S1E37 – Yellow Peril Tactical on Starting Firearms Training
Episode Notes
Yellow Peril Tactical can be found on Instagram @yellow_peril_tactical, Twitter @YPTActual, and Patreon @yellow_peril_tactical. You can listen to their podcast The Tiger Bloc Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts.
The host Margaret Killjoy can be found on twitter @magpiekilljoy or instagram at @margaretkilljoy. You can support her and this show on Patreon at patreon.com/margaretkilljoy.
Transcript
Margaret
Hello and welcome to Live Like the World is Dying, your podcast for what feels like the end times. I’m your host, Margaret Killjoy, and I use she or they pronouns. And this week I’m talking to 3 people from Yellow Peril Tactical. Yellow Peril Tactical is a group of Asian I guess firearms enthusiasts? That’s probably not the proper way to say it. They’ll explain themselves a little bit better in a moment. But they are a group of people who organize different shooting clubs and different tactical training. as well as putting out a lot of content online. They’re actually one of the more interesting sources of non-right-wing gun stuff on the internet. And so I was very excited to sit down and talk to them about what is involved in starting your own firearms club and what is involved in organizing as marginalized people. And I also talk to him about guns, you’ll be shocked to know, so there’ll be some geeking out about guns. But a lot of it is about how to organize stuff and make things happen. This podcast is a proud member of the Channel Zero Network of anarchist podcasts and here’s a jingle from another show on the network. Da-da da-daaaaaa.
Jingle 1
Hello! If you are listening, then you are here on purpose. This is Twin Trouble, the podcast about fighting the system and staying rebellious while incarcerated. The show takes the form of a recorded phone call between my twin brother, currently locked up in a federal transfer overflow jail in Grady County, and myself in the “free” world of Chicago. Why are we talking about prison abolition?
Jingle 2
The reason I wanted to do this whole prison thing is they keep people’s voices down. They want to shield the public from the day-to-day experiences of the [inaudible] who are incarcerated are going through. I’m not gonna take this sitting down or bent over, I’m standing up and I’m gonna continue to speak my mind about what’s going on. So I would hope [inaudible] the podcast we could get [inaudible], we could set it up
Margaret
Okay, if you all could introduce yourself with I guess your name, your pronouns, and then I guess what brings you to Yellow Peril Tactical.
Snow
Hi I’m Snow, she/they pronouns, I was invited to Yellow Peril Tactical by John Chinaman and another contributor. And I had been following their/our work for a little bit. And the posts that I actually have in mind is the one with the squid sauce and the handgun. And that just really, like, I felt so seen just by that one picture. And I just really felt like—I don’t know, it was a very pivotal moment for me and a moment where I really felt like a sense of community around meeting other fellow leftist Asian folks who are also into firearms and self-defense, community defense, and also shared like an intention to get better for themselves, for their community, and I think just the camaraderie, so to speak, among the other YPT tigers (dare I say) has been really nice actually. We shoot the shit a lot but we also have a lot of, like, encouragement towards each other and give each other advice as well as folks that reach out to us. So that’s kind of what keeps me in it. It’s a fun time so far.
Margaret
What was the post?
Snow
It was one of our earliest posts and it was, like, this pretty well-known, like, bottle of squid sauce. I use it all the time. And it’s a handgun propped up by a chopstick and I just, like, I saw that and was just, like, what the fuck like this is me.
Margaret
Cool.
Camilla
I’m Camilla. I use she/her pronouns. I found out about YPT through the internet/someone told me about it. About a year and a half ago almost I started taking up firearms as a training and self-defense tool, and started getting really into community defense, and have just been using it as something to get me out of the house and into the woods for the past year. I’ve been getting into doing the beginners/intermediate people teaching other beginners thing. And actually the first time I ever heard that was on your show, so I heard that and I was like, yeah, that’s totally what I’m about to start doing, that’s wild, that’s cool that other people are talking about it. So thank you for that and I’ll pass it to John.
Margaret
That’s cool.
John
Hey y’all, I’m a John Chinaman, he/him pronounce. I am actually one of the original Yellow Peril people. But I’ll say before, like, that doesn’t fucking matter. Like, it doesn’t matter when you join. It holds no specialness being one of the original people. But I only say that to just explain that I was—I was around the beginning. And basically what happened was me and some people that I shoot with in real life, we heard about this guy. His name is Austin Tong. And he was a Fordham student and he got in trouble by his university because he had posed on Instagram with a firearm. And, well we were like, that’s bad. And then we checked his Instagram and it was all just like pro-NRA bullshit, pro-Donald Trump bullshit, I own a gun because, you know, I’m afraid of anti-Asian violence. Oh, me too. But, I mean, oh damn, I wonder who’s trying to stoke all that anti-Asian violence, you know. Think about it there. And so we were just pissed off. We were just pissed off. And we were just, like, we’d like toyed around this before. We were like, hey, when you go start that Yellow Peril Instagram account. And so I was in like—I was in a freaking parking lot I just started it. And I was like, ah shit, like, we actually have to like post things. Shit. I don’t want to reiterate too much what Snow and Camilla said, but honestly one of the most special parts about this has been honestly learning about more of my own heritage. Like, talking to other people, you know, obviously—obviously I’m a firearm enthusiast, but really talking to other people who are going through or have gone through similar things as me and learning about, like, what it means to be Asian American in these United States, so-called United States, and the grappling with that has honestly been the most special part for someone who didn’t actually kind of grow up with that community.
Margaret
Yeah. Could one of you all explain a little bit more—just kind of an overview of what Yellow Peril Tactical is to our listeners?
Snow
Yeah, I can do that. We are a collection—collective of leftist east and southeast Asians that do a lot of firearms education. But we also do political education, the occasional shit post, which the internet seems to really like. It seems like the memes, actually, that we put the least amount of effort in get the most likes. It’s kind of wild, like we’ll just throw something together and it’ll just get like a thousand likes and just makes no sense but, you know, it’s cool. We also do fundraisers. I think last year we raised like $5600, something around there, to various fundraisers. We also post a lot of infographics geared towards new shooters, like we’ve done a couple like how to shop for a firearm like a handgun and a rifle, and like we did a glock guide recently. And we also do we peer pressure people into posting their groups and splits because we like seeing people get better, including ourselves. And we recently started doing like a drill of the month thing just to kind of give new shooters something to go on when they’re at the range instead of just mag-dumping with their friends. So yeah, we do all sorts of shit. But that’s kind of like the main hustle.
John
And it’s definitely geared towards, like, newer shooters, people who are newer to firearms. Second everything that Snow said, it’s very easy to just go to the range and be like, okay, cool, what do I do? Like just shoot a bunch of rounds into a microwave or something, and then you’re like, oh no, this like a skill. You can build and learn from others and teach others as well.
Margaret
But shooting a microwave sounds really fun though.
Snow
I have been to a range area—like a public land—and there was like this random thing in the middle and I got a closer look at it, somewhere about a fucking TV. Like a flat screen. And it was just like in pieces. Like the screen was shattered and then like the frame was all fucked up and, like, whatever layers in between those two was just, like, perforated, and it was just so confusing to me because I’m just like, why? Who brings a TV out to the range and just shoots at it. That’s so bizarre.
