Scream of the Butterfly

Dogs improve with age, rock stars generally don't.

On 2/28/2024 at 11:25 AM, invisible_rose said:

Shelia was likely told not to use the word rape, or the publishers edited it, unless she brought a legal case because it would otherwise be potentially libellous. 

I suspect something similar may have happened with the Look Away documentary as well. There are only two explicit rape accusations in it. One of them is against an anonymous person and the other against a dead person. In the documentary, Sheila makes no mention of the anal rape that in the other version of the story precedes Axl's apology. Michelle's interview is missing entirely. It's possible all of these decisions were made to avoid defamation lawsuits.

In my opinion, the story is incriminating enough even in the form that it appears in the documentary. Consent is not given freely in a situation where violence is present. As a thought experiment, imagine if one person signs over their property to another person immediately after being physically assaulted by that person. Is there anybody who would consider such an agreement valid? It shouldn't be any different when it comes to consenting to sex.

7 minutes ago, meadsoap said:

 

I did estimate late 1990, and I stick by that. You brought up that Rolling Stone interview where Axl said he found out his sister was sexually abused by his stepfather "last year". While the cover story didn't come out until April of 1992, Axl conducted that Interview in mid-January of 1992 while the band was on tour in Las Vegas. That would be about 12-and-a-half months after the events of December 1990, when Zutaut was in the studio helping Axl record vocals. Since Axl talks like a normal human being, he just said it happened a year ago instead of "about 12 months and 13 days ago, I found out..." like he's some kind of timekeeping robot. It's not proof of much.

But whether it happened in 1990 or the early months of 1991, that's still before he started recovered memory therapy (which was your excuses for not believing Axl's words about being sexually abused by his stepfather). 

He didn't say "a year ago", he said "last year". Stop twisting things.

59 minutes ago, Blackstar said:

I think the time frame of when Axl talked to Tom Zutaut could be narrowed down to either December 1990 or February 1991. According to Bob Clearmountain, who was initially hired to mix UYI, the falling out with Tom Zutaut happened during the second week of the mixing. Based on the dates on a bootleg tape containing presumably the first 11 Clearmountain mixes, he started working on mixing the songs Axl had finished recording vocals on in mid December 1990 (the earliest date on the tape is Dec. 15, 1990 and the latest Jan. 16, 1991). Then Tom Zutaut, according to himself, went to the studio again in February 1991, when Clearmountain had mixed 24 songs (that was probably when Axl invited him back), and they decided to fire Clearmountain and hire Bill Price.

But it's also possible that it was earlier than that, because Axl had been in the studio before he started recording his vocals (to record piano and keyboard parts).

Why do you think it could not have happened later? My guess would be it happened in the summer of 1991, perhaps around the Toronto shows:

"During the interview, Tom Zutaut, the young artists-and-repertoire executive at Geffen Records who signed Guns N' Roses, arrives from Los Angeles with the tracks for the band's two new albums, which are now tentatively due in September. Rose still needs to put the final vocal on one selection--and a studio was booked in Toronto for the next night."[The Los Angeles Times, July 21, 1991]

I should add that in the Rolling Stone interview Axl did in 1992 he said, "I didn't know my sister was molested until last year." which directly contradicts the idea that he told Zutaut about it in 1990.

5 hours ago, meadsoap said:

You can't say I'm the one that's "sloppy with facts", when 3 other posters besides me have been constantly correcting you on your comments, and you refuse to listen to them either. Not once through this whole conversation did anyone have to do that to me lol. Almost everything you've said you've gotten wrong, and multiple people have devoted paragraphs to explaining why, and yet... you're still here still not getting facts right and you had to be corrected AGAIN.

Speaks volumes, not that I expect you to grasp that either.

If I have said something that isn't true, it's because the original source (Axl, Zutaut, George Chin, etc) was wrong. I don't think the post above yours corrected what I said but added some more information and opinion to it.

For all our speculation, it remains we can't be certain when the discussion took place or what exactly was said. It wasn't a written note from Axl as you claimed earlier. Your fierce commitment that it happened in 1990 or whenever you think it happened seems rather deranged. I have no horse in this race. It would make sense to me if it happened in 1991, after Axl and Zutaut temporarily reconciled, because that would also be closer to when the interview actually happened in 1992. On the other hand, if it happened earlier, that would give Axl more time to change his mind about who he was going to say sexually abused him. I'm fine with whenever it happened or even if it didn't happen at all but still uncertain.

