Episode 10
The Bro Culture Behind GoonTape (and why it works) (ft. GoonTape)
Adam, the founder of GoonTape, joins host John on GOA's State of the Second to explain how a heat-resistant athletic tape became a brand with a community behind it. The product started during COVID. Adam was doing enterprise software sales, commuting four hours a day, and hated it. He trained at the Executive Protection Institute, ran black-tie security gigs in New York City, then watched that work disappear when corporate events stopped. As an AK shooter, he wanted a cheap, disposable way to handle a barrel that gets hot fast. After some hillbilly testing across metals and cloth types, he landed on a cotton-poly blend, committed to a factory minimum, and ended up with 10,000 rolls of tape in his apartment and the sudden realization that he now had to sell them.
The name does double duty. A goon is an enforcer and a goon is a bad guy, and Adam saw goon culture in the Second Amendment space as a way to say he carries to defend his family, not to hunt deer. The marketing leans into what he calls advertainment, the kind of weird, artistic gun content people either love or hate. That approach pulls in people who tell him they have no interest in guns but liked the marketing. Adam talks through the surreal feeling of seeing GoonTape stickers and shirts in the wild, the handwritten notes the company still puts in every package, and the bro community that has formed around something as simple as tape. He also recaps GOALS in Knoxville, where smaller companies and big names like Smith and Wesson all felt approachable.
The back half is the soapbox. Adam's gripe is that the gun community needs to recruit people on the fence instead of preaching at them, reaching gamers, airsoft and paintball players, and people overseas who only know guns from mass-shooting coverage. He and John trade real situational-awareness stories, from a near home invasion to being followed on the Las Vegas Strip, and argue the police often arrive after the danger is over. They cover constitutional carry, the racist origins of gun control, Virginia's 2020 turnout in Richmond, and why a concealed-carry event might bring more people in than open-carrying rifles. Adam closes on the gun-store experience as many newcomers' first impression, praising welcoming ranges and calling out egotistical salespeople who run people off.
Links
Questions this episode answers
What is GoonTape and what is it actually made of?
GoonTape is a heat-resistant athletic cloth tape made from a cotton-poly blend, marketed toward firearms and combative sports as a cheap, disposable way to handle gear that gets hot, like an AK barrel. Adam describes it as soft tape for rough work that can be used for anything.
How did GoonTape get started, and what was Adam doing before it?
Adam started GoonTape during COVID after working in enterprise software sales and running black-tie security gigs in New York City that dried up when corporate events stopped. As an AK shooter, he tested metals and cloth types, landed on a cotton-poly blend, and committed to a factory minimum of 10,000 rolls.
Where did the name GoonTape come from?
Adam chose the name because a goon is both an enforcer and a bad guy, and he saw goon culture in the Second Amendment space as a way to say he carries to defend his family, not to hunt deer.
How does GoonTape use marketing to bring people who aren't into guns into the community?
GoonTape leans into what Adam calls advertainment, weird and artistic gun content that draws in viewers who tell him they have no interest in guns but liked the marketing. Reaching those on-the-fence people is the entire goal, reinforced by handwritten notes in every package and a bro community around the tape.
Why does Adam believe situational awareness matters more than relying on police response?
Adam and host John trade real stories, including a near home invasion and being followed on the Las Vegas Strip, and argue that police often arrive after the danger is already over. The takeaway is that staying aware of your surroundings is your first line of defense.
What does Adam think the gun community gets wrong about recruiting people on the fence?
Adam argues the gun community preaches at people instead of recruiting those on the fence, and should reach gamers, airsoft and paintball players, and people overseas who only know guns from mass-shooting coverage. The goal is growing the Second Amendment community, not just talking to insiders.
Why can a welcoming gun store matter more than the gun itself for a first-time buyer?
Adam points out that the gun store is many newcomers' first impression of the community, so a welcoming range can bring people in while an egotistical salesperson runs them off. He also suggests a concealed-carry event may draw more newcomers than open-carrying rifles.
What did Adam take away from GOALS in Knoxville?
Adam recapped the Gun Owners Action Leadership Summit (GOALS) in Knoxville, where both smaller companies and big names like Smith and Wesson felt approachable.
Chapters
- 00:00 — Meet Adam from GoonTape
- 00:43 — Rapid fire questions
- 03:08 — Adam's revolver-heavy EDC
- 05:03 — Home defense guns by state
- 09:09 — How GoonTape started during COVID
- 13:21 — Why the name is GoonTape
- 15:31 — When sales took off
- 17:42 — GOALS in Knoxville
- 20:42 — The coolest uses for the tape
- 23:25 — Building the GoonTape community
- 26:48 — Soapbox: recruiting people on the fence
- 29:56 — Situational-awareness stories
- 39:53 — Constitutional carry and gun-control history
- 42:43 — Virginia, lobby day, and going on offense
- 55:15 — The gun-store experience for newcomers
- 59:43 — Sponsor gift and where to find GoonTape
About the guest
Adam is the founder of GoonTape, which makes a heat-resistant cotton-poly blend cloth tape marketed toward firearms and combative sports. He is from Long Island, New York and now lives in Northern Virginia. Before starting GoonTape he worked in enterprise software sales, then trained through the Executive Protection Institute's driving school and seven-day bodyguard program and worked black-tie security gigs in New York City. He started GoonTape during COVID and has run it for over four years. He is a self-described revolver fan and FUD who carries firearms for self-defense.
Key quotes
"We make heat resistant athletic tape. We market it towards firearms and combative sports. Essentially we say it's soft tape for rough work, but you could use it for anything." — Adam
"We are here to grow the second amendment community full stop." — Adam
"we had had multiple people tell me, I don't, I'm not interested in guns. But I really liked your marketing and it piqued my interest. And I'm like, that is our entire goal." — Adam
"I want the gun community to add more people that are trying to recruit people on the fence." — Adam
"If you want to know what the society would look like if good people couldn't own firearms, go to Manhattan." — Adam
Transcript
Welcome to Goa State of the second podcast.
Speaker A:My name is John and today we have from the penalty box the man himself from Goon Tape.
Speaker B:Adam, what's going on, everybody?
Speaker B:John, thank you for having me.
Speaker B:This is wonderful.
Speaker A:Thank you for being on.
Speaker A:I appreciate it.
Speaker A:Go ahead and tell the folks a little bit about who you are and just a brief summary of Goon Tape from the.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker B:So my name is Adam Normal Dude.
Speaker B:Goon Tape.
Speaker B:We make heat resistant athletic tape.
Speaker B:We market it towards firearms and combative sports.
Speaker B:Essentially we say it's soft tape for rough work, but you could use it for anything.
Speaker B:We got dudes that are pros that use it, dudes that are regular joes like myself that use it, and everyone in between.
Speaker A:So we're gonna go into our first segment which is rapid Fire questions brought to you by Blackout Coffee.
Speaker A:Check out Blackout Coffee's no Compromise blend.
Speaker A:Get your freedom loving caffeine addiction from Blackout Coffee.
Speaker A:Great supporters of Goa support brands that support Goa.
Speaker A:Again, that's the Goa no Compromise blend by Blackout Coffee.