Margarte
I mean it sounds like it would be a perfect like 90s anti-capitalist video, you know?
Snow
Instead of Office Space where it’s like a printer, it’s just a fucking TV.
Margaret
Yeah. Kill your television. Okay, so there’s a bunch of stuff I want to ask you about and some of it is a little bit more like theoretical, and I kind of want to ask you a bit about your experiences. But I think I want to start a little bit with some of the practical stuff. Like you all are—I mean, one of the things that I find so interesting about you all is that you’re one of the best resources for new shooters on the left—or probably just new shooters in general—to gain firearms information that is, like, practical instead of, I don’t know, shrouded. You all have this whole thing where you attack Red Fudds all the time and I want to ask you about that and a little bit. But one of the things I want to ask you about is what are some of these basic drills that new people can—or possibly intermediate people, but especially new people—can be doing. Like, what are groups and splits, for example?
Camilla
To start off, groups and splits is essentially taking metrics and applying it to how you’re training. So that involves having a timer of some sort. You can do it the hard way, or you can go in with a bunch of friends to get a shot timer. And you essentially put up a fresh target, you have your shot timer, you press the button—usually have a delay set, at least that’s how I prefer to do it—it goes beep, and then it from that beep onward it’s counting the amount of time between your shots. And the groups part is how far away your rounds are hitting on the target, and the splits is the amount of time in between your shots. Usually you pay most attention to the first shot and the last shot, but it totally depends on what the drill is. When it comes to drills, there’s a lot of different things you can do. It entirely depends on where you’re at in your journey. If it’s your first day shooting, the drills are going to look really different than if you’re going to the range to work on your draw from concealment or something in an ongoing kind of practice way.
John
One of the things we talk about a lot is that, when you’re at the range, like, not going to lie, like, shooting is expensive. Ammunition is expensive, guns are expensive, right? So when you’re at the range with live ammunition, it’s good to show up with a plan. You may not stick to it, but show up for a skill like you want to work on. Whether that’s, like, getting rounds on target fast from your holster, from concealment or whatever, or being able to hit fast follow-up shots, or being able to transition between targets quickly. There’s a lot you can do at your house in dry fire— for those who don’t know, dry fire is making sure your gun is unloaded, pointing in a safe direction, and practicing it. Just pulling the trigger. And you can do a lot of that at home and when you’re on the range, you know, practicing the stuff that you can’t do at home. You need live ammunition for, like, recoil management. One of the things that we did our December—someone correct me if I’m wrong here—drill of the month was like putting four rounds on a 3×5 index card. Actually quite difficult. January—I see Snow nodding at me because, actually and Camilla too because we’ve all been having trouble with this. Literally draw—put two rounds on a 3×5 index card, rehoster, draw, put two more rounds on. And it is very very hard. It took me a week to do this by the way.
Snow
It is unforgiving. Yeah.
John
It is extremely unforgiving. I finally did it today.
Margaret
What kind of range is that?
John
Five yards. Really not that far. Um I but there’s.
Margaret
I mean, I don’t think I could do it, like…
Camilla
It’s one of those things where it’s like, it just sounds, like, very doable—well, because it is. But when you’re there and you’re timing yourself and someone’s filming you.
Snow
All your friends are watching.
Camilla
Yeah, you just kind of like revert to your worst fucking version of yourself, you know. You’re just, all your training goes out, you’re at your most, like primal, like nerves. Just yeah.
Margaret
One of the things I actually really appreciate about the content you all put up is I feel like you encourage people to post not just their like coolest sexiest stuff, you know, like I think it was even today that you all posted, like, I failed at the thing I was trying to do. And it was like someone like sitting there sad, you know. And like, you know, and I actually think that that’s an important part of making people feel welcome into a sport like this because it’s so buried in machismo and it’s not just—in my experience it’s not just about the gender or the gender presentation of the people that you’re shooting with, but it’s stuff like that. It’s the, like, making sure you can do like the coolest thing and then only posting your like super coolest—also one of the reasons I appreciate it is that, frankly across the board when I watched watch right-wing or left-wing or centrist whatever, like, guntube people, they always look like they think they’re really badass looking. And it never looks like smooth or good. And I’m always like, huh, okay. It’s all like slow motion with dramatic music and stuff as they, like, kind of like jiggle with this thing and there’s lots of—I don’t know, this is completely meaningless to anyone who doesn’t spend all their time watching dumb videos about new calibers and shit. But so that’s something I really appreciate about you all is the way that you break down some of that machismo just by actually being honest about what the journey looks like. That’s not really a question. Sorry.
Snow
No, I’m glad that you brought that up because, like, we teach like 101s to folks in the area and something that I always incorporate into when I’m teaching is just, like, telling folks, one, marksmanship is like not the goal of the 101 class. And when I first started shooting, I was fucking horrible. Awful. And I probably say it like two to three times within like the first hour. And I do it in a way to be like, yeah, like a lot of people aren’t fucking good. Most people aren’t good at shooting for a very long time, even if they’ve been shooting for years. But I think bringing that, like, honesty and like humility means a lot to folks because like guns are intimidating. And like, it’s already hard enough to learn a new skill let alone one that’s fucking firearms and.
Margaret
Yeah.
Camilla
Yeah, and it’s intimidating because, like, we’re presented with this message in this worldview—or at least I was growing up in liberalism—that the only legitimate and skilled people with firearms are law enforcement and military and that those skills, like, reside squarely in their domain. And I think like the demystification process of, like, going out to the range, having someone show you who feels like from your community—like your friend, your family member, chosen or otherwise, or your comrade—like having them really like spend some time with you and, like, show and put some care into how the stuff is presented really just kind of, like, cuts through a lot of the misogyny and like the militaristic machismo culture like y’all were talking about. And shooting guns isn’t actually that hard, it’s just there’s so much mental shit attached to it. It’s really hard to shoot with, like, you know, whatever hair’s breadth precision. But I don’t know if there’s—I don’t know if that’s real, to be honest. Like I know there’s people that drill that and—but like 99% of the people out there are relying on a veneer of, like, machismo to really get the point across. But yeah. It’s all bullshit. Just need to find people that are willing to like sit down with you. And I think maybe that’s one of the goals of our page and our collective is just, like, to be a virtual friend or something.
John
We answer all of those to DMs. Every—basically every single one gets answered. And just so listeners who, like, don’t know a lot about guns know, like, if you’re going to the range like once a month with some buddies and, like, trying to just, you know, just do your best—like I’m not even saying you have to be good—just like do your best. Put rounds on target. See if you can learn from your mistakes. You’re already shooting more than the law enforcement officer on the beat. Like you’re already doing more than those people, like not even joking.
Margaret
I’ve had vets who have been part of different shooting groups who I’ve been around—I used to live somewhere with access to a shooting range—and the vets didn’t know better than other people. I don’t know how to say this politely. And also the number of times I had to insist that, yes, actually people should wear ear protection. And it’s always vets who are like, we don’t need ear protection or whatever. Okay, so one of my questions—we talked a little bit about the like misogyny and bravado, but I’d love to talk about guns in the United States traditionally white supremacist—or at least primarily white space. Gun culture—and obviously you all are an intervention into that. And I’d like to kind of ask you more about ways in which racial dynamics come up and how you all handle them and what especially listeners of color or, you know, people can take away from what you all have learned.