3 hours ago, Avillart said:

Apparently you didn't read the interviews then. In early 1992 he publicly stated that he had memories/feelings come up that it happened to him and that he suspected it years ago. He only started the regression therapy in 1991, so do the math. 

Can you (or anyone) provide a quote where he says he remembered it before he started therapy? (I'm talking about conscious memories.)

5 hours ago, meadsoap said:

1. We do know when the conversation with Zutaut took place. Zutaut directly said that Axl told him about it while recording the UYI albums' vocals. Axl and Zutaut fell out and stopped talking to each other in late 1990, so he and Axl talked about it before then. That was months before Axl started regression therapy.

They were still recording as late as summer of 1991 and Zutaut was still around. He returned after Axl called him and apologized. The fall-out they had over Erin wasn't the end of their communications. So it's a very wide time window. It's also possible that decades later Zutaut's recollections aren't accurate.

5 hours ago, meadsoap said:

2. He made comments that he thought they were normal when he was child and still being raised by his stepfather. He did not say that it was normal and non-abusive when he started talking about it in interviews.

Where did I say otherwise?

5 hours ago, meadsoap said:

You said he was doing the same thing as Sheila Kennedy, which is the false part. Sheila Kennedy, decades after it allegedly happened, was still asserting that it was consensual in interviews, up to 2 years ago.

I think she was talking about her thinking at the time it happened that led her to not go to the police. She blamed herself for putting herself in that situation, allowing it to happen etc. But that discussion should probably continue in the other thread.

5 hours ago, meadsoap said:

If you want me to stop accusing you of saying things that aren't true... simply stop saying things that aren't true.

You are by far sloppier with your facts than I am with mine and that is the truth.

5 hours ago, meadsoap said:

3. Choosing not to talk about something personal to you is not the same as changing the details of a story you already told (which Sheila did several times) and lying about several more details. Obviously. I shouldn't have to explain that but you I guess you find new way to surprise me every time. 

He didn't just choose not to talk about it. He made it very clear it was his biological father, not his stepfather, who sexually abused him.

1 hour ago, Avillart said:

 

He started the regression therapy after having memories coming up. The memory/feeling that it had happened was what made him start regression therapy.

We had this discussion before, and you didn't provide any source, so my impressions are still based on the interviews I've read myself. He may have suspected it, but I don't think he ever said he remembered it before starting therapy.

1 hour ago, meadsoap said:

Not true. Axl never said that. Axl started past life regression therapy months after his conversation with Tom Zutaut. That means that the conversation with Zutaut (where he confessed to Zutaut about sexual abuse by his stepfather) featured no recovered memories. These were memories he had all along that he just wasn't open about. You can make an argument that the memories of his biological father (not stepfather) are false memories resulting from regression therapy, but his stepfather is a completely separate issue.

 

We don't know when his conversation with Zutaut took place. I started the post with "Going by what Axl said in interviews" to make it clear I wasn't taking Zutaut's comment into consideration.

1 hour ago, meadsoap said:

This is also not true. Axl talked about how being raised in an environment of normalized violence influenced how he responded to situations later on in life, but he always called it exactly what it was: abuse. He first stated talking about it publicly in 1989, and his description of it never changed. He's maintained all these decades that he was abused physically and mentally in many awful ways. 

I don't remember whether he ever called it abuse, although I assume he had started to perceive it as such at some point. He did say "I thought these things were normal" in the Rolling Stone interview in 1992. You should take the time to actually read the interviews and not be so quick to assert that something isn't true. I think this is at least the third time you have falsely accused me of saying something that isn't true. Take a look in the mirror.

1 hour ago, meadsoap said:

This is nothing like Sheila Kennedy. She has already been proven to have lied and embellished (intentionally or not) key details, her details of her story keeps changing in contradictory ways, she said she consented just two years ago (and maintained that for decades) and then suddenly says she didn't consent now that she's seeking money for a lawsuit, and details she had in her original book are being dropped from the lawsuit at her convenience. She completely inconsistent and exaggerates at every opportunity, which is actually the exact opposite of what Axl has been over the decades.

Axl's "details" changed quite considerably if you believe the Zutaut quote that you are so fond of. He told Zutaut he was going to do the Rolling Stone interview to expose his stepfather for sexually abusing him, but when he actually did the interview, suddenly it was his biological father who had sexually abused him. This is indeed in a whole different ballpark from Sheila's situation.

4 hours ago, Blackstar said:

Well, you fail at trying. Try harder and ask your questions in a more respectful manner to those involved and those you're talking to.