Speaker A:You can find it in our store or at Blackout Coffee.
Speaker A:So I'm going to ask you five questions.
Speaker A:You answer them as quickly or as shortly as you want.
Speaker A:First question is, are aliens real?
Speaker B:Everything's real.
Speaker B:I mean, I'll give you a weird response back, maybe.
Speaker B:I am a believer that the universe exists much larger than we can comprehend in our brain.
Speaker B:So I'm a believer if we could think it, everything that we could think of is out there and probably much more.
Speaker A:You know, we.
Speaker A:Somebody else said that and I was like, are we all on marbles?
Speaker A:Like Men in Black.
Speaker A:Can I just play?
Speaker B:It's amazing how like memorable that scene is.
Speaker B:I don't think like everyone was prepared.
Speaker B:I still think about that.
Speaker B: , that movie came out in like: Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Wow.
Speaker A:I feel old now.
Speaker A:Go to pizza topping.
Speaker B:Go to Pizza topping.
Speaker B:I'm from Long Island, New York and we have some pretty good pizza.
Speaker B:I like to keep it classic, man.
Speaker B:I like pepperoni on my pizza.
Speaker B:I like cheese pizza.
Speaker B:But I'm all also down for the, the super weird ones too.
Speaker B:We do like amazing buffalo chicken pizza, but if I had to pick, it would be pepperoni.
Speaker A:Pepperoni.
Speaker A:That's a good choice.
Speaker A:Are you, are you like, does it have to be thin and crispy or.
Speaker B:Is it just my ideal pizza?
Speaker B:Thin crust.
Speaker B:But mostly it just got to be delicious.
Speaker B:I am a stickler for the sauce.
Speaker B:So like in Virginia we have some okay pizza.
Speaker B:That's where I live now.
Speaker B:We, you Know, it's like once you taste the good stuff, it's hard to go back.
Speaker B:So I, I, I'm more of a sauce stickler if, if I'm being pressed,.
Speaker A:The folks in our office in D.C. have told me we, the pizza downtown is a decent pizza.
Speaker B:I, you know, I haven't been to D.C. in a minute, which I am not too upset about, but I will have to check that out because I'm in Northern Virginia, which is like, I'll say, like the suburbs of D.C. and there's some spots I don't, you know, not.
Speaker B:Some of the pizza is pretty good.
Speaker B:You know, if you're listening, Northern Virginia.
Speaker B:But yeah, it's no bueno.
Speaker B:No bueno on the pizza department.
Speaker A:We talked about this before the show, but what is your edc?
Speaker B:So I am a secret fud.
Speaker B:I got the Gary Plush thing going on here.
Speaker B:So I'm a big wheel gun guy.
Speaker B:I like to carry revolvers for a lot of reasons.
Speaker B:So in the summer it's like usually like a Ruger LCR and like my bathing suit because I, I cannot say enough great things about the lcr.
Speaker B:I know revolvers is like, oh, it's only got five rounds or so.
Speaker B:But for me, I am looking to get out of a precarious situation, not to hold down the fort, so to speak.
Speaker B:So five rounds is fine.
Speaker B:And then, dude, I'm a little bit of a hipster, so, you know, I don't know.
Speaker B:Can I take out my piece?
Speaker B:Can I show people?
Speaker A:Yeah, go for it.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So I mean like today I got my super Blackhawk here.
Speaker B:I just kind of keep it in a correct term for saying no holster.
Speaker A:There is a term for that.
Speaker A:We'll call it goon tape carry.
Speaker B:I'm a huge fan of revolvers.
Speaker B:I shoot them well compared to semi autos.
Speaker B:I like to train with them.
Speaker B:Usually this is a 44 magnum.
Speaker B:Usually I carry a GP100 and I just throw some 38 special plus P's in there.
Speaker B:And yeah, I never feel like if I have two pistols on me, I'm never feeling like, oh, I should have had my G45 or something.
Speaker A:You know, I am with you on that.
Speaker A:I throw my, my daily carries normally in a fanny pack because I'm a hipster I guess at heart.
Speaker A:But I will constantly carry my Smith and Wesson 360 because it is lightweight, it's easy to carry.
Speaker A:I love that gun.
Speaker A:Oh yeah, mine's actually a Japanese police overrun.
Speaker A:So it's 36 special only.
Speaker B:Awesome.
Speaker A:And it's yeah.
Speaker A:Love a good wheel gun.
Speaker A:You can call me a fud.
Speaker A:I don't care.
Speaker A:Wheel guns, real guns, I don't know, I, I guess I stand with you and duck on both of those.
Speaker B:Yeah, right, right.
Speaker A:So let's go.
Speaker A:What is the go to home defense go then?
Speaker B:For me, variety is the spice of life.
Speaker B:You know like if God forbid.
Speaker B:So I'll, I'll answer this in a.
Speaker B:It's a two part answer.
Speaker B:So I spend a lot of time in some not so free states and just for the sake of ease of, of dealing with any possible issues after God forbid, a home invasion.
Speaker B:It's a 12 gauge shotgun.
Speaker B:I love.
Speaker B:I mean the Mossbergs I think are the best pump guns.
Speaker B:There's a lot of great semi autos.
Speaker B:I don't own any semi autos.
Speaker B:But my go to in the behind enemy line state, it's a Mossberg 590 with the heat shield.
Speaker B:Gotta throw a bayonet on there because I mean reasons.
Speaker B:I mean how many shotguns could even mount a bayonet?
Speaker B:So you gotta do it.
Speaker B:And then typically, you know, when I'm.
Speaker B: magazine pattern: Speaker A:That is awesome.
Speaker A:An odd for home defense.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:No, because you need a 5.
Speaker A:You need a bayonet in case the hunt attack.
Speaker A:You know, you never know.
Speaker B:Finally someone gets me.
Speaker A:You might get into a trench raid in your house.
Speaker A:What's the old saying?
Speaker A:Go.
Speaker A:I had a cannon because that's what they wanted me to have.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker B:Of course dude.
Speaker B:Yes, absolutely.
Speaker B:You get it?
Speaker A:I get it.
Speaker A:I'm with you.
Speaker A:The last question is what is your go to content creator to you watch.
Speaker B:Oh, that's a great question.
Speaker B:You know what, there's a lot of good ones.
Speaker B:I will say most of the time I put on like a longer format Hickok 45 and I could rewatch those videos forever and ever.
Speaker B:I'm also a big fan.
Speaker B:Like I mentioned.
Speaker B:I'm definitely a FUD.
Speaker B:Not you know, I'm like Super Pro 2A to the max.
Speaker B:But like the old style stuff I'm a big fan of.
Speaker B:So I like range hot tv.
Speaker B:I'm a huge fan of just like what I'll call like old school like gun writing just in, in video format.
Speaker B:I, I find it really informative and I nerd out on that.
Speaker B:And then so yeah, so Hickok, obviously you Know, like, I watch grand thumb.
Speaker B:I watch administrative results.
Speaker B:Dirty kid.
Speaker B:All those guys rule.
Speaker B:But yeah, I'm a. I'm a sucker for like the.
Speaker B:The FUD stuff.