Snow
Yeah, I could take the first stab at that. I think growing up that was definitely my understanding of it, that it’s mostly white cis dudes that go shooting and go hunting and posts unsolicited pictures of their hunts on social media—and I get to look at them. And, you know, I grew up in like an anti-gun household, like my parents are Vietnamese refugees and so their relationship to guns and war is just that it’s bad, right? Like they endured a lot of trauma. Like my mom hid under a table until like the 90s whenever she even heard like a helicopter fly over the house. And this is when she was living in the states. Like, they got here in the 80s, right. And so that’s how deep like that warfare trauma was for my family and, you know, my mom side the family lives in East Bay California, and so, you know, they are familiar with guns. And I knew that, but I never really interacted with it because it was, like, it’s my male cousins, you know, and so getting into it more in the last like year and a half has been like a wholly new endeavor in a lot of ways. Being a part of YPT makes that a lot easier and more navigable. But overall, like, the majority of the people I see at the range like whether or not I know them were still, like, white people. And a lot of chuds. And it’s intimidating, not just because of them being men, but also because they’re like politically opposed to people like me—that look like me—taking the means necessary to, like, defend ourselves in our community. And it motivates me in a lot of ways to be the best that I can be, but ultimately, like, it doesn’t take away that, like, stress that I feel, like the anxiety I feel around who else has guns. But I find that the more folks—like-minded folks that I’ve met shooting and going to range days, like, we need more—well maybe not we need—but like, there ought to be more BIPOC folks and femme/nonbinary-presenting people, identifying people in these spaces if they want to be. And from the conversations that I have, like, they want to be there. Like we have so many people reaching out to us via DMs or like, how do I get involved in a group, like do you know anybody in this area. Sometimes we do and sometimes we don’t, but we’ve seen a trend of like more and more people, like, reaching out and asking for those kinds of resources. And I think given, you know—especially since 2017 after Charlottesville, like it’s becoming much much more apparent how brazen a lot of these armed right-wing militias are going to be. I think January 6th 2021 was a lot—a wake up call for a lot of people. I was horrified but not surprised. I was a bit entertained to be honest. I was like, he he he. But at the same time I was just like, you know, we warned y’all. We have been saying this and y’all think we’re not based in reality when we say these things, but yet here we are. And, you know, Asian people—I’ve mentioned this on like one of our previous podcasts, but just like, my aunt and grandma were mugged a couple summers ago. And, like, my aunt was knocked unconscious and like spent a couple days in the hospital. And this was like during the wave of like anti-Asian hate crimes, and then actually like kind of validated my, like, inner stress and anxiety of, like, this kind of thing. And that I think it’s a far-fetched reality to think that like hate will go away as long as we just keep organizing. The right is always going to be there. Fascism is always going to be there.
Margaret
Mhmm.
Snow
And the only way we can endure is by being resilient and continuously adapting. And so firearms and firearms education, for myself and others, is like one of the tangible ways that I feel like I can move towards that resiliency. I just talked a lot. But yeah.
Margaret
No no, that’s all really useful.
John
I mean, I’ll say it, like I got my first gun—I think it was like 20? I think it was 2018. I mean it wasn’t very good or practicing a lot., but that’s when I got mine. So it was in the wake of Charlottesville and seeing some of that stuff happen, and I want to second what Snow said about finding a group, finding a crew not only to keep you like sort of motivated—it’s obviously more fun when you do with others than I suppose just like going to the ridge and just blasting around by yourself. But in some cases it can honestly be—it can honestly be related to your own physical safety—and I hate saying this, especially if there’s people out there who are new to firearms or thinking about getting into firearms—but I mean, like me and people I shoot with, like we’ll go to ranges and we’ll see like 3% militia there. You know what I mean? Like see like dudes who—and they’re all dudes obviously, like people who given the chance, if they knew what we believed or even, yeah, some people’s, you know, racial makeup or, you know, or sexuality, like people could get hurt. Like, you know, one time people started pulling tags like at a like at a range once where I as at. Like having people to not only keep you motivated but to help keep you safe is honestly very important in a space where it’s a lot of armed reactionary white dudes. I gotta let this dog out. Sorry.
Margaret
Yeah, where I live currently I’m back undercover, like I’m back in the closet essentially in a lot of the and situations I find myself in just because I’m now in a sort of deeper rural situation than I was previously. And it, you know I have the like—well I have white privilege and then I have, like, the capacity to put on—well, no one ever reads me a straight no matter how hard I try. But I, you know, I can put up enough of a front that people can ignore my bangs and my braid or something like that and it’s a—sometimes just a matter of safety. But that’s something I can do because I’m white. I don’t know. I have no grand statement out of that, actually.
Camilla
Yeah, and I mean it’s because it’s different for everyone. Everyone negotiation of like arming up and what that means and the things that that confronts you with is really different. But it’s—I don’t want to say always, but a lot of the time it’s really intense and you’re kind of like navigating your own, like, mortality. I don’t want to be too philosophical and heavy about it. But like, yeah, you don’t want to downplay the fact that you have like a machine on you, or that you’re training with it at the very least, or owning it, that is designed expressly for killing. And there’s no way to dilute that, and it’s dangerous too. So yeah, I don’t know about other folks but I have a really fragmented consciousness around it. I can’t forget that I have these things, especially if they’re on your person, but you also can’t be thinking about it constantly, at least in a way that gets your nervous system going into fight/flight/freeze. Yeah, a level of normalization and, like, taking it kind of slow and maybe figuring out what sort of increments you can dip your toes and your ankles and your calves and your quads, you know, like you don’t jump in, you don’t cannonball into like having a gun, hopefully. I mean sometimes there’s like intense situations, right? But you navigate those as they come up. But yeah, otherwise you like to have bite-size chunks. Otherwise it can be like too much and you maybe overlook something, and doing it with a crew—doing it with at least one other person means that someone is watching your back and bringing things to your attention that we sometimes overlook.
Margaret
Well, that actually leads me to one of the main questions I have for you all, you know, similar to you all saying in your DMs you constantly have people asking basically, how do I get started? And I think that’s actually one of the biggest questions facing the anti-authoritarian left in general right now is like, literally, like people want to join us and don’t know how, and especially right now in these times of like pretty intense isolation, people don’t know how. And so I’m hoping that you all will just magically solve this in the next short bit of time by answering the following question, which is: how do people—how can people get started—how can people start their own shooting groups? Like, how do you—not necessarily like how do you find a crew, but maybe how do you, like, make the crew a crew. How do you—how do you get going?
Camilla
Well you’ve got a complete Prestige and Call of Duty first. That’s the first step. I’m sorry.
Snow
Oh my God.
Margaret
That’s actually a reference that goes over my head. I’m aware that there’s a video game called Call of Duty but I don’t know what Prestigge is.
Camilla
It was like an answer antithetical to the one that I want to give.
Margaret
I picked up that part but now I’m curious, what is Prestige and Call of Duty.
Snow
Yeah, tell us Camilla.