Anyway, if you just read this, no further explanation is needed.

https://www.a-4-d.com/t4995-13-july-november-1991-use-your-illusions-are-out-so-is-izzy#19582

 

From your link: "Alleged memories resulting from regression therapy included early memories of his stepfather being abusive to his mother resulting in Axl being born with a hatred towards his stepfather [Rolling Stone, April 2, 1992]."

I think this is incorrect. He was talking about his biological father, not his stepfather. I don't recall him ever accusing his stepfather of being abusive to his mother.

4 hours ago, whatashame said:

sorry, here's a question to all those who understand it better at this point. It's not me trying to be a wise guy, it's me getting lost in the Kashardian-like soap opera - I can't seem to put the pieces together anylonger .

 

So Axl's mum and the biological father had a baby, Axl, and the biological father sexually abused Axl and then left. So in comes Axl's stepdad, sexually abuses Axl and Axl's sister for years, anally and so, and Axl leaves home, comes back all buddy-buddy, buys cars for gifts and offers forgiveness, all the while Axl is on the record hating fa-xxx-ts, n-xxx-rs, the police, and proudly confessing to nearly killing the guy who he met on the bus ride to NY and who offered him a sleepover and late at night tried to sexually abuse him, and so on and so forth?

 

edit

no, fool, don't ridicule me, just explain it to me, i'm trying here

Going by what Axl said in interviews, he didn't know he had been sexually abused. He only found out about it when he was about 29. He believed something must have happened that would explain his issues with women, and other problems, so he started regression therapy and came up with the memory of having been raped as a child by his biological father.

He also said he had been beaten as a child by his stepfather, which I assume he had remembered all along, but most likely it would not have been considered child abuse in Indiana at the time, or even now, and Axl himself said he had thought it was normal (even though he's now trying to use it against Sheila Kennedy that she didn't initially recognize that what happened to her was rape). I imagine he didn't think it was enough grounds to cut ties with his family, especially if his stepfather had changed and was remorseful for what he had done.

7 hours ago, Rindmelon said:

I read it as her saying she is supporting him now (with a lawyer) but indicating that if she was firm with him when he was younger then none of them would be in this situation. Almost as if she is taking some blame for the situation he is in. 

If my reading is right then I actually think she is being a bit unfair on herself. Loads of kids lack discipline and don't have perfect parents, doesn't mean we turn into whatever Fernando is accused of being.

She deserves some blame at least for how she reacted when Kat tried to turn to her for help.

1 hour ago, Blackstar said:

It raises the question, though, that if she mixes Axl with someone else in that part of her story, maybe she has other parts of it mixed up, too (even in regards to the "main" story), because there other things she got wrong in her book, the hotel and its location, for example (even though, judging from her other stories, she seemed to know New York very well). She's also a woman who has met many people and had many encounters, especially in that time frame.

I suppose anything is possible, although I don't think being mistaken about the identity of your rapist is anywhere in the same ballpark with being mistaken about what he said on the radio or other details. The radio thing could be a dream she had and 30 years later thought happened for real. Lots of possibilities. (And, no, I don't think that means that she may have as well dreamt up her entire encounter with Axl.)

58 minutes ago, BluegrassBlues said:

I would agree with that, but she has also mixed up, whether intentionally or not, other important details that is so crucial to her case. She was dishonest over something as harmless as her age when it supposedly happened, wasn't able to name one of the biggest hotels in New York it happened at despite knowing the area well, named a medication that wasn't even being prescribed at the time as being in his bathroom just to name a few things. As for the interview part, I'd give her a pass on that, but to my knowledge, Axl has never bragged about any Penthouse or Playboy models or anything like that ever. If she was getting another interview of his mixed up that would be understandable, but I don't think he's ever said anything about having wild times with any kind of adult entertainer like that. All that added up doesn't give her much credibility for her case. I don't doubt she has been abused in the industry she's in, it unfortunately happens every single day, and I do have empathy for her, I'm just not so sure anything happened her, or if it has, she has not helped her case any with these discrepancies 

I don't think she's being deliberately dishonest about any of these things, but I do think that her mistakes create an impression that her memories are in a disorganized state (althought I think she's been trying to sort them out for the lawsuit.)

7 hours ago, SoulMonster said:

Because lying that someone has had sex with someone is hardly damaging. Lies about rape, on the other hand... There is simply no reason why he would care about someone saying he has sex with them, he probably can't remember half of the groupies he has had anyway. 

