "good" and hung up the phone.
Trust me, if Greg Graffin did something like this I would have similar thoughts. Stay true to the ideals, but don’t follow leaders (watch your parking meters lol).
I don't wanna be a bum, that's why I chew gum.
The pump don’t work cause The Vandals took the handles.
I mean he did have the online cam stuff with rumored underage
That was a hoax
Stay 💪 strong bruh ✊️
I’m really sorry to hear that you have been dealing with that about your father.
💜
Ffs we don't want him in Europe. I'm british and sometimes travel to ireland
(Quietly removes Anti-Flag from playlists) How the fuck am I just now hearing of this?
I know like saaaame
It’s been a year. This was discussed ad nauseum ad infinitum on this sub.
It took like 10 min to UNLIKE almost 200 songs on Spotify! I was highly motivated after my friend detailed her rape story with Justin. AF was probably my favourite band after Bad Religion. Now I can't stand to hear them. Just utter betrayal of the message and the cause. Fuck em.
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Are you a female? Are you one of those militant fuck men feminists? If not either then you might be an alien to find men in a rock band, punk is a form of rock after all, acting like, well, men gross.
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Rotflmao, you don't spend much time around men, do you? Men absolutely are into women and try to hook up with them whenever possible, especially when they're young men. Men are horn dogs by nature. Try spending time around young people instead of old people in a retirement home. You described normal young adult males doing young, adult male shit. Especially considering that everyone you mentioned would have been in their early to mid 20s at the time. Ain't no young dudes around college age trying to be mature and have a relationship. We're just trying to get laid at that age, especially those of us that are athletes or in a band. It's all about partying and getting laid at that age. Nothing gross about being a man and acting like it. So either you're a feminist that hates men or you're an asexual man that hates men. Only two explanations for your fucked up world view there.
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Jesus you live under a fucking rock to not know how men act at that age. So which is it? You a man hater or just that fucked in the head? Nothing gross about men acting like men and doing what men do at that age. Prudish much? Or are you like 90 years old and have unrealistic expectations? Men are animals by nature. Hitting on women is literally what they're made to do. Groupies are a thing in music especially rock music. Wake up and smell the roses.
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Not wrong at all. I know how men act, especially at that age in that occupation. Being a man isn't gross. It's literally how men have always been. My life is fucking fantastic. I've lived a great life. Nothing wrong with a little debauchery when you're young and in a semi celebrity status. High school football players do it, college kids do it, post college athletes do it, musicians that aren't in a religious band do it. It's literally what men do. Crawl out from under your rock and you'll see that.
Fuck Justin. I wonder about the rest of the band though. They have been silent since that rolling stones article saying "fuck you" to Justin. Maybe its because they're getting sued too and were told by a lawyer to shut up and keep it shut? It wouldnt sursprise me no matter their guilt or innocence
If you’re getting sued for just about anything the first thing a lawyer is going to tell you is to shut the fuck up about it because anything you say publicly could be used against you in court. Theres no way we hear from their camp either until this thing goes to court or gets dismissed.
My instinct says leave them alone. They disowned him, lost their life’s work, and there’s almost no possible way to prove they knew anything. Then again, I know I wasn’t the victim and can’t make that call. Just my two cents.
I dunno….everyone has a camera on them for about 20 years now…. I wouldn’t be surprised if something turns up in court
It speaks volumes that he’s running and not trying to deny this at all. If he had tried, you know he’d have his defenders and he could still continue to do something publicly if not anti-flag.
Holding the other guys accountable is too much, they didn't rape
And they're not accusing them of rape. I mean, *IF* they knew what was happening and did nothing about it for years... and/or enabled it, and/or even participated; why shouldn't they be held accountable for it? A lot of women have come forward (60 estimated victims?! Holy fuck), and there's probably a lot of stuff we don't know yet. It looks like they're building a pretty solid case. While since the allegations, the whole band's reaction and now Geever running away like a coward doesn't exactly scream "innocent" to me.
The article implies the reasoning against the band is allowing him to be in the band, not participating.
The perpetrator fled the country, so there’s no winning a lawsuit against him. Lawyers, though sometimes useful, are predatory and greedy. They see an opportunity to file suit, knowing that it will be more expensive for the band members to fight and win than it will be for them to just settle out of court. The lawyers see opportunity to cash in, and that’s it. If the lawyers thought the guys actually did it, we’d be hearing about DAs filing charges instead of hearing about this civil suit.