Camilla
Ah, Prestige mode is when you max out on your level—I think it’s like 55 or something—and then you go through again and you just keep doing it. That’s like the almost violent level of, like, never ending-ness of these types of like games where you’re just, like, you’re just putting a different patina on your gun and spending 8 hours to get there, you know? Yeah, stupid reference aside, let’s see I’d say that there’s no cut and dry way to get there, but there is a way for pretty much every single person to get there. So I don’t have like a road map necessarily, but maybe me and Snow can tag team this because I don’t know if my brain alone is up for the task of, like, responding to this and it’s a very important question. I did it by just watching Youtube, honestly. That’s me being a millennial. Just watching Youtube trying to find some like good introductory, like, safety videos. And videos about philosophy of keeping a gun—not like deep like treatises on owning guns, that’s not what I mean. I mean like philosophy as in how do you—how do you do this rightly, you know? How do you protect yourself, protect everyone around you, not expose, anyone to danger? What are all the things to think about in your life? And then there’s like political things. I would say some of those things are like, are you dealing with like multiple voices in your head saying like you don’t need a gun, like, because those types of voices are generally like the liberal in your head gaslighting you and, like, downplaying the realness of your life. So I would say that, you know, that’s a thing to reckon with. That’s a thing I’ve reckoned with personally. And you just kind of, like, have to do it out of love sometimes. That’s where I’m going to leave this thought for right now and I’ll pass it off to someone else.
Snow
So yeah I think that’s—I mean, that’s a good start to the answer. I think, like, to add on, it’s just like, what are your goals? Like what is it that you intend to do with these firearms? Hopefully it’s self-defense and community defense. And starting out with just one friend, you know, that constitutes a shooting group. But I think, you know, I was going to say SRA. but I’ve heard very mixed reviews about so those locals. I think some are good. Um, but I can’t—
Margaret
SRA is the socialist rifle association?
Snow
Yes, thank you. My bad.
Margaret
No, it’s all good.
Snow
And maybe starting there, you could also always send us a DM on YPT. But, you know, I think with all the different leftist gun-stograms that have popped up over the last like year, like it might be worth a start like seeing if any of them, you know, kind of look like they live in your area. Or if not, just like asking them for advice. Because most of the people that are on leftist gun-stagram—I want to say most, not all—are pretty nice. Um, and pretty humble. And I think it’s really hard when, like, you live in an area where there’s not a lot of like identifiable leftists. And so that can be very hard. Or if you live in an area where guns are hard to access, like that brings a whole other set of obstacles that you have to go through in order to acquire fire arms or the knowledge. But. you know, like Camilla said, like Youtube is a really good place to start. Our page is a really good place to start. If you’re aware of even just, like, any mutual aid groups in your area that just do like self-defense classes, like hand-to-hand self-defense kind of stuff might be a good place to start. Like, zine fests. You never know who’s going to be at the zine fest. Could be some cool people there. So I think it’s just like trying to find community first might be a good idea, especially among leftists. You know, out in the Pacific Northwest we have quite a few zine fests and you never know what you’re going to find.
John
Starting with people in the community, like, that’s legit.
Like I know—and they’re not in my area—but there is a group of Food Not Bombs people that we know that basically just doubles as a shooting group. They feed homeless people and they’re doing a ton of great work, and they double as a shooting group. It’s pretty freaking awesome. They do a ton of self-defense stuff as well. I know you mentioned SRA, Socialist Rifle Association earlier. Seems like it’s very heavily chapter-dependent. Some chapters are just like—just balling out, like just wonderful people, like lots of resources, people who are very skilled, eager to teach, lots of new people who are eager to learn. Some chapters seem to exist only on paper. It’s always worth reaching out if there’s one in your area, to reach out and see, like, what they do and who’s around, basically.
Snow
There’s also—that reminded me of like Arm Your Friends, they’re are relatively new Ongram and they’re a great place to start also.
Margaret
Okay.
Camilla
There’s—like, having trouble with this kind of like implies that there’s a challenge or a barrier, right, to like getting into this. I think some of those common barriers that we hear about/have encountered ourselves are: your friends are libs, or your friends, like, don’t just agree with your decision and your analysis conclusion that, like, hey I want to be armed now,—regardless of what the reason is, regardless of what the goals are, like if you have lib friends, they’re going to push back on that probably. And that is something you can, you know, work in those relationships around or you can try to develop some new relationships. And I think, like, the latter is really like the best way to go about getting some people to shoot with on like a quicker timeline, because you don’t know where your friends are gonna move. Do you even want to be learning in the context of like more liberal folks who aren’t necessarily like ready politically, etc. to to start shooting? So like ways to do that are DMing people and like trying to set a meetup time, like the old fashioned like hit people up cold or, you know, kind of just like plumbing your social connections and trying to figure out like who knows who and, you know, it can be hard and intimidating as fuck to reach out to people because people are like, are you an op? You must be an op. And there’s a lot of that parannoia and that’s very real and that’s not going to go anywhere. But the more you can, like, create like authentic genuine connection with people who are already doing this or have voiced being interested in it, the better time you’re going to have so just look for those moments and opportunities I guess.
John
I went shooting today with someone I met at DSA of all places. Like people always trash DSA or whatever, yeah—
Margaret
Democratic Socialist America?
John
Democratic Socialists of American, people as trash them like, oh yeah, they’re are a bunch of libs, blah blah blah. Dude’s a really good shooter, eager to like share knowledge and whatnot, like you just meet people.
Margaret
I think that we have these assumptions about how people, like when you live in an echo chamber—I lived in an echo chamber for a very long time. Now I don’t live in an echo chamber because I live—the echo chamber’s me and my dog. So I’m not trying to bash that, but when we live in these echo chambers we can start thinking to ourselves like, ah, DSA is all liberals, or all liberals hate guns, or in, you know, all of these things. That don’t really hold up necessarily to closer analysis, and also things are changing dramatically and quickly, you know. A lot of people who were liberals a few years ago aren’t anymore. Shout out to the more than one liberal financial building accounts that I know—like, the people who, like, tell you what to do with money—that are now like going anarchist because of the times and because of just actually more availability of an understanding of—I mean these are clearly people who understand capitalism, right? And it used to be they were all about helping poor people navigate capitalism, to to work through it, to come out ahead. And now they’re a little bit more, like, actually this whole system—Anyway, so I guess I’m—I would say I’m not surprised by, you know, finding comrades in all kinds of places. And I know my own experience is that—it’s kind of actually not necessarily the best thing. I’m usually the most experienced firearms person around when I’m shooting, just literally because I’m at the low end of intermediate but I work with new people a lot. And that’s actually has worked really well for me, it’s just a lot of people coming forward and just being like—I mean some of it is like, yo, I’m kind of sick of all these dudes who are like trying to teach me it. Like more than once people have been, like, my boyfriend really wants to go shooting and I want to go shooting. but honestly I don’t want to learn from him, you know. And like that’s actually the thing I would say to like someone who’s considering learning to shoot, like maybe don’t learn from your significant other, especially if there’s like kind of a traditional gender relationship going on in your relationship, you know? Anyway, that’s a tangent but… Okay, well now that we’ve solved that and everyone will feel perfectly free to start doing this, which is great, I’ve been trying to solve this for a long time. I want to talk about the kinds of people you don’t want to go shooting with, and I want to talk about the Mosin Nagantvwhich is the best rifle ever made, and the 1911, the best handgun ever made. And I want to talk to you all about why you agree that we should look for the firearms that wars a hundred years ago instead of the firearms that are currently in use by militaries, and how we should value aesthetics over function. Is that correct? That’s ya’lls line with Yellow Peril Tactical, right?