Speaker B:And no offense, I don't mean that negatively.
Speaker B:You know, it's just kind of like not tactical.
Speaker B:The.
Speaker B:Not tactical gun pages.
Speaker A:I like the.
Speaker A:The OG the OGs.
Speaker A:Admin's a cool guy.
Speaker A:He's.
Speaker A:He's local to me.
Speaker A:Fun dude.
Speaker A:Like, are you in Arizona?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Oh, okay.
Speaker B:Cool.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Him, Mike.
Speaker A:Tactical considerations.
Speaker A:Tactical Toolbox.
Speaker A:They're all close.
Speaker A:Close by.
Speaker A:Friends and nice.
Speaker B:Oh, cool.
Speaker A:I love admin.
Speaker A:Does some really cool things.
Speaker A:I think Toolbox is love you, by the way.
Speaker A:But he's a.
Speaker A:A guy of his own and.
Speaker A:And Mike just.
Speaker A:Yeah, I love him and I are best friends.
Speaker A:He get.
Speaker A:He'll let me borrow stuff from safe things that it's a good friend to have.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:He'll just be like, hey, you want to borrow some stuff?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:What?
Speaker A:What do you got?
Speaker A:Oh, yeah.
Speaker B:Say less.
Speaker A:Say less.
Speaker B:Dude, it's.
Speaker B:It's amazing.
Speaker B:I mean, like, in five years, maybe a little bit more, but roughly five years, like, the level of, like, cinema quality content that has been coming out from the Second amendment community is like, unbelievable.
Speaker B:I mean, literally, many of the bigger channels put out stuff that at least to me, is way more interesting than most of the action movies that come out of Hollywood.
Speaker B:No knock, you know, the Hollywood folks out there.
Speaker B:I'm sorry, but up your game.
Speaker A:Oh, I know.
Speaker A:It's just I was watching some of admin stuff and I was like, wow, that's a. Wow, that's a very.
Speaker A:That's a lot of quality.
Speaker A:That's like.
Speaker A:You spend a lot of time editing this.
Speaker A:It's amazing.
Speaker A:So that is our rapid Fire segment again.
Speaker A:That's brought to you by Blackout Coffee.
Speaker A:Go ahead and check out Goa's no Compromise roast from Blackout Coffee.
Speaker A:Now, Adam, let's get in the meat and potatoes of this.
Speaker B:Do it.
Speaker A:What made you start?
Speaker A:Goon tape.
Speaker A:And what is goon tape?
Speaker A:Let's go.
Speaker B:What is goon tape?
Speaker B:So goon tape is a cloth tape, essentially the.
Speaker B:The backstory behind it.
Speaker B:So at the time, I'll take a.
Speaker B:Let's take it from the.
Speaker B:The way beginning, but I'll do it super fast.
Speaker B:Stay with me, folks.
Speaker B:I promise it'll.
Speaker B:It'll be pretty quick.
Speaker B:So at the time, I was in the corporate world commuting, and I was doing enterprise software sales, and I just hated it.
Speaker B:Loathed.
Speaker B:It is such an understatement it was like I was commuting like four hours a day and I was just like, I can't do this for 30 years.
Speaker B:What are the things that I really like?
Speaker B:So to make a long story short, I found the Executive Protection Institute and went through their driving school and their seven day bodyguard program.
Speaker B:Because I was like, okay, well, I like cars and I like guns.
Speaker B:So let's see if we could actually get paid to do some of this stuff.
Speaker B:And you, you can.
Speaker B:You definitely can.
Speaker B:And so basically fast forward, you know, I'll say like two years.
Speaker B:I was mostly like black tie security gigs in New York City, which was super easy.
Speaker B:You wear a tuxedo, you're like right this way to the bathroom, miss.
Speaker B:You know, it's right over there is the snack bar.
Speaker B:You know, super easy, no ninja stuff.
Speaker B:The pay was great and I loved it.
Speaker B:I love talking to people.
Speaker B:It was a lot of fun.
Speaker B:And then co happened and you know, I call me a bit of a skeptic, but I was not convinced that the two weeks to stop the spread was going to be lasting only two weeks.
Speaker B:And being that I was a subcontractor and most of my business, all of my business basically was at corporate events, I was thinking, well, this is probably not a good business to be in if nobody's hosting any corporate events.
Speaker B:So I love AKs.
Speaker B:I love to shoot Kalash and Cob pattern rifles.
Speaker B:They're just cool and they're the bad guy guns.
Speaker B:So, you know, there's something to be said about that.
Speaker B:I think this is pretty interesting just in general.
Speaker B:Um, and if you, if you shoot AKs, you know, they get hot fast.
Speaker B:So if like you're in the back dumping mags, I mean, dude, if you're c clamping, you're, unless you're wearing gloves, you're going to be c clamping for like one or two mags.
Speaker B:And then very quickly you'll be transitioning to, you know, griping the magazine.
Speaker B:And at the time there was a solution out there that worked really well.
Speaker B:It, it just was a little expensive.
Speaker B:Like I was like, you know, super stingy.
Speaker B:And I was not looking to spend like a hundred plus dollars on something that was going to help with the heat mitigation.
Speaker B:So we did a little hillbilly testing just to try to figure out like, okay, what can we get that's a disposable product, Something that's at a much lower price point and you know, would, would resist heat really well.
Speaker B:So we found a few different Products, you know, aluminum based stuff.
Speaker B:Different weird metals, different types of cloth.
Speaker B:Pure cotton, Cotton synthetic.
Speaker B:And we found a cotton synthetic blend that we really liked.
Speaker B:But we had some issues with the way that it was dyed and with the way that the adhesion adhesive was mating to the fabric itself.
Speaker B:So to make a long story short, we called up a bunch of factories and we're like, this is what we want to do.
Speaker B:And one of them was like, oh, we'll do that.
Speaker B:You just gotta buy a metric F ton of this.
Speaker B:So I was like, okay.
Speaker B:So it was Covid.
Speaker B:You know, it's not like I was heading into the office because it was Covid.
Speaker B:So, you know, told them that they had a deal.
Speaker B:I had like 10,000 rolls of tape in my apartment.
Speaker B:And then, you know, had the quick realization at that point, and for some reason, not earlier than that, like, oh, my God, we need to now sell this.
Speaker B:So, yeah, dude found a.
Speaker B:Found a local photographer that just did an excellent job and figured, okay, well, you know, we can do something a little bit different with the marketing here.
Speaker B:We'll do a little gun.
Speaker B:Gun porn.
Speaker B:Sorry, I don't know if you have to believe that.
Speaker B:You know, do a little gun porn and make it more artistic as opposed to like just doing like the typical gun bunny stuff, which nothing wrong with that, but it's.
Speaker B:It's out there.
Speaker B:So if we're trying to stand out, it's a lot easier to do.
Speaker B:Like, oh, that's so weird.
Speaker B:You are.
Speaker B:You know, you guys are coming out with brass knuckles and your video to promote it is smashing a peanut butter and jelly.
Speaker B:Like, why would you do that?
Speaker B:It's like, oh, because people either love it or hate it.
Speaker B:So that's kind of how we all got started.
Speaker B:And yeah, here we are.