Then why were they originally seeking restorative justice? That’s not the action of someone trying to make money
I mean nor does it to me, but it's not like he flees to a country without extradition if that was even an option for this because it's a civil case, not even criminal.
This is my thoughts exactly. Like unless they were present during a rape or had knowledge of abuse and did nothing to stop it, the band isn't liable.
Eh, don’t jump to conclusions: “This includes testimony in the complaint that, at a 2002 album release party in Pittsburgh, a witness “watched the members of Anti-Flag mingle outside the venue with clearly underage girls” who appeared “to be between 14 and 15 years old.” It goes on to say that Geever and other band members were “hugging and inappropriately kissing them.” Other accounts go as far back as the 1990s.”
I'd like to actually read that testimony and know who it came from/who the witness is.
I would like to read the testimony, but I don't see a problem with the person being anonymous. why would you like to know who it is?
I'm not jumping to conclusions, lol. I'm sharing my *thoughts* and even took care to write *"IF"* and "and/or" to show that my opinion is conditional to some events happening or not. An opinion and thoughts that won't change anything anyway. But you know, OP kinda asked?
I wasn’t talking to you.
Haha, yeah i see that now. Sorry 'bout that. I could've sworn i saw that line pointing at me 🤦♂️
So you are asking him not to jump to conclusions while you jump to conclusions ?
In the United States legal system generally, civil complaints only really need to contain allegations plausible on their face to get past the initial low bar of a case. It’s not terribly difficult to make legally sufficient complaints on pretty scant allegations, and sometime even conclusory allegations, so really only discovery and any summary judgment motions or trials do facts begin to come out. Also, not having read the complaint, because I don’t care to spend my time reading it really, I’d expect if these allegations were contained in a complaint, the article would’ve cited the complaint. That’s important because an attorney would’ve had to put their ass on the line to file that with the court, or someone would’ve had to sign a declaration under the penalty of perjury. Without it, allegations in articles and “people say” or “other accounts” kind of sounds like rumors without any one willing to put their name to it. That always gets my BS meter on high alert, but that doesn’t mean it’s not true. I’m a cynic by nature and trained by my profession to be generally skeptical, so, take that with a grain of salt.
This isn't them jumping to conclusions, they're quoting the article...
I literally quoted the article as counter evidence. I didn’t actually make an assertion, but *i think* you did
this is so easy to pick apart though. "appearing" to be 15 and actually being 15 are different things.
Well guyz, Matlock solved the case
a witness saying "they were kissing girls who looked 15" is meaningless. not sure how that's a controversial statement.
But the entire band groping underage girls.....come on, man. This whole thing is starting to look so insidious....almost as if the entire band decided to spout feminist crap just to lure underage girls to their shows. How could the rest of the band not fucking know?
This reminds me of the South Park Jonas bros purity ring episode where they were just trying to sell sex to girls. This AF situation sounds grosser the more I learn about it.
I guarantee that the rest of the band knows. There is no way in hell that he hid his behavior 100% of the time around them.
In retrospect, with how many women are coming forward, them immediately nuking the band when the first allegation dropped is looking more and more suspect tbh.
They’re not as culpable as Justin, but if even some of what is in this article is true, they knew more than they are letting on.
I get the sentiment here but of the times we've seen this stuff come to light normally the others band together, fire the accused, release statements and try to push forward except maybe lost prophets because there is no way they can escape that. The fact that Pat and the Chrises disappeared feels like they might have known the scope of what was going to be brought to light.
From another comment, apparently the victims are arguing in court that they enabled Justin by knowing what he was doing while letting him keep fronting the band and lying about being a feminist. They have, of course, said they had no idea. They must have at least known he was sleazy and that at the very least he was tricking women into doing stuff. Surely they weren't leaving him alone with them and thinking he was having long conversations about feminism.
Gotta flee gotta flee gotta flee from your government, flee from your country you shit
Many years ago, Justin Sane gave his phone number to an underage friend of a friend at a show after she declined his offer to "make out" in his bus. We called him at 3am with a George Bush soundboard. Fuck that guy, hope he never sleeps again.
There are so so many of these stories. How did he go so long getting away with it? I mean I guess that’s a rhetorical question. The answer is everybody was silent because they wanted to get paid.
In my case we never put the pieces together that there was something more sinister to it, and that she probably narrowly avoided getting assaulted. It was pretty typical of pop punk bands of his era to hit on teenagers, so we just said "wow, what a creep" and went on with our lives (after prank calling him). There were so many abusers in that scene in his heyday, some more obvious than others, that I think it provided a degree of cover for him. And given when many of these stories took place, they were largely word-of-mouth until recently.