 

Even if Sheila herself didn't use the word "rape", a lot of people recognized that was what she was describing even in 2016. Read the comments to the Daily Mail interview:

'He raped her then. Because that's what she's describing. No need to euphemize rape with "had sex with her."' (This comment has 332 upvotes, 31 downvotes.)

'Re: Axl Rose: Dear Daily Mail, Usually they call that scenario "rape", not "had sex".' (180 upvotes, 14 downvotes)

'I get tired of hearing about people who think saying "Sorry" after they have done something awful, makes it ok...' (286 upvotes, 30 downvotes)

'I'll never think of Axl Rose the same again.' (186 upvotes, 73 downvotes)

And so on. I think it's safe to say that the story did hurt his reputation and wasn't interpreted as a mere account of consensual sex by many/most readers. Also, Little Michelle has been accusing him of rape with that very word for years and he hasn't taken legal action against her either.

5 hours ago, meadsoap said:

He also pointed to the Howard Stern interview, where she completely fabricated statements Axl had made during the interview. Very big misstep by Sheila. Any jury could look at that and see she has a history of lying about easily verifiable things in order to "embellish" her story. If she lied about that then what else could she lie about?

Since there's no evidence of what allegedly happened between them privately, then the entire case rests on making people believe she is credible and her motives are pure. 

It wouldn't make sense to lie about what he said on the radio, because as you said it's easily verifiable. More likely, she just got two memories mixed up or something. People remember things incorrectly all the time even when nobody is deliberately lying. I think her apparent false memory hurts her credibility a little bit, but not to a point where I would conclude that the more memorable event in the story also never happened. After all, she's not suing him for what he said on the radio, but for sexually assaulting her.

In his answer, Axl does not deny the allegations that she was in his hotel room and in bed with him. He merely denies knowledge and information sufficient to form a belief about the truth of the allegations. In other words, a fan photo taken in passing is no longer the only thing he doesn't deny. I'm guessing he must have realized that there could be evidence to support that part of Sheila's story, such as testimony from the other model who was still in the room at that point, or even just from somebody who saw them arrive at the hotel, so denying it is not in his best interest.

36 minutes ago, BluegrassBlues said:

I think it was earlier, going by Axl's clothes and hair my guess would be around 88 or 89 

28 minutes ago, Blackstar said:

I assume it was taken in 1989, because of Axl's hair and also because in another picture from the same batch, his mother looks the same as in the recently shared photo in front of the BMW.

Yes, and I think they all look a bit younger than what I would expect in 1991, especially Stuart.

I wonder where and when this picture was taken. Was it an earlier family reunion or could it have been taken in 1991?

2 hours ago, jaknudsen said:

The diatribe was on the first night, wasn't it? https://www.a-4-d.com/t1723-1991-05-28-deer-creek-music-center-noblesville-usa#5719

It appears so, but on the youtube video at around 20:10, Jake Query said the show he attended was the second of the two nights at Deer Creek. He also said that Axl ended the show with the words, "Good night and thank you homeland." Those were the words Axl said at the end of the second night (I don't know whether he said the same thing at the end of the first night.)

1 hour ago, meadsoap said:

I don't know if you were aware, but it's possible to have other family members besides your mother, father, brother, and sister...

If by "family" he meant extended family, it makes no sense to write "his granny and family", because his granny is part of his extended family.

1 hour ago, meadsoap said:

And someone else already pointed out that neither his mother or his stepfather ever attended any concert, much less in the 90s when Axl was done with them for good.

Saying so doesn't make it so. We don't know with certainty whether they ever attended a concert or not.

2 hours ago, meadsoap said:

What does Axl's stepdad have to do with that quote? It didn't say he invited him, or which family members he invited at all besides his grandmother. He can't spend time with his maternal grandmother if he's angry with a man who is completely unrelated to her?

It says "granny and family". Amy and Stuart worked for Axl and were around all the time, so most likely they were not the family members who were collected from Lafayette. That leaves the parents.

Where did anybody say that he can't spend time with his grandmother (or with his mother and stepfather for that matter)?

1 hour ago, Blackstar said:

I don't seem to remember this quote or its source of this quote (is it from a book?)

Yes, it's from his book.