Camilla
Yeah, I could tell you’ve been—you’ve been studying up on our Instagram bio—
Johns
Go ahead Camilla.
Camilla
1911 is a Colt 45 handgun that chuds’ll often cite—
Margaret
What’s a thud in this context?
Camilla
A chud in this context is a tending toward violent, like, right wing conservative authoritarian person, very broadly speaking.
Margaret
Okay.
Camilla
They often say that two world wars! It won two world wars! So that’s, like, that’s the joke of the 1911. The history behind that weapon is interesting and horrific, as is the interest—as is the history behind, like, literally every gun that was involved in conflict. But have an interesting story. The reason I chimed in so quickly is because I have an uncle who has been a cop—has been a retired cop for almost my whole life because, so he’s like pretty old, but he still every day carries. He, like, his thing is like carrying a 1911 in his fanny pack. And like, you know, I grew up with this person, like, almost my entire life. So finally I’m like, hey, what’s up uncle. Like, I’m into guns now, like, what’s up. Let’s talk. And so the next time I see him he takes me outside into the backyard where we can have like a second of privacy, and he’s like, yeah, let me show this thing to you—Really quick, flagging. Flagging is when someone swings the muzzle of the gun across your body or holds it on you unintentionally, usually. So then you say, hey, you flagged me. It means someone pointed a gun at you which means that they’re violating one of the most basic, like, safety principles of like having firearms—So he he flags me multiple times with it and I’m just, like, astounded because like it confirms everything that I think I know about police officers, which is that they’re incompetent and aren’t good at shooting and aren’t safe. But it was just, like, such a rich moment for me. And I said something both times and he just kind of, like, waved it off and was like, it’s a sick gun though, right? I mean, like he’s in his eighties so he’s not saying “sick,” but that was his equivalent. And yeah, that’s maybe all you need to know about people who really love 1911s. I mean, like, collectors and stuff, there’s exceptions to everything that I’m saying, that’s like a generalization. And the Mosin is a Russian rifle that someone else can talk about right.
John
The 1911, right, like it’s a classic, yeah, but it should be left as a classic. It holds 7 rounds of .45 which is a slow round, it’s not really as good as 9mm which, if you’re not into guns, like every—guns you think of generally like shoot nine millimeters. It’s not as good. They have a tendency to jam. They’re not very good. But yes, old heads like them. But again, I agree with Margaret here, if you’re gonna get an old gun you have to get a gun that was designed in 1891 by Sergey Mosin that symbolizes an authoritarian Stalinist regime, because that’s what makes it good. The optics make it good.
Margaret
[Laughing]
John
Not, you know, it doesn’t matter if it’s bolt action and fires extremely slow and only holds five shots, because back in the 40s some conscripts carried it once upon a time and killed some fascists with it and that’s why it’s still relevant in 2022. You heard it here first.
Margaret
The reason I love everyone being obsessed with Mosin-Nagants is that, before I really knew much about guns and my friends would take me shooting, my friend took me shooting actually on the Pacific Northwest—and we were shooting one of his guns which is a Mosin-Nagant—and it fired without the trigger being touched. Twice.
Snow
Oh.
Margaret
And because we’ve practiced all of the other rules of firearm safety, nothing bad happened. The gun was always pointed down range and so when it went off on its own, it did so down range so I’ve never really trusted Mosin-Nagants.
John
Margaret, who doesn’t love surprises? We all love surprises.
Snow
You know, maybe this is too soon, but Alec Baldwin sure doesn’t like surprises, you know?
Camilla
Oh my goodness.
John
Oh my god. Oh, rim shot.
Camilla
But in all seriousness, if you have a Mosin, I’m pretty agnostic about whether you hold onto it or get rid of It. Don’t shoot someone or yourself with it, please? They’re like kind of affectionately and pejoratively referred to as Garbage Rods. And that’s kind of like what their value is. Obviously they’re bullets. It’s a gun. You could really fuck someone up with it. Yeah, if you want to talk about good firearms to get into here and now, we can talk briefly about that because that might be helpful for some people. But it’s definitely going to be a more modern thing where you can like pull the trigger more than once without having to like, you know, pull a bolt back.
John
I think we should talk about that, Camilla, but it’s probably worth saying that or a while there you would see it online all the time—still do—someone being like, you know, ready to bash the fash, right? And it’s a firearm designed in 1891 that was just a a crap-tier rifle back in 1891. And you’re like, why—you know, you can get—you know, you can get other stuff. And maybe it made sense when that firearm was $100 in a crate in your local sporting goods store. But, you know, we regularly post links to AR rifles that are like $430–440. Like good quality, like, Soviet military surplus. Like, the Mosin was a 5 shot bolt action rifle, so you have to like cycle a bolt—work a bolt back and forth to shoot it. Or the SKS rifle, a firearm that was obsolete 2 years after was introduced, holds 10, incredibly heavy. Like, those guns are now going for $500–700, so you can get a better gun for cheaper. And yet still we see to this day people proudly posting pictures of Soviet Military surplus, you know, “We’re ready. We’re ready, boys.” Like, you know, but let’s get into more what Camilla said because that was just depressing.
Snow
I mean, just to like wrap it up though. Like I think just to clarify for folks that like aren’t super gun nerds like we all are is that—to pull out further what John was saying—is just, like, a lot of people out there are saying these kinds of dare I say antiquated firearms are not up to like the performance that more modern guns are. And so for them to say it’s “just as good” is actually quite reckless and dangerous. And so that’s why we’re so against it as being your, like, primary firearm, right? Like I have a lever-action. Is that my primary carbine? Fuck no. But it is it one of my favorite guns? Yes. So it’s just like, you know, like we say, mission drives gear and.
John
Like, you don’t have to have that many guns.
Like I have a shotgun which I use for hunting, and then a carbine, and a handgun, right? Like no one’s saying you got to get a crapload of guns, and like maybe buying one of those guns back in the day, yeah, it made sense when it was a $100. But now that you can get better stuff for cheaper—for cheaper!—there’s no reason you should buy one with your hard-earned money. And advocating that new firearm owners go buy those is frankly—is reckless—is negligent reckless, honestly.
Margaret
I mean, I want one. But I want one in the context that bolt action is my favorite action to shoot.
Snow
It’s fun.
Margaret
My current favorite rifle is my dad’s 1972 .22 mag bolt action rifle that’s meant for shooting groundhogs, and it’s my favorite gun. And it annoys me because .22 magnum is the same price as, like, large—same price as a center fire ammunition. But it’s, like, not particularly more effective than .22 LR, which is the cheapest ammunition. But it’s my favorite gun and so I completely feel you on the lever action. And I would totally have a Mosin-Nagant. I like history and there’s like something like kind of—I mean, it’s funny because I spend most of my time—my waking hours trying to figure out how to be mean to authoritarian communism. That’s like, you know, what drives my life. But I still kind of am like, ah, that’s cool gun. I don’t know. So—but the thing I wanted to point out really quickly for yeah—saying—I wanted to kind of geek out about guns with you all because I don’t get a chance too much in my day-to-day life. But I think it was you all who brought to my attention this term Red Fudd. And would one of you be able to briefly explain what a Red Fudd is and what a Fudd is so to sort of tie up this before we talk about good guns.