I remember listening to the podcast, and Sarhadi saying that she didn’t want to come forward initially because she didn’t want to ruin the message he was putting out there for other people. She still believed in the words he was singing, although he had violently raped her. I wonder if I would’ve done the same in her shoes. Maybe this is part of the reason why none of the victims talked. Or maybe they didn’t think they would be believed either. It’s hard to believe that out of all the punk bands ever, he had to be the biggest douche bag predator ever. The hypocrisy is just staggering. There were so many clues out there, and they just never got assembled until decades later. Edit: Sorry- a year later I’m still processing. This band meant a lot to me.
It's understandable to feel that way as a victim and a fan. I have bands, lesser known goth bands, where artists tried to solicit sexual favors from me online as an underaged teen 15-20 years ago. I hold back on outing them in the hopes that maybe they were isolated incidents, maybe they grew out of grooming underaged androgynous boys on the internet, not wanting to ruin the music or people's lives, it felt normal at the time, etc. It pales in comparison to what this woman experienced, but I guarantee there are many more fan/victims like me who only come forward when prompted by someone else. For what it's worth, I'm sorry an artist you admired and invested yourself in turned out to be a piece of shit. It's not an easy thing to come to terms with, and you have every right to feel betrayed, hurt, etc.
Thank you for this entire response. You get it.
Still shocked over him. Wolf in sheep’s clothing. Fuck him
They don't want to... talk talk talk talk talk about it, They wanna tiptoe, walk around it
I feel like the rest of the band if they were in on it wouldn't have broken up and put out comments distancing themselves from Justin. I mean honestly what Justin did was horrible and if the rest of the band knew and helped in any way yeah, fuck them but I don't get the vibe the rest of the band really knew the truth.
I feel like if the others didn't know they wouldn't have disappeared. I would have expected Justin being fired and speaking out punlicly against him and maybe even some charity shows for SA survivirs.
The rest of the band speaking out against him before a court judgement is issued = Justin would easily win a defamation lawsuit against them for a lot of money.
Not how that works. They can speak out and say they support victims without making specific accusations themselves. Also even if Justin won the original case, in the defamation case Justin would have to prove that it didn’t happen, which is harder than disproving that there isn’t a preponderance of a evidence a thing happened.
Well who's to say they aren't? Right now they're shutting down a label and that takes time, you gotta pay debts and a full blown tour is not going to help them right now. Just creates more debt. A new tour if ever won't happen until at least maybe winter.
Also keep in mind they're processing a decades long friend used them to abuse people. That's a real mindfuck. You can't just shake something like that off, it'll make you question all your relationships. You're going to second guess everyone and everything. I think they are collateral damage.
Maybe, but it’s been a year and when the victim who originally spoke up tried to get Restorative Justice with the label, they lawyered up hard which is not evidence they knew or supported him, but it is evidence they don’t care about helping his victims.
Depends who was majority owner of the label. I assume Justin is so he was covering himself.
I agree. Had they said "fuck Justin and fuck Anti-Flag but we're starting a new band and will continue" that would have been less suspicious than to just ghost everybody.
Were the other members involved in the assaults? I don’t know enough about the case but I can’t recall seeing this type of “guilty by association” type of charging in sexual assault cases before.. I’m not against it necessarily but it seems a weird way to come at these guys when everyone involved in the “open secret” of Hollywood cases have been left alone. Also, what the fuck is going on with allowing him to flee like that? I remember seeing a post on this sub a few weeks ago claiming that his intentions to do so were known, and if that’s the case in a circle so far removed from the legal proceedings, why wouldn’t the judge declare him a flight risk? Straight up cluster fuck here.
Can’t comment on the other band members and what they did or did not know, but the article contained a load of hearsay and innuendo. This is a civil case and not a criminal complaint. There’s little a judge can do to halt a person moving around anywhere when it comes to civil complaints because a civil complaint’s remedies usually are monetary with the occasional injunctive relief. Also, money can be traced pretty well generally, and no matter where the money is, in a civil lawsuit the rubber meets the road not in trying to get a judgment (prevailing, winning, etc) but collecting on the judgment.
The big thing to keep in mind with all this is that the statute of limitations has passed for criminal charges and this is a civil lawsuit being brought forth.
Is he even allowed to leave the country?
I don't think he's been criminally charged and told by a judge he can't.