Speaker A:So what came up with the.
Speaker A:So company's named Goon Tape.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker A:Goon is synonymous for a defenseman in hockey.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Why Goon Tape?
Speaker B:So it, it fits the mold in a lot of ways.
Speaker B:So it's like, you know, people ask a lot like, dude, why don't I just get hockey tape or get lacrosse tape or get fill in the blank tape?
Speaker B:And I'm great with that.
Speaker B:I'm like, yeah, dude, do you like it?
Speaker B:They're like, yeah.
Speaker B:I'm like, awesome.
Speaker B:That's super cool.
Speaker B:But for what I was looking for, like, for example, one of the big issues with.
Speaker B:I call it cloth tape because I think, you know, not to get into like splitting hairs.
Speaker B:But like, to me, hockey tape is a bit of a misnomer because hockey tape could be gaffer's tape, it could be cotton cloth tape, it could be cotton poly blend tape.
Speaker B:Like there's all these different tapes that like you use on a hockey stick and they're all hockey tape, but they were all for something else first.
Speaker B:So like we sell a, A cotton poly blend cloth tape.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Like, if you're like trying to like, you know, berate me, I truly don't care.
Speaker B:You know, we're here to have fun and to grow the second amendment and what I call the self defense community.
Speaker B:So yeah, so the name, to answer your question, John, is I think it's.
Speaker B:It's a good mix because it's like, dude, especially at the time, like goon culture in the second amendment was like, hey, I am not a fud.
Speaker B:Like I don't have guns to just go hunt deer with there to, you know, defend my family and my country.
Speaker B:And I'm also like, not a ultra straight edge, like police person.
Speaker B:So I was like, okay, cool.
Speaker B:So like, essentially it's like, yeah, we got, we got a goon, which is an enforcer, a goon which is like a bad guy.
Speaker B:And dude, it's like one word, goon tape.
Speaker B:It just fits so well, you know, it's like, you know, that's pretty much it.
Speaker A:Yeah, I mean, that's when I heard the name first.
Speaker A:I'm thinking, I'm thinking enforcer.
Speaker A:Yeah, I like watching hockey.
Speaker A:Hockey's a thing.
Speaker A:There's also the movie Goon, which is so fantastic.
Speaker A:I guess I can plug a movie.
Speaker A:But yeah.
Speaker A:And so you guys came up with this during COVID It's kind of taken off and gone to things.
Speaker A:What.
Speaker A:When, what was that aha moment when it took off?
Speaker A:You're like, wow, this is actually.
Speaker A:People are buying this.
Speaker A:This, people are using this stuff.
Speaker B:I know bs like every single day when I look at sales and just our customers, it still gets me hyped.
Speaker B:Like, I'll look and I'll be like, just so jazzed up.
Speaker B:Because, you know, like you have an idea in your head and then you execute it.
Speaker B:It doesn't always go to plan, but like, we have really cool customers and a lot of them are repeat customers.
Speaker B:And it is basically the same feeling on like day one of sales as it has been now over four years since we started, where it's like, oh my God, like people really like what we're doing with social media and then they like our tape because they rebuy it.
Speaker B:So it's like, it's a really it's, it's the most fulfilling part about working on the Goon Tape project because it's hard, dude.
Speaker B:Like, you know, like I, I know a lot of people, they, they're like, you know, have criticism about everything in the world, but those aren't the people that are doing anything.
Speaker B:And so, like, if you're doing stuff, even the most simple of tasks have a easy way of complicating themselves very quickly.
Speaker B:So when we get messages from people that are like, hey, you throw in an extra, you threw in an extra sticker.
Speaker B:And you know, we do handwritten notes on all of our packages still.
Speaker B:Hey, thanks so much, John.
Speaker B:Enjoy the tape.
Speaker B:Or thanks, John.
Speaker B:You know, like, when we get messages like that, it's like, it at least for me anyway.
Speaker B:I don't want to speak for anybody else, but it definitely brings me back to being like, these are real people that are getting really excited about what you're doing.
Speaker B:And all the annoying stuff that happened today, all the fires that you're putting out, it's because you are helping these folks.
Speaker B:And then all of a sudden it's much more easier to manage.
Speaker A:That's so satisfying.
Speaker A:Like, see, how do I with this most self.
Speaker A:Self fulfilling, you get this fulfillment of like joy watching people.
Speaker A:I've done it working for manufacturing stuff and getting messages like, hey, thanks so much for helping me out.
Speaker A:And you're just like, all right, that made my day go.
Speaker A:You don't understand how much like all the fires in the world, but somebody comes up to you and goes, yeah, that's great.
Speaker A:I mean, we're talking downstairs.
Speaker A:You came to goals.
Speaker A:You didn't see me?
Speaker A:Yeah, I was running around and you're like, dude, it was awesome.
Speaker A:Like that just.
Speaker A:Yeah, it brings you this joy because you're like, I put in so much work for that.
Speaker A:For those of you don't understand, it was a lot of 80 hour weeks plus 12, 13, 14, 15 hour days and make goals happen.
Speaker A:So that makes me feel good on the 100%, man.
Speaker B:Yeah, it was like, it was, it was, it was really cool because I thought a lot of the companies that went were maybe not.
Speaker B:They were like, I'll say, like it felt more like intimate in a way.
Speaker B:And so, you know, if I like, you can go up to like the Smith and Wesson booth, you know, one of the oldest gun companies in existence, and BS with the people and it's like, oh, they're, they're bros or you know, she bros or whatever you want to call them.
Speaker B:And it's it's cool.
Speaker B:And it really had that feel.
Speaker B:And then I, you know, I don't know, you know, why you guys picked Knoxville, but that was a home run.
Speaker B:We went out just, you know, a few guys that we all met up, rented a house.
Speaker B:Some of the.
Speaker B:Some of your Arizona boys, Infinity Targets and Allied Threads.
Speaker B:And then up in and Minnesota, the reap weaponry boys.
Speaker B:I'll plug Colton's company real quick, if you don't mind.
Speaker A:Yeah, go for it.
Speaker B:Reap weaponries, if you guys don't know them, they're freaking awesome.
Speaker B:They do bullpup conversion kits for AR15s, and they're like, stick.
Speaker B:Their selling point is the triggers are actually phenomenal.
Speaker B:So, yeah, check them out.
Speaker B:Colton, what's up, dude?
Speaker B:But, yeah, so we had a great time, and it was in Knoxville, and we kept running into all the other, like, creators and all the other gun companies, and it was like, oh, this is like second amendment ville.
Speaker B:Least for that weekend.
Speaker B:It was so much fun.
Speaker A:So Knoxville was picked.
Speaker A:Personally, I love the first off, Kaylee, who's not here, is from Knoxville.
Speaker A:She'll make a vehicle.
Speaker A:So we've got a hometown advantage, I guess.
Speaker A:But I love the Knoxville area.
Speaker A:I love that whole, like, going into Knoxville is going to Knoxville proper.
Speaker A:It's a big city, but it's got that small city vibe still.
Speaker A:And then going like, 20, 30 minutes outside, I could be in the Smoky Mountains and go hang out.