Camilla
Ah, it’s a reference to Elmer Fudd, I believe. Red meaning communist, Fudd—affectionately, of course—Fudd is Elmer Fudd. So like, the caricature is someone who believes and is a proponent of what we call Fuddlore which is the comment—you know, it’s like summed up in comments like, “the SKS is just as good as the AK47” or “SKS is just as good as an AR15” from wherever. Give me some, give me some other ones.
John
I guarantee you that — guarantee you that everyone in here has heard the Fuddlore that on the news when Joe Biden said all you need is two shotgun blasts. If someone’s coming to your house just fire in the air. They’ll run away. Yeah, that’s massive Fuddlore. Do not fire your gun into the air aimlessly and hoping the other person will run away, like—
Margaret
It’s also a crime. Warning shots are completely illegal. The president is telling you to do something that is a crime.
John
I don’t want to opine on any every jurisdiction. But yeah, usually you don’t do that.
Camilla
Yeah, it’s not going to save you either.
John
Camilla’s colt story, right? It’s like, “Why would you want to buy one of them plastic glocks. I got one of these all-metal Colt 45, Two world wars.” Fuddlore
Camilla
Yeah, like racking the shotgun being the defense enough to save you from someone breaking in your home trying to harm you. That’s another Fuddlore piece. Yeah, I mean, so there’s like—there’s Fudds that are like more authoritarian right, and then there’s just like Red Fudds. So you make a distinction sometimes. But when you want to talk about Fuddlore, you don’t need to make the distinction.
Margaret
Okay, so if someone listening to this is like, I don’t know how this particular episode will convince people that they need to get a gun, but let’s say it did. And people want to get involved in shooting for self and community defense purposes. What would be good introductory firearms?
Snow
Glock 19, you know. It’s—you know, there’s three categories of handguns, right? There’s full size, compact, and subcompact. Typically you see most people, like, conceal carry subcompact and compacts. But for smaller-framed people, even a Glock 19 can be hard to conceal. But generally speaking, if you only want to buy one handgun, a Glock 19 is like what we’d recommend—or at least what I’d recommend.
Margaret
That’s a that’s like an in-between size?
Snow
Yeah, and it holds 15 rounds stock, but you can buy extendos that—that’s slang for extended magazine, or “stendo” even for shorter slang—and that could hold up to like 30 rounds if you want to be ridiculous at the range. But that’s a very common handgun. It’s also usually standard issue for a lot of law enforcement. So there’s just like a lot of aftermarket parts that you can buy to add on to the Glock 19 if you want, But it’s also just, like, very common to have it. Even for smaller-handed folks like myself can handle it fairly well for the most most part. I think I’ve known a couple people that have had trouble handling it, but I mean that’s the handgun that I would recommend. Anyone else? Camilla, John? Free handguns?
John
I have one handgun. It’s a Glock 19. Like, I second everything, what Snow said, and it has a lot of magazines out there because your gun doesn’t work if it doesn’t have magazines. So, for example, CZ—I don’t know what stands for, some Czech manufacturer technology, like to call it. During the pandemic you, like, couldn’t get CZ mags because like they had all dried out, like, they were nowhere to be found. You still get Glock mags though. So. Camilla?
Camilla
Yeah, I’m big into Glocks too. I don’t know if anyone was like holding out hope that we’d say something different, but I would say categorically polymer—meaning plastic—striker fired—as opposed to hammer operated—handgun. Like, so polymer striker fired guns are the easiest to use. They’re reliable. If you get one from a brand like Glock, you’re going to have a lot of parts everywhere. If you get it in a common caliber like 9mm, there’s going to be ammo everywhere when there’s not a general ammo shortage. That’s a different story though. But yeah, I don’t know, that’s what was important to me on top of the reliability, on top of like the usability for me and my body. Which, ultimately, that’s what this is all about, right? It’s a tool. So you don’t want to get a screwdriver or a saw that sucks to use, you want to get one that molds to your body and that you can like use exactly how you want to use it. And I think the same goes for a gun. You can hold guns at gun stores. That can really suck though. I mean, not a fun, like, situation when someone you don’t know hands you a gun and expects you to act in a way that you might not understand yet. So I’d say if you know anyone that has one that you know is—or that you have some level of trust is going to be safe with it, or if you’ve had some conversations already, then you can ask them if you can like hold it. Or, you know, if the priority isn’t buying the gun but just kind of, like, trying to figure out which one you ultimately, like, someday maybe soon want to buy, then maybe just start doing some research and try to figure out like what size you’re going for, what your application is. What’s your goal. Yeah.
Margaret
I’m going to make a suggestion other than Glock just to be conflictual, and I do this on ya’lls Instagram all the time and you all are very polite and don’t argue with me and just ignore it. Which is that I really like—it’s still a polymer frame striker fired 9mm handgun—but I really like the M&P series from Smith and Wesson. And frankly I like them because I think they’re prettier. I think Glocks are ugly, and I don’t like that because I’m vain.
Camilla
They are prettier.
Margaret
And one of my favorite experiences—and this actually has nothing to do with the quality of Glock, I think it has to do with the hand grip—but I was shooting once with someone who was just being really really dismissive of my M&P and was just singing the praises of Glocks, and then his Glock kept misfiring and my M&P didn’t misfire during that, and so I was very vindicated and was winning people over. And so this is the kind of thing that you can look forward to doing is having meaningless opinions about minutiae. And that’s the main reason to get involved with gun culture is to have large disagreements about minutia, at least that’s the main thing I would argue.
John
I mean no, you’re right Margaret. The whole point of gun culture is to pick a brand and then saddle yourself and hitch your wagon to that brand for the rest of your life until your’re dying days. I mean, you know, that’s it. Why else get into guns, you know?
Snow
That that’s why I got into it, personally. I’ll just, you heard it here first folks.
Camilla
This is my nightmare.
Snow
Yeah.
John
For the record, we do like the M&P, especially the 2.0, Margaret great. That’s why we don’t argue with you and, yeah, so.
Margaret
Good. Thanks. Especially now that the the Shield Plus is double stack now, and so you can get a reasonable number of bullets into a semi—a subcompact, and that’s why my concealed carry gun is a Shield Plus.
John
It’s probably worth mentioning, just very quickly, like a lot of us like Glocks. But ultimately what Camilla said is really what hits the heart of it. I mean, you’re really looking for something polymer striker fired in 9mm. So striker as opposed to hammer. You get the most bang for your buck. That was terrible. I didn’t even mean to do that.
Margaret
You’re fired.
John
You get the most like value ad per dollar up to around, like, probably like 600 or so dollars. And then after that you’re really having diminishing returns there. I mean we had a post that people actually got really mad at us for about a Soviet surplus gun called the Makarov. And we told people to buy a Hi-Point instead, which is $150 polymer striker fired 9mm and it’ll shoot quality defensive ammunition, unlike some sort of crappy Soviet surplus weapon. And you’re probably going to get hate mail now, Margaret, for publishing this opinion.