1 hour ago, Blackstar said:

But there's also this account of a journalist who had attended the shows at the Deer Creek as a young fan:

Jake Query: [...] And it was only years later that two different people that worked on that tour from the Indianapolis side, that had worked in the promotion of it, have told me the reason that was delayed was because Axl Rose was sitting in his hotel room in Indianapolis, and all of the things of his childhood, you know, the evil stepfather – I’m not saying this flippantly... [...] Some of the, you know, alleged and apparent very bad things that happened to him as a young person came back to him, and he was sitting in his hotel room, on his bed with his legs folded, saying, “I can’t do it. I can’t go out there, I can’t go in front of... I can’t do it again.” And it took a team of people to convince him and rally him to go out there. And I remember when Axl Rose came out on the stage in that particular night, night two of that tour, he started out with kind of a diatribe against Indiana and authority in Indiana [...]

Source:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WX3tghRo6RY

https://www.a-4-d.com/t4611-2000-08-25-indianapolis-star-guns-free-zone-slash#18156

Interesting. This person attended the second Deer Creek show. I think Axl's family attended the show the night before.

This quote is from George Chin and he's talking about the show at the Deer Creek Music Center, Indiana, in May 1991. It appears that Axl was still on good terms with his family (at least superficially) at that point in time, which is kind of surprising, even more so if he had already told Zutaut that he was going to expose his stepfather for the monster he was. I think it's more likely that the interaction with Zutaut happened at some point later that year, but who knows.

George Chin: "Indianapolis is where Axl and Izzy grew up. At this gig, Axl sent a stretch to collect his granny and family from Lafayette, to come to the gig. The driver had orders to bring back ice-cream and pizzas from this one store in Lafayette where Axl used to hang out when he was a kid, and after the show, Axl and his family had a real homely reunion. Axl's granny was an older female version of him. She knew all the words to all the Guns N' Roses songs and she sang along at the gig."

23 hours ago, Karice said:

Like I've said, Sheila looks REALLY bad in this case. She chased and seduced Axl, not the other way around, and the fact that she and Axl are literally only  like MONTHS apart in age makes her look even worse. This wasn't some say 15  year old Fan who Axl chased and seduced into having sex with him, that  would have been REALLY bad, but these were two roughly 26 year old consenting Adults, one who literally implied she chased and seduced Axl, not the other way around. 

I think if anything it makes her story more believable that she's honest about the fact that she found him attractive and was the one to approach him. Being attracted to somebody and making a move does not equate consent to a violent sexual assault and does not make her the sexual predator in this situation. I'd like to think in this day and age it wouldn't go down well if Axl's defense was that she seduced him. Besides, if you go by Axl's version, none of this ever happened and the only thing he doesn't deny is the possibility of a fan picture taken in passing. If you don't believe her version, it would be better to go by his version than to accuse her of things that have not been alleged by anybody involved.

21 hours ago, History2010 said:

None of that is going to happen. GN'R will continue just as they have been. The Steven Tyler allegation is just as bad as Axl's and Aerosmith will be playing arenas this year. Nick Carter has six rape allegations against him and yet the Backstreet Boys are continuing to tour and are playing festivals this year. There's no need for GN'R to quietly semi retire because unfortunately the general public doesn't take these kind of allegations against rock stars seriously. They don't care if the artist is a good person or not. They just want to hear the hits and they will be happy to show up to see them perform. 

I agree for the most part, although I think there are also examples to the contrary and I don't think the artists you mention have survived entirely scot-free. Nick Carter claims he's already lost millions in revenue due to brand partners and concert promoters cutting ties with him and the band. It still remains to be seen what if any the consequences will be if he ends up losing the lawsuits against him. The same goes for Steven Tyler and Axl Rose. In Axl's case, I think he disappeared from the public eye in the 90s in part because of the lawsuits with Erin and Stephanie, and has never fully returned. Who knows what impact it will have on him if he has to go through a sexual assault trial now and is found liable. He might not need to be cancelled by the general public and the music industry. He might cancel himself and never make another public appearance.

4 hours ago, AxlRQ93 said:

GNR had a good run while it lasted. 

It's going to be interesting to see whether the band will be able to continue as if nothing happened after everything is said and done. I could see it go either way. This lawsuit has definitely been reported very widely. A lot of people who didn't know about the allegations before are now aware. It could translate into at least some lost opportunities for the band.

54 minutes ago, Avillart said:

 

Wasn't so difficult when she bragged with the story in her Kiss and Tell book. And she wasn't (allegedly) assaulted by Axl in the "industry" but in a private situation that she herself initiated. 

I think when she said that it's important to make the industry safe for women, she wasn't just talking about her own incident.