Speaker A:It's so different, and I just love that area.
Speaker A:It's so beautiful.
Speaker A:Getting to go hang out.
Speaker A:But it was.
Speaker A:It was cool with the.
Speaker A:With goals, just walking around and seeing all the people and how everybody was interacting.
Speaker A:All the vendors were like, yeah, dude.
Speaker A:The.
Speaker A:The crowd was different.
Speaker A:There's.
Speaker A:There's no fuds.
Speaker A:And I'm like, listen, we, like, anybody who likes the Second amendment can be here.
Speaker A:Come on in.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:But they.
Speaker A:The conversations just like you said.
Speaker A:Like, you could walk up and just be like, hey.
Speaker A:And they're real people.
Speaker A:A lot of people look at the larger companies like Smith and Wesson and.
Speaker A:And Palmetto and all those things that they look at them and go, oh, they're a large company.
Speaker A:Like, they don't want to talk to me.
Speaker A:No, they want to hang out and talk.
Speaker A:They're real people.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker A:So that was the cool thing about that.
Speaker A:I'm sorry.
Speaker A:So you.
Speaker A:You guys launch goon tape.
Speaker A:You get everything going.
Speaker A:Everything's rolling.
Speaker A:You're getting all these emails back.
Speaker A:What's the coolest thing that you've seen people use Goon tape for.
Speaker B:There's been a lot of stuff.
Speaker B:So I was saying a little, you know, in the intro, we have dudes that are pros, and I mean, like, the dudes.
Speaker B:And we have folks that are regular.
Speaker B:So like, on a. I'll say like a normal basis.
Speaker B:Like, one of my.
Speaker B:One of my buddies, he's an intel guy, and he loves to use the tape when he's traveling to wrap the door handle in his hotel room to the.
Speaker B:The.
Speaker B:The locking bolt up top so that people can't, like, jimmy the lock because it's, like, physically resistant.
Speaker B:I always thought that was pretty cool.
Speaker B:But in terms of.
Speaker B:I'll say, like, just like actual field craft of people using it is using the tape to hide, like, handcuff keys.
Speaker B:And using the tape to mount different, like, RFID solutions without getting too far into specifics of stuff is like, hiding and.
Speaker B:Sorry, hiding stuff.
Speaker B:And I always just find that so interesting.
Speaker B:But on like, an everyday level, yeah, I like to.
Speaker B: to wrap my grip safety on my: Speaker B:But yeah, I do.
Speaker B:I do wrap the grip safeties.
Speaker B:I know that's like a big.
Speaker B:No, no.
Speaker B:We have some professional revolver shooters that use our tape to increase the palm swells on their competition guns.
Speaker B:And we got to do a better job of, like, showing all the different uses because that's one of the most fun parts about this, is seeing the stuff we used to.
Speaker B:When we first started up, we posted, like, somebody got a goon tape tattoo on her butt cheek.
Speaker B:And so we posted.
Speaker B:Cause I thought that was awesome.
Speaker B:Like, I don't have any tattoos.
Speaker B:And I thought that was so cool.
Speaker B:I was like, some woman on the Internet has, like, a goon tape logo on her butt.
Speaker B:That's so cool.
Speaker B:And it wasn't like, it wasn't super scandalous.
Speaker B:It was like, you know, you could tell what it was.
Speaker B:But it was pretty tasteful as far as butt tattoos can go.
Speaker B:And so we posted on our story, and then we just got, like, so many pictures of, like, people, like, wrapping up their girlfriends and wrapping up people that they may or may not have paid to hang out with, where I was just like, we gotta stop posting this entire stuff because it was really encouraging.
Speaker B:Like, I would be fearful looking at my DMs where I'm like, what is that?
Speaker B:Oh, God.
Speaker B:Oh, no.
Speaker B:So, yeah, that's the other end of the spectrum.
Speaker B:We.
Speaker B:Those were dark times.
Speaker B:We don't.
Speaker B:We don't.
Speaker B:We don't talk about those dark times.
Speaker A:I mean, that's the cool part about your guys company is that.
Speaker A:So first off, there's so many uses for it, but you guys are like, you've got this brand and it's being built and it's that like I want to, I don't want to call it like a bro brand, but it's, it really is like this bro community or this big community of people that you're building around something as simple as tape.
Speaker B:Totally.
Speaker A:And it's, it's supporting the second amendment, bringing people in and like I've seen it on a case, Ars, handguns and people of my Goon Tape.
Speaker A:And it was like overnight it went from like, cool, there's this tape and then all of a sudden like it's everywhere.
Speaker A:What is up with this?
Speaker A:And yeah, like what's that feel like where you go from like, yeah, cool.
Speaker A:I got this product idea, it's selling, everybody's happy.
Speaker A:And then now all of a sudden it's like this culture of Goon Tape.
Speaker B:It is surreal.
Speaker B:That's the only way to describe it.
Speaker B:Like I'll be out and about if I see somebody wearing like a Goon Tape shirt or like have like a Goon Tape sticker.
Speaker B:Like, I almost always go up to them to introduce myself and to give them something just because I think, I think it's the coolest thing ever.
Speaker B:Like, I mean like it's.
Speaker B:I don't think it would be as cool if it was like, oh, Adam's out here, like doing all this thing for Adam.
Speaker B:But like we have number one like our business other than to, you know, sell our product and provide a solution for heat mitigation and grip.
Speaker B:We are here to grow the second amendment community full stop.
Speaker B:Like, we don't do political stuff, but we do.
Speaker B:We are gun culture forward.
Speaker B:And to be able to introduce people that like we had had multiple people tell me, I don't, I'm not interested in guns.
Speaker B:But I really liked your marketing and it piqued my interest.
Speaker B:And I'm like, that is our entire goal.
Speaker B:Because.
Speaker B:And we can probably get into this a little bit later for, you know, the soapboxing part.
Speaker B:But we are just.
Speaker B:There are so many people on the other side that are ignorant and super against private firearm ownership in this country that I wanted to make sure that we were doing our part to like bring people in.
Speaker B:And so seeing that, when I'm like, oh, is that Goon tape?
Speaker B:Or even if it's another kind of tape, like I can tell if I'm looking at it, you know, it's handled so many of these rolls of tape and, you know, I've seen it.
Speaker B:So, like.
Speaker B:I know, but it's really cool because it, to me, it means that, like, okay, we're growing the second amendment.
Speaker B:We're getting people, like, in a fun way to be like, yes, this is important.
Speaker B:You should own one of these tools or at the very least, like, be aware that they're not the cause of all of these problems that you think they are and, you know, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker B:So, yeah, it's answering your question in a very long, roundabout way.
Speaker B:It feels fantastic.
Speaker B:I love it.
Speaker A:Well, that's a perfect segue to go into our from the soapbox portion of the show.
Speaker A:This is brought to you by Patriot Mobile.
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Speaker A:Adam, what is your.
Speaker A:From the soapbox?
Speaker A:We kind of touched into bringing people in, but let's dive into that.
Speaker A:Get.
Speaker A:Get passionate, my friend.
Speaker B:Oh, man.
Speaker B:Honestly, I could go on forever because I am as you guys are too.