Camilla
And if you want to get a rifle, get an AR platform or an AK platform. We can go into more depth if you if we have time right now, but don’t don’t get old, needlessly specific guns from history unless you already have guns that accomplish all your core needs.
Snow
Also, like, don’t buy a Scar as your first rifle.
Margaret
Oh, what’s a Scar?
Snow
Ah, it’s a french—it’s funny, when I was first getting into firearms, the French abbreviation is FN, and I’m like, what the fuck is that? Fucking Nice? And so now whenever I see it I’m like “fucking nice.”
John
Fabric national.
01:01:09.89
Snow
But it’s a fucking like $5000 starting rifle that looks cool, shoots well, eats through optics, but it’s kind of like—it’s like quite the undertaking if you’re new to shooting rifles. And, like Camilla said, you know, AR or AKs—like AsK used to be popular in the way—oh well, “used to be,” excuse me—they still are popular. They used to be more affordable compared to like AR platforms. Now, not so much. You know, they range in like the $900 plus now, whereas before you get a quality AK for like $500 give or take. But I think for folks that are new to rifles, like, ARs tend to be more modular, meaning that you can add more easily different accessories on your carbine. So you can add a flashlight, an optic, a little, you know self open charm maybe. But you can just have more rail options for the AR and it’s much easier to just, like, do it yourself versus, like, the AK which has a different structure. So it’s a little bit harder. Like some come with like a side mount. Sometimes you have to install that yourself. And so it’s just more steps and oftentimes you need like gunsmithing tools to get that kind of stuff done. And so that can be a barrier for folks. So I mean, the AK looks fucking cool, you know. I have one. What can I say. But like, it just depends. Like AK reloads look cooler, you know, because you got that bolt that’s just—that click is just so good. But it’s a lot harder sometimes to add on stuff, especially if you want to keep the wood furniture that looks just like so good. But it’s a compromise to either have the aesthetics of the wood furniture or getting, like, a rail installed.
John
One of the YPT homies ended up having to take an angle grinder to I think a handguard so would fit on his AK because it was the wrong type of AK. ARs, like, just get parts, put them on. If you like angle grinding stuff, yeah, knock yourself out. I don’t—I’m not handy like that. Also, yeah, second what Snow said about the Scar. It’s nice. It is not $5000 nice. Nope.
Margaret
Well clearly this would never apply to guns, because of course there’s different laws about the transfer of guns and you by and large can’t buy people guns legally, and so—but there’s always the kind of, like, once you hit the level of diminishing returns of a survival tool, I find that it’s better, rather than getting the like super fancy version of the thing, is to just get another one and give it to someone else. Because I’d rather the person walking next to me having a good enough first aid kit instead of me having like the super best one, you know. And again, obviously this gets very complicated with guns. But there are parts that are not the gun that you can buy for people and might be worth spending money on instead, you know. Okay, well we’ve been talking for a while and I guess like I kind of have one final ambiguous question that you can kind of reframe however, you would like, and I—it’s a little bit of a, like, “why guns?” What does community defense look like to you? What is the—what are you going for here. Sell me on it. Or talk about something completely different. Do a final thoughts thing. Totally up to you.
Snow
And I could take a stab at it. This is, yeah, another thing that I’ve mentioned in some of our previous podcasts. But essentially, like, I could be a rainbow belt in unnamed martial arts, but ultimately, like, if some 6’7” motherfucker wants to harm me like, you know, I’m kind of fucked. And so in some ways like it’s an equalizer, right? And that’s not to say that, like. my firearm is my first line of defense. Of course I’m going to do all of the verbal de-escalation, prioritize escape, whip out my pepper spray, you know. But ultimately, like, it’s something that I feel like I would need for my own safety. And also community safety, like, we’ve seen chuds, right-wingers, what have you, like, attack people just like marching in the streets, exercising their first amendment rights. And we’ve seen them pull guns on people, right? We’ve seen them murder people. And it’s just kind of like, if they got them, like, I think it behooves us to also consider getting them, right. Because, as cliche as it says, like, you don’t bring a knife to a gunfight, right? Like, if they see that you have one, they’re going to think twice. And if they don’t think twice, then you have at least the means to defend yourself and whoever else that you’re with. And I think the time or the argument for, like, “Well we just need to get rid of guns” is like fucking so done. Like, it’s too late for that. We’re so far removed from that reality that to say that is just, like, it’s just—I mean, it’s just that, it’s not based in reality. Like, that’s the life that we live in. And it’s like, you know, did Vietnamese people during the American war in Vietnam, like, have a strong opinion on guns? No. But did they also pick up guns? Yes. Right? Like, at that point in time it wasn’t about a matter of opinion, it was about a matter of survival. And that is kind of—that is how I see it is that it’s, you know, I’m not here to philosophize, you know, all day long. It’s, you know, understanding and being aware of the situation and like the climate around me and taking the means that I feel like I need to defend myself and those I love.
Camilla
I think about it and have like rationalized it to people in my life to help them understand that I’m not necessarily out here training for today or tomorrow. I have, like, an informed realist kind of like perspective on what might lie ahead, and so I’m kind of like trying to get myself to somewhere other than behind the eight ball when it comes time to use those skills. I don’t necessarily walk around thinking about the imminence of, like, collapse, civil conflict. But I do want to be prepared for that like when/if it happens. I know it’s, like, a very blunt way of talking about it. But it’s very real, right? And it becomes a thing where it’s just like, there’s such an overwhelming amount of people on like the authoritarian right that have access to these tools and know how to use them, and I just want to help, like, hyper-local communities near me, and wherever else listeners might be, and people who aren’t even listeners, to like—whatever, I want people to be able to defend themselves, and that’s fundamentally what it’s about for me.
John
For me, I want to second everything Camilla and Snow said. I actually like it when they speak before me because they are more eloquent than me and say things that I wanted to say. Just to add on to that: for me, why do I want to own a firearm? It’s the utter failure of the state. And I’m not even sure it’s correct to call it a failure, because it never, like—the state is—the state never protects people like us, right? The state exists for the benefit of the ownership class, white men, and it doesn’t—it’s not a failure to protect us. It never was designed to do that in the first place. So when you’re talking about community defense, Snow’s right. You don’t bring a knife to a gunfight. You get the best tools for the job. I hope I never have to use a firearm in self-defense. Community defense to me, like, you know, I’m not even say—no one’s got to go—I’m not saying that anyone’s got to go Antifa super soldier and, you know, go march around out there. Although some people do that. But community defense to me can be as simple as, you know, giving someone like pepper spray, right? Which is an extremely effective deterrent. Go on our Instagram, see us blasting one of our homies in the face with it. It—I almost puked and I was, like, I was there. I almost puked. You know, it can be just teaching someone who is interested in guns like how to, you know, how to use a gun. Like, you know, maybe they want to get into guns and like learn how to use them themselves, or worst case scenario, at least they know you know gun safety. But you can’t rely on a government or the state to protect you, and in many cases you can rely on them to probably harm you. So you just gotta do it, you just gotta do yourself, rely on yourself and the people in your community, and the people that you trust, and your friends.