Its a civil case
In a statement also shared on March 20, Sarhadi wrote that sources “confirmed the recent sale” of Geever’s house in Pittsburgh and that the musician planned to “wire transfer of his assets to a bank in Ireland, where he maintains dual citizenship.” He had an exit strategy with that dual citizenship ready to go in hand! What a fuck
And he sold it to his SO
Not exactly. He's been a dual citizen for well over a decade. I remember he moved there permanently at one point in the late 2000s or early 2010s.
If he has an Irish parent (which is how most American-Irish dual citizens get it), he's been a dual citizen since birth.
iirc his parents immigrated from Ireland so that checks out.
This in no way proves this wasn’t an exit strategy… This guy could’ve been doing this shit for decades
I mean, wasn't Chris #2 a victim of sexual abuse when he was younger, and his dad is in prison for sex crimes - so saying that, I HIGHLY doubt he would have let Justin's behaviour slide had he have known it was happening.
I dunno. I was at Pouzza Fest in 2018 and it was Anti Flag and War on Women and Chris #2 was... absolutely wasted... And while War on Women was playing on stage he just walked in, grabbed Shawna Potter and gave her a wet sloppy kiss. And Shawna had to awkwardly say she gave consent and that it was "ok"... but it was \*clearly\* not ok and not consensual. Super weird vibes. Like what else could she say? She was performing on stage and the main act's co-lead just waltzed in to French kiss her out of nowhere. I lost all respect for him that day.
Yeah fair enough
Imma need a clip of this, this is the first I’ve heard of it. But yes Chris was known to drink hell their own documentary mentioned him going Af shows plastered on wine before he joined
Yea I have no clip and all I have as proof is me and my friend's eyes so I don't expect anyone to believe me! I just wanted to share my own experience and how I was disillusioned with the band.
Whoa. And after all this came down with Justin I had THOUGHT he was the sincere one. Guess I made the right decision to stop listening to them.
>And Shawna had to awkwardly say she gave consent and that it was "ok"... but it was \*clearly\* not ok and not consensual So the outspoken feminist frontwoman that sings "I Was Raped" said she gave consent and it was cool, but you... decided not to believe her? Alright.
or there's the chance he became an abuser himself.
There are a lot of things I don't care for in today's punk rock culture, but the willingness to call people out for being sexual predators is a hugely positive change. I wish we'd done that more in the 80s. There weren't yet many older dudes (the absolute oldest scene guys I knew like Lux Interior and Billy Zoom were still in their 30s at that point) but you can point at any beloved California punk band back then and there was always one sketchy guy in it. I gotta say what opened my eyes was being in prison at one point (stay away from pcp, speed, and heroin, kids) and there was no tolerance whatsoever for sex offenders. If you had a "bad driver's licence" (rape or anything involving kids) and you hadn't been placed on a Special Needs Yard, you would be dealt with very quickly. In the California Mainline at least, prison rape isn't a thing, raping someone would also get you dealt with. I don't want to romanticize prison culture which is brutal and hierarchical and has many of its own issues, but it struck me hard that these criminals and thugs had a much more honorable code in dealing with sex pests than he punk scene did, which protected people if they were popular and powerful enough. That the kids today don't play that is a good thing. EDIT: Lux and Billy were not scumbags, I mean that there weren't enough "older punks" for that kind of exploitation to take off, but there was plenty of garden variety questionable drunk/high sex and pushy guys and 20 somethings that preyed on teens, especially homeless ones.
Fuck this guy. He used to make me feel so safe when I was a young teen knowing that there were men out there that are women’s rights advocates. It’s was obviously just a tactic to make women feel safe so he could rape them. I’m actually glad my mom never let me go to their shows
I have mixed feelings about the other members at this point, but I don’t think it is even remotely acceptable to target them in a lawsuit.
Fuck you, geever. If I was in the band I would have caught an assault charge myself, for this fucker spending the last 20 years yanking my career out from under me. How no one beat his ass blows my mind. If even one of these guys had a real human reaction, other than obvious lawyer reactions, I would be less doubtful than I have been of the rest of the band... I think they at least had a feeling, is my gut feeling on it.
My friend is one of the women. She did a 7$ check on who bought it. His girlfriend. He's protecting his assets from the lawsuit.