Speaker B:That's why I love goa.
Speaker B:You know, absolutists, right?
Speaker B:It's like.
Speaker B:It's like.
Speaker B:Well, you know, I think that, you know, deer rifles, like, no.
Speaker B:You know, recreational nukes, full stop.
Speaker B:You know, sorry if that offends anybody.
Speaker A:Not.
Speaker B:No, I'm not.
Speaker B:Sorry.
Speaker B:You know, so I think that I guess, you know, to choose one to gripe that's really grinding my gears is I want the gun community to add more people that are trying to recruit people on the fence.
Speaker B:So what we're trying to do is like, look, nobody likes to be preached at.
Speaker B:So we try to do everything in a fun way.
Speaker B:I call it advertainment, where it's like, you know, again, nobody wants to see a roll of tape.
Speaker B:They want to see a style floating with, you know, peanut butter and jelly dripping off the barrel or something like that.
Speaker B:Oh, by the way, there's some goon tape in it.
Speaker B:So we're trying to do that especially with people that play video games, like first person shooters and people that play airsoft and paintball, because while many of them might think, well, I would never own a gun, I am.
Speaker B:I feel good knowing that those people have never had an incident where they didn't have to immediately think, I wish I had a freaking gun.
Speaker B:Because I don't know if you have.
Speaker B:It's not a great feeling to have of like, oh my God, I, I am really happy to have a gun right now, you know.
Speaker B:So I'm trying to, you know, we, as goon tape, we're trying to get those people that are on the fence.
Speaker B:And it's really hard to do because a lot of the people that are like, they're like, especially like airsofters and maybe like California for example, Huge milsim airsoft environment over there.
Speaker B:And they got a ton of people that play that are really into it.
Speaker B:But there's also a lot of folks that are like, this is for play and for playing war.
Speaker B:And I'm, you know, reducing it a bit.
Speaker B:But you know, I don't see myself ever having like a shotgun or anything like that.
Speaker B:And so I want to lead by example with goon tape and start developing content that, you know, grandma is not going to be like, you know, you know, people from a different era especially, but also like a lot of the youngsters who grew up like with this constant being berated with, you know, horrific mass shooting related images.
Speaker B:A lot of the people, when they think of guns, that's what they think about.
Speaker B:It's a infinitesimally small percentage of negative incidents compared to life saving positive incidents.
Speaker B:But that doesn't make the news.
Speaker B:And so even though man is a rational being for the most part, you know, it's like something's got to feel good, you know, for the most part for a lot of people before they start like getting factual about it.
Speaker B:And so the people that play Fortnite and cod and like a lot, lot of these franchises that are like, kind of like candy crushing the, you know, like the, the gun space where it's like, oh, my gun's pink and my gun's purple.
Speaker B:You know, I'm not personally into that as like, you know, like I'm, I'm playing, I'm playing Modern Warfare 2, bro.
Speaker B:Like, you know, it's like, it's like that's what I, I mean, you know, that, that was, that was what I like to play.
Speaker B:But these younger guys especially, they are more interested it seems like anyway to like the kind of like brighter colors kind of stuff.
Speaker B:And so I want to do more of our marketing push to get those people to be like, all right, well I play Fortnite.
Speaker B:Oh, that's a cool picture.
Speaker B:Kind of reminds me of Fortnite.
Speaker B:Maybe and then it's like, oh, this is a real gun company.
Speaker B:Like, they make real guns.
Speaker B:And that's, I think, the opportunity to get the conversation started.
Speaker B:Well, like, hey, I try to start with situational awareness because growing up in New York, like, dude, I had an issue, like, not even too long ago, maybe like two months ago, where I was house sitting and some dude freaking tried to.
Speaker B:My car was out front.
Speaker B:Some dude.
Speaker B:And this is a safe neighborhood, some dude tried to ram the front door.
Speaker B:And so I was like, I grabbed my shotgun and I was like, you know, I went to the door, he ran away.
Speaker B:I had got my shotgun.
Speaker B:Nothing happened, thank God.
Speaker B:I went to tell the neighbors before I was leaving just to be like, just so you're aware this happened.
Speaker B:Like, I am, you know, a dude that's a little too heavy to carry out of there, you know, I would be fine, you know, but like, if you have kids, just be aware.
Speaker B:And I just, I can't get over, like, the look on the neighbor's faces were like, did you call the police?
Speaker B:And I was like, no, I grabbed my shotgun.
Speaker B:They're like, what?
Speaker B:Like, it just, like, he just could not believe it.
Speaker B:And I'm like, that is so nice that you'd never have had that experience where you're just like, oh, I'll call the cops.
Speaker B:Cops will solve the problem.
Speaker B:But the odds of that happening, unfortunately, because of distance, time travel, et cetera, no bueno.
Speaker B:So anyway, to get back on, on track here, apologize, folks.
Speaker B:You know, yeah, just, I, my, my gripe is that we need to do a better job as a community, bringing people in, making them see, like, okay, you might not need a gun, but you should have situational awareness.
Speaker B:You should know what's going on around you.
Speaker B:Because unless you're literally holding hands with a police officer or he's right next to you, like, they will not be able to help you until the bad part is probably almost done.
Speaker B:Again, no knock on law enforcement.
Speaker B:It's just like anybody, you know, especially now where you get like penalized, you know, for helping people out and stuff.
Speaker B:And not to get into that, but, you know, so that's, that's my big gripe.
Speaker A:Yeah, I mean, we were a few things, like, we were on with John Bailey from Eotech early on.
Speaker A:He's one of, like the first episodes of the podcast and we were talking about, like, eotech is a.
Speaker A:It's very noticeable what an eotech is.
Speaker A:And I was talking to him about, like, how's it go at show he goes, I've got kids who are like, that's my setup in Fortnite, or that's my setup in Call of Duty.
Speaker A:And I'm like, is that.
Speaker A:It's that really bringing people in?
Speaker A:It's like, yeah, it's bringing people into the community.
Speaker A:You know, video games is a good way.
Speaker A:I just did a class with Carrie Sloan from We the Female, and we're talking to her, and there was a.
Speaker A:Like, 50% of her class were liberals or anti.
Speaker A:Mostly anti gun, who had gotten in, seeing how it's going, and started getting into that training and bringing in and watching her talk and watching those.
Speaker A:Those women flip the switch and go, go, go.
Speaker A:From being very like, oh, I need a gun, but I'm anti gun, to, oh, wow, this is true.
Speaker B:Like.
Speaker A:Like you said, call the police.
Speaker A:It's five to 10 minutes before, if you're lucky to get them there.
Speaker A:That's.
Speaker A:And they.
Speaker A:Even police officers will say, you'll talk to them.
Speaker A:And they'll be like, yeah, you should have something.
Speaker A:You were coming after the fact.
Speaker A:It's not like, yeah, we're there.
Speaker B:We got the reports.
Speaker A:Yeah, we got reports to write.
Speaker A:But it's like, that is my big thing is we need to send out that message that, hey, we are a welcoming community.
Speaker A:We saw this during COVID I guess you could say that we saw 40 million new gun owners, or 20 or 30, whatever the number comes to be, we are welcome community.