Margaret
Yeah, and—to interject my own answer to question I asked you—like, just thinking from what you are talking about, one of the things that I think about a lot is that, like, because people—you know, I think sometimes people don’t arm up because they’re like, well, I would lose a gun fight. And right—well, like, maybe—like, probably—like, you don’t really win gun fights, you survive them. And for me a lot of it is just about like—people say like, oh, not being a statistic, right? Because, like, I don’t want to get murdered like sometimes people look at me like they want to murder me when they realize I’m a man or whatever, you know. After they’re, like, they’re checking me out in the dress or whatever. And I don’t want to get murdered, but I also just like don’t want to passively get murdered. Like, for me, I don’t know if this resonates but, like, it’s not that I think I’ll win. It’s that I get to, like, shoot them also. Like, it becomes fair. And so then I’m like, all right, well I fucking lost. Okay. Like, I mean, I don’t want to lose. I don’t even want to play, I don’t want fight, but… I don’t know.
Camilla
No, I think that’s super valid. I think that’s very real. Like—and I don’t know—especially for us trans folks, like, it’s a different thing for me politically. It’s just like, it’s resistance to like a type of genocide—genocidal conditions that exist in our country towards gender deviance. So—and sexuality. But like, I’m thinking specifically about, like, the obvious violence that’s directed towards trans people. And yeah, fuck yeah, if that continues being the case, I’m going to carry something to defend myself with the same lethal means that will be used against me if someone just, you know, whimsically decides they want to—which kind of feels like it’s the score out there sometimes.
Margaret
Yeah.
Camilla
Yeah. I don’t know about y’all, but that’s kind of my thing.
John
Snow, you made this point I think on a previous podcast. It was just like, did y’all learn nothing from summer 2020? Did ya’ll learn nothing from that whole experience? Joe Biden gets elected and we’re like, all right, cool. It’s all good, yo. The same people that were talking about ACAB or whatever. It’s like, well you can’t be ACAB and be gun control. Like, who do you think is going to take your guns? Who do you think is going to do that, you know. You can’t. I think you made that point, Snow, and it’s correct.
Snow
Yeah and I think too it’s just, like, I’m not fucking going down without a fight. Like it’s, you know, I’ve fucking come too far. You know? Lincoln Park is playing in my head right now. And it’s like, I have so much to fight for, not just for myself but for my loved ones and my community. And like, it’s that drive and like will to live that I’ve, , had to cultivate for some time. It’s not something that has come naturally to me. And I’ve, like, struggled with my mental health a lot. And so to finally get where I’m at, I’m like, you’re not fucking taking that away from me. And if like you’re gonna fucking come up on me like that, like, it’s gonna be a problem for you and me. And I really like what you said Margaret around, like, you don’t when gun fights, you survive, right? And like, I am fucking trying to survive out here, you know, just a ho trying to make it out here. And like, I want that to be a choice that I don’t have to defend all the time. You know?
Margaret
Yeah.
Snow
I feel like I have to like have a like dissertation for a PhD on like why deserve to live and I’m just tired of it. Like, I’m tired of it.
Margaret
Oh my god, that’s such a fucking good point. Like I finally just, like, my like stock line is, like, self-defense is a right. The current most effective form of self-defense in modern society against lethal force is a striker fired 9mm semiautomatic handgun.
John
I’m dying. I’m dying over here Margaret, sorry.
Camilla
Amen.
John
A-fucking-men.
Margaret
And then, you know, on a community level, it’s a semiautomatic rifle—or carbine, which is a shorter rifle, for people who don’t keep up with—I don’t actually remember where the barrel lengths change between the definitions. But okay, well, you know, there’s so much more that I want to talk to you all about and I’d love to have you all on again, but it’s definitely running long and then, I guess I wonder if you have any, like, final thoughts about any of the stuff we’ve been talking about.
[Jeopardy music]
John
I got something. I don’t know, maybe this is like too big or something, but I don’t know. Like, I think the people in Yellow Peril, they know me as like just a sort doomer person. And I am like, that’s completely true. But honestly, like, one of the funnest things and one of the most, like, empowering things is like when I’m out there like with my friends and I’m, like, shooting. And a lot of times, like, I fucking suck. Doesn’t matter. Like, it’s fun, and I I feel better about life. I mean, it sounds cheesy, but it’s true.
Margaret
All right. Well, where can people find you? I know you’re not really online or anything like that but—you know, it’s funny, people—I get in trouble for my dry sense of sarcasm a lot, and it’s been really kicking in really hard the past couple months. But where can people find you online or find out more about what you do?
Snow
We are on a few platforms. Our main platform is Instagram @yellow_peril_tactical and we’re also on the Twitter, regrettably. But our Twitter is @yptactual. And if you ever want to send us an email. We’re at yellow.peril.tactical@protonmail.com, and we also have a website but we don’t really do anything with the website. I think it’s just yellowperiltactical.com. But that’s where to find us send us a DM.
John
We got it because we didn’t want anyone else taking the website.
Snow
True Domain wars.
John
And if you’re on Instagram, keep typing it in because we’re sort of like shadow banned. You have to typing it in, like, yellow_peril_tac and then it usually shows up.
Margaret
And you all have a podcast. What’s it called? How can people find that?
Snow
So yeah, our podcast is Yellow Peril Tactical Tiger Bloc podcast, and we’re on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. And you can also find us on Patreon. I say Paaaatreon because I want to be British sometimes. But we’re on Patreon, give us a follow. It’s just to help us cover our costs. We don’t make any profits off of it. But this is something we do in our free time. And John Chinaman, what’s our Patreon.
John
Ah, you can find it, the best way to find it is actually like going to like our Instagram or Twitter and looking in the Linktree and just click on it. It’s there.
Margaret
Okay, and it looks like yawls Patreon is patreon.com/yellow_peril_tactical.
Margaret
Thank you so much for listening. If you enjoyed this podcast, please tell people about it. Tell them on the internet or tell them about it in person while wearing a mask, or not wearing a mask depending on your risk analysis and how well you know the person. You should tell people about the show if you liked it—which you probably didn’t hate it because you made it this far, and you can also do all of the internet things as well. You can subscribe and rate and review and do all of those things that make machines tell other people to listen to this podcast. You can also support this podcast by supporting Strangers in the Tangled Wilderness, our publisher, on Patreon which is patreon.com/strangersinatangledwilderness. And we are publishers of radical culture. We’ll be putting out zines, and podcasts, and pop culture reviews, and fiction, and poetry even maybe, and a whole bunch of other stuff, and you all are going to help make it happen. Well, some of you all are. The people who support us on Patreon are making it happen, and I’m very excited. There’s nothing more amazing than watching a project be able to come forth and do so much stuff. Because Strangers in a Tangle Wilderness has been around for almost twenty years but it’s been on and off, and watching it get reinvented anew like a phoenix from the flames. Yeah, I’m going to leave in that terrible metaphor and you can help and you can help by supporting us on Patreon. And in particular I would love to thank Hoss and Chris, Sam, Nora, Hugh, Kirk, Natalie, Eleanor, Jennifer, Starro, Chelsea, Dana, David, and Nicole for making this possible. And well, that’s all for me, and I hope you’re doing as well as as you can in everything that’s happening.
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