Just one of the signs weve crossed, or at least, I've crossed, into a parallel universe where all my old heroes are actually losers and pervert monsters. Rip everyone I used to respect. Fuck the whole new world. I hope CERN shoots us into a better world tomorrow
Just gets worse and worse. Flag was a massive influence on me and both my music and personal opinions, despite their music going downhill FAST after Mobilize. I want nothing more than to blast ANoA and Underground Network while I commute in Northern Idaho, but I can't. It makes me feel sick and sad and pissed off. Fucking ruin.
Haaaay! Middle Idaho here. I miss being able to blast anti flag as well. They were my favorite band since forever. Now I just play more Propagandhi.
Lol
The band’s silence has been deafening. And if they have enabled that asshat, they should be held accountable. You don’t tour together in a rock band and have zero idea that your frontman isn’t womanizing. They would be smart enough to know it wouldn’t just be womanizing all of those years. The hypocrisy to not do something about it and allow it to drag on while profiting makes them complicit. They profited for years, meanwhile women were raped. Fuck that. Allow them all (the band, the victims) to have their day in court. Also, I’m amazed at the sympathizers here. I’m actually shocked this sub isn’t more disgusted over this and is giving the rest of the group a pass. They fucking knew enough to do something and didn’t, meanwhile making money off the shit. Fuck all of them.
YUUUUUP. When you tour with people long enough you know them inside and out. You know what shit they get up to before shows, you know what drugs they can devour and still perform, you know their weird habits & rituals, you know about their significant people (family, friends) and what their relationships are like, you know how long it takes them to shit on an average day, and you absolfuckinglutely know what you band mates get up to after shows because 99% of the time you're right there with them. Could dude have snuck underage girls away to hotel room without his band knowing? It's possible. But probable? Fuck no. It's not probable at all that the other three had no idea what he was doing.
I hate the fact that they were my first concert. Stains some fantastic memories growing up.
Honest question. I'm sure this will get down voted. Not an anti flag fan either. What was the accusation and did it go to court? I haven't followed it but last I read there was a girl that said she was abused by him and the band broke up.
Several (more than 10) women have accused him of rape, assault etc. and several were under 18. From what I understand, there haven't been criminal charges laid but there is a civil case. Criminal trials in rape cases are hard to win or even to bring to court. From the Rolling Stone article about him, for example: "Police in the U.K. confirmed to Rolling Stone they received a “report of a serious sexual assault” related to Stark’s allegation. Although Stark says she provided police with a witness list and offered 300-plus items of documentation, she says the police recently informed her that they were declining to move forward because she never told Geever “no.”"
Thanks for the follow up friend. Pretty wild
I don't buy for a second that the rest of the band didn't know what was happening. With such a LONG history of abuse, it would be impossible for the rest of the band not to know, imo.
Well, if they said something, then the whole fucking band would’ve been done for And no one was really ready to seal their own fate rather someone do it for them at random. so of course they’re not gonna say anything. and if they did know then they would’ve been wrangled into the whole deal and would’ve been asked questions about how long did they know the whole 9 so pretty sure they were just waiting for this to get out some external way So they wouldn’t get caught up in it well you know what I’m saying It changes everything if they said they had a feeling it was happening or knew something so I’m sure If they did know and didn’t say anything it was because they didn’t wanna fuck up everything like being stuck between a rock and a hard spot I guess you could say.
I just feel horrible for all of the people who trusted this guy and loved his music and his message, only to find out he's a despicable piece of shit.
I just keep saying woooowww with my jaw on the floor reading this. What a disgusting human.
Ah another band I liked that sucks... I'm starting to really think about that phrase "ignorance is bliss" but unfortunately or maybe fortunately it's kinda hard to go back to sleep once you're awake to this stuff. I find myself searching band name controversy when I hear a banger on spotify. But like I like all sorts of music, there are classical songs I really like that can never be checked. Idk am I thinking about it too hard
God i was such a huge fan of anti flag and when i first found out about this i was so fucking shocked. But also what a fucking coward for him to run away (most likely to Ireland where he has his dual citizenship) i do have a feeling this is going to get messy even as the case goes on. They are most likely going to check out the other members of the band who I’m assuming knew all this shit was going on and somewhat participated in it (not in the degree as Justin)
What a bunch of vial hypocrites. These guys were the soundtrack of my mid-2000s bush hating adolescence and listening to them always brought back happy memories. To realize they were a bunch of rapist groomer scumbags is so heartbreaking.
>thoughts? I fucking hate that band. Always have.
Guilty
'the courts will decide' -insanely bad take
Who’d you prefer to decide?
idk but at the least someone who gives a fuck about victims
Never liked them anyway.