Speaker A:We want you to be part of this community.
Speaker A:Doesn't matter what side of the aisle you're on, as long as you go, yeah, I'm pro gun for sure.
Speaker A:And just bring them in and go, hey, man, come hang out with us 100%.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And honestly, dude, I think if we don't do that, we will just be outnumbered because the optics are.
Speaker B:It's so easy to make private gun ownership look bad.
Speaker B:It's like, oh, you're.
Speaker B:You're part of the problem.
Speaker B:You.
Speaker B:You're allowing this to happen.
Speaker B:Why?
Speaker B:To.
Speaker B:Why does anybody need a machine gun?
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:It's like there's.
Speaker B:Well, all these issues are happening, and it's really easy to convince somebody that the guns are the problem.
Speaker B:I was overseas on vacation earlier in the year, and I was.
Speaker B:We were.
Speaker B:We were in Scotland, actually, and playing St. Andrews, and it was amazing anyway.
Speaker B:But, you know, when I wear cowboy boots and jeans and it's very obvious that I'm an American over there and I don't care.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And I'm friendly to everybody.
Speaker B:I understand that.
Speaker B:I'm an ambassador to my country and all that stuff.
Speaker B:So, you know, but everyone wanted to know.
Speaker B:They're like, oh, so, you know, what do you do?
Speaker B:And I would tell them a little bit about goon tape, and, you know, I could kind of see them, like, a little uncomfortable about it.
Speaker B:But, you know, people are drinking and they're like, I want to know more.
Speaker B:And so somebody would almost inevitably bring up, like, the school shootings and stuff like that, which is a serious topic, of course.
Speaker B:And it was amazing to me because I could see, like, the light bulb go off in people's minds when I would ask them, like, are you aware that the AR15, which is what they would always bring up, like, no, not Glock glizzy switches.
Speaker B:Always the AR15.
Speaker B: s invented, like, in the late: Speaker B:And then they could, like.
Speaker B:I could see, like, the gears turning in their heads where it's like, okay, so, you know, not only were the guns around since then, but I was like, yeah, at that time period, you could order them directly to your house in the mail.
Speaker B:There were no background checks.
Speaker B:You get them from Sears and all this other stuff.
Speaker B:And it was cool to see people realize, like, oh, actually, I've kind of been looking at this in, like, from a very non American lens because in most other places, even the places that guns are legal, there is not that same kind of gun culture that we have here.
Speaker B:And I really want to make sure that we are building up this culture and bringing people into the fold.
Speaker B:Because, dude, like, we will just be outvoted and they will make another amendment, and the second amendment, in my opinion, will be gone if we let that happen.
Speaker B:And I don't think we're not about letting that happen, John.
Speaker B:I mean, come on, you know, that'll.
Speaker A:Never happen on my watch.
Speaker A:Let's go.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:What was it you brought?
Speaker A:I.
Speaker A:So for our honeymoon, my wife and I, we went down to the Dominican Republic, and we're sitting there talking to a guy.
Speaker A:I was working at a gun store at the time.
Speaker A:And he's like, well, what do you do for work?
Speaker A:And I'm like, oh, I work at a gun store.
Speaker A:Guy was from the US he had moved down to the Dominican, got married, and we get to talking.
Speaker A:And I'm like, well, what's it.
Speaker A:What's it like here?
Speaker A:He's like, well, you can get a gun.
Speaker A:Just you got to pay and this and that.
Speaker A:And I'm like, oh, yeah, what are you looking at, oh, Springfield xd.
Speaker A:I'm like, okay, cool.
Speaker A:Like, what's that zone?
Speaker B:Let's go.
Speaker A:Oh, 100 grim zone.
Speaker A:And he's like, we're talking some more.
Speaker A:And he's, I was like, well, how much?
Speaker A:He goes, it's, it's like almost two grand.
Speaker A:I'm like, that's a 350, 400 gun in the States.
Speaker A:He goes, yeah, but here, like it's this.
Speaker A:And then I gotta fit this and this and have all these licenses.
Speaker A:I'm like, bruh, you, you were in Pro freedom and you can't decide to come here.
Speaker A:Like, I get.
Speaker A:It's a beautiful country, my friend, but so we get to talking some more.
Speaker A:And he's like, yeah, it's, it's, you know, we gotta, we don't have to worry as much.
Speaker A:And I'm like, well, what do you have to worry about?
Speaker A:Because all this, I'm like, well, that's a lot to worry about, dude.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker A:So it's the same thing.
Speaker A:Like situational awareness is a big thing.
Speaker A:You brought that up.
Speaker A:And I want to touch on that real quick.
Speaker A:I had to go to an event in Chicago.
Speaker A:Can't carry in Chicago.
Speaker A:Well, lawfully carry in Chicago, but again, I was flying in, so couldn't carry in Chicago.
Speaker A:So I brought a stabby Sharpie.
Speaker A:Great self defense tool if you ever need a cool self defense tool.
Speaker A:And just being self aware that like if something happens, all I have is this pointy Sharpie.
Speaker A:And then the other time situation awareness came into play is again shot shows in Vegas.
Speaker A:Vegas, you can't carry either.
Speaker A:It's very, and the, the don't even say because there are people who are like, well, I carry in Vegas all the time.
Speaker A:Yeah, you can carry in Vegas.
Speaker A:The minute they find out in the hotel.
Speaker A:We, we have heard horror stories from, from companies and people who have left guns in the hotel room or check back.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And they just, they, they kick them out.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:So we were walking back from the Venetian, going to Circle Bar, walking back after we're done filming the one night.
Speaker A:And I'm walking with my co. With Kaylee and we're walking down the Strip to the Link.
Speaker A:And as we're walking, I watch this girl.
Speaker A:As soon as we walk, just peel off and come start following us.
Speaker A:So I grab her, I'm like, we're going into Harris, let's go.
Speaker A:And she's like, what's going on?
Speaker A:Like, we're being followed.
Speaker A:Let's go.
Speaker A:We got backpacks on.
Speaker A:We got, we got the goa Gear on, they're gonna do something stupid.
Speaker A:So we're gonna go into Harris.
Speaker A:At least we got security and security camera.
Speaker A:But it's things like that that really bring you a peace of mind.
Speaker A:You're like, I can't do anything.
Speaker A:Yeah, I've got, I've got a pocket knife on me.
Speaker A:I can defend myself with that.
Speaker A:But at that point it's like, do I really want to be that close?
Speaker A:Right, yeah, like I want that force.
Speaker B:Multiplier, I want that 100.
Speaker A:But it's, it's those things, it's those times and situations.
Speaker A:As a gun owner, as somebody who's really self aware of everything.
Speaker A:You know, first off, if you do anything, just having that tactical awareness and situational awareness of what's going on around you.
Speaker A:But not only that, but also like, hey, things can happen in moments notice.
Speaker A:Get what you got to get and just carry like it's, it's 29 states have constitutional carry.
Speaker A:Getting your carry permit depending on where you are is decently easy.
Speaker A:Just do it, take the time and do it.
Speaker B:Oh, for sure, for sure.
Speaker B:Yeah, it's, I love seeing this push of constitutional carry too.
Speaker B:And you know, I'm, I'm in Virginia now and we're, we've got a lot of transplants, myself included.
Speaker B:And a lot of people are coming from vehemently anti gun places where thankfully, you know, for the most part they're pretty safe.
Speaker B:And so being out in the country though is a way different ball game because just by sheer distances involved, dude, the police station might not be closer than the Walmart.
Speaker B:You know, it's like, it might be a ways away.
Speaker B:And if you're, if you don't have a force multiplier like that, I mean, you know, it's, it's no bueno.
Speaker B:And I think that having all the restrictions in place of like, hey, Europe, you're a, you know, an upstanding, you know, law abiding citizen.
Speaker B:But we're going to need to make you jump through these hoops.
Speaker B:Meanwhile, it was like rule number two in our founding documents, like, hey, say whatever you want, government can't take your guns.
Speaker B:And then, you know, and it's like, but you know, it's like, it's like, have you been sad in the past?
Speaker B:Like, do you drink alcohol?
Speaker B:You know, it's like, like all these other things that I think are not conducive to keeping people safe and I think a lot of them, if not all of them were started for extremely immoral reasons to prevent certain people from having access to firearms.
Speaker B:And so I'm surprised that a lot of people on, I'll say, like in more liberal leaning circles haven't doubled down on that to say, well, the origins of most of this gun control is, is, is I think anyway.
Speaker B:I mean a lot of it, I'm not saying all of it, but I think a lot of it is racially based.
Speaker B:And we're now in this situation where it's like, okay, now, you know, it's like, why do we need to be proving ourselves constantly to be able to defend ourselves?
Speaker B:And yeah, constitutional carry, I think is super important in Virginia.
Speaker B:We got to get that going.
Speaker B:And I'm hoping that a lot of people on both sides of the aisle can come together and realize like, dude, support the police all you want, that's great.
Speaker B:They're absolutely needed, you know, profession obviously, but a needed component of civil civilized society.
Speaker B:But like as we were talking about earlier, they might get there too late.
Speaker B:And until that, until they arrive, what are you going to do?
Speaker A:Right, well, and I used to work way out in the middle of nowhere and we were having our safety meeting and you know, pre working and we have our safety meeting and talking about stuff and they're like, okay, yeah, it's 45 minutes to the hospital, like, okay, so don't get hurt, right?
Speaker A:And the sheriff will show up in about 35 to 40 minutes.
Speaker A:I'm like, cool, so anything goes down, like, let's, let's figure this out.
Speaker A:So it is.
Speaker A:Once you have that impact of going, okay, well now I need to really take my, my own self protection into my hands.
Speaker A:And we're seeing that a lot with people just understanding again, we have to go back to unprecedented times like Covid, where it's like, yeah, they're not coming and this could happen.
Speaker A:And a lot of people saw that and realize that.
Speaker A:And we're still seeing that kind of trend where people are like, well, I need to get into.
Speaker A:A lot of people who are leading on the fence are now coming over.
Speaker A:But yeah, it's just insane to think.
Speaker A:And yes, gun controls, I'm gonna say it now.
Speaker A:Gun control is racist.
Speaker A:The original gun control in California was based on making sure that Black Panthers couldn't have guns.
Speaker A:Racist, sorry, gotta call a spade a spade when you gotta do it.
Speaker A:Gun control is racist.
Speaker A:It's proven.
Speaker A:You can argue with me all you want, but it's a proven fact.
Speaker A:But yeah, it's, it's crazy to see like state, even the state of Virginia, if you look at the state of Virginia, the especially this election.
Speaker A:And Alex Shea from our team, who is trying to do the best Virginia project, which is West Virginia, taking some of those county.
Speaker B:I'm trying to make Fairfax county secede.
Speaker B:Like, because we got like Virginia.
Speaker B:We basically, it's like country everywhere.
Speaker B:And then the pockets outside of D.C. which everyone's a transplant.
Speaker B:So it's like, hey, I've left Massachusetts, which has maybe the strictest gun control in the country, right?
Speaker B:And it's like I've left Massachusetts and New Jersey and now I work on policy in D.C. and I live in Virginia.
Speaker B:That's a very rural state.
Speaker B:And it just like New York and all these places.
Speaker B:So anyway, so I'm trying to get, if you guys want to hop on the Make Fairfax Secede movement, you know, get in touch with the Instagram account, we can get that going.
Speaker B:Because no, it's seriously exactly like that.
Speaker B:You look at like a heat map of Virginia and even with the people that are, I'll say, like leftward leaning, maybe they're older Democrats are like, I'm pro, super pro union, but I'm not about to give up my shotguns.
Speaker B:I want to get a lot of those people to make a firm stand with somebody, I don't know, maybe Nick Freitas, you know, in the Virginia Ledge, to, to really just like be on the offensive.
Speaker B:Because going back to the gun, the gripes from earlier, we're.
Speaker B:We're not very, we're gonna say we're not very offensive.
Speaker B:We are offensive, but we're not on the offense as much as I would like.
Speaker B:So we're constantly having, and you guys know, at Goa, we're constantly having to like, put up the shield for all this unconstitutional stuff.
Speaker B:And it's like, oof.
Speaker B:We, you know, we got away from that.
Speaker B:But if we started to be more proactive about like, no Virginia is going to be constitutional carry.
Speaker B:It's bipartisan.
Speaker B:Regular people that live in rural areas don't want to give up their guns.
Speaker B:And it's not political.
Speaker B:Like, I think most people would be like, oh yeah, that's reasonable, you know,.
Speaker A: a as a whole come together in: Speaker A: , maybe: Speaker A:They all came together because there was a lot of anti gun legislation and they're like, no, we're not dealing with this.
Speaker A:And that is what we got to do.
Speaker A:I think as a society, we're very reactionary and especially if you are more leaning conservative, we're always very reactionary.
Speaker A:We're very like, okay, cool, we, we won.
Speaker A:All right, now's the time to light the fire, friends.
Speaker A:It is time to pull a playbook from the left and get angry and push these, these elected officials to actually do what they, they campaign on.
Speaker A:And GOA has our.
Speaker A:Every year we put out a scorecard and every year we score, we rate politicians on, on how they vote.
Speaker A:And you'd be surprised how many did, depending on the letter.
Speaker A:It doesn't always mean they stand with their parties policies on guns.
Speaker A:You just got to look at that and go, okay, cool.
Speaker A:If you are a gun owner, I'm not saying live in this microcosm and be a one issue voter, but you kind of got to be a one issue voter and that's pro freedom, pro gun.
Speaker A:And, and again, like you said, they went, one is freedom, two is guns.
Speaker A:To protect those freedoms, let's go.
Speaker A:Yeah, like they were smart to.
Speaker A:But I digress.
Speaker B:No, I, Dude, I, I think you're absolutely right.
Speaker B:And again, like, I am super fortunate in that a lot of the people that I'm talking to are not in the gun entry at all.
Speaker B:And so like many of them, especially, you know, some people in my family and a lot of my close friends, they're like, that's insane.
Speaker B:And I'm like, no, like you have to understand most of the places are not as safe as the areas you're growing up in.
Speaker B:