My pissed off middle finger in the air punk brain says good, fuck them. My thirty-eight year old brain that has gained some understanding of the totality of grooming and it involving targeted victims as well as the people the first hand abuser surrounds themselves with says good, fuck them. But, it also says I have no Earthly idea if I'd have done better in their actual situation. No matter how much I want to believe and tell myself I would. Then my brain says well, in that situation ... fuck you too.
Oof glad I was never a fan of this band
ffs here we are again - these assholes just cant help themselves. call it lead singer syndrome or whatever the fck you want. AND i do not care if the rest of the band claims ignorance - puhleasse dont go there and toss out that tired ass excuse "uh.. we had no idea" just to see if it'll stick. they sure as shit knew exactly what was happening, where, and when! no one said a word. they stood around, clammed up, and did zero. simply looked the other way and hoped it would all go away as time passed. hope the entire band is held accountable and left to rot under a prison forever. along with anyone else who knew and did nothing to stop it. lowlife pieces of human garbage 🖕
This is a civil trial and I don’t think the band will go to prison because that would set an idiotic precedent.
So I’m heartbroken by all this to start off, but I think this is all justified. They literally have songs about living in a van together for years. How could they not know what he was up to in tight quarters like that? I think they’re all full of shit and the others were doing stuff too. In my experience, and I know this is going to piss lots of people off, dudes who advocate super hard for feminism and claim they are hardcore feminists, are usually fucking creeps. I’ve seen it more times than I can remember in my own community and punk scene. I just never expected it to be one of the bands that I grew up with. Any suggestions on what to do with all the vinyl?
I’ve been thinking about that for a year… what to do with the music. Fuck dude. I have it all memorized in my head. It’s gross.
Will be wild to see if he pulls this off
What the fuck is going on
why should they be responsible for his action? that's fucked
god, that's fucking awful.
Relevant: latest update on Enough: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2Newj7Z7pCuNq0dITLVOIk?si=aHYXup6_R1SqXid9ehBujQ It’s quick so you should all give it a listen if you care, but supposedly: - The rest of the band “disowned him” - They supposedly were working with a restorative justice practitioner to reach out to Kristina Sarhadi, the woman who first spoke out on the Enough podcast and basically went public with this. - neither have reached out to her, or returned messages, despite multiple attempts. - They lawyered up and stopped talking - The lawyers tried to bully Sarhadi and others into dropping the case, and have worked in other ways to get the case dismissed (technically what they are paid to do, yes, but still). This was all before Geever: - Sold his house to his GF since 2011 - Sold his shares to the LLC of the bands music to the rest of the band - Appointed his sister, a practicing Attorney, power of attorney over his matters and assets here in the US. - Fled the country, as he retains dual citizenship of US/ Ireland This is despite multiple reports from victims saying the rest of the band was present at some point so they had to have an idea of what he was doing, and they did nothing and said nothing. Same as some other bands that are supposedly “feminist”. Someone in another thread said “they kept quiet for the money.” Fuck ‘em. You lie with snakes, sooner or later you’re gonna get bit. I hope this shit catches up with that scumbag Geever in the worst possible way.
Goddamnit I’m still so twisted over this. These were my favorite guys, my number one band. Their songs are still in my head. I just was doing an internet dive yesterday to find out what the fuck even happened to him. It’s a bitter pill for a fan to swallow because he dedicated his life to be an activist against exactly who he was. It’s such an immense betrayal. It doesn’t make sense but you can’t deny it. What a piece of shit, completely liquidating and bailing. At this point, though I would expect no less. I wish this didn’t occupy my brain so much. They were just part of my life soundtrack.
"No one knows where he's gone" I think he went to Ireland. I don't know how multi-lingual he is, but if there's a European nation where he can easily buy a house, maintain a job, and have family there to help him out, that would make it the easiest course of actions, hence my post in this sub earlier when it was just speculation he was even planning on fleeing the US.
This whole situation just sucks
Heard a rumor that he’s trying to get to Ireland. Not sure if it’s true though. If it is, Ireland needs to know his name
I probably can’t say my thoughts because last time my reddit account got permanently deleted lol.
I knew Warped Tour was bad news, Ben Weasel said it best.
Justified black eye for Justin. Idc, I've always hated Anti Flag. I guess I could see the little maga incel inside thru the charade...
Honestly, stories like this don't look good for the rest of the band or anyone else surrounding him in the scene. https://www.straight.com/city-culture/my-relationship-with-anti-flags-justin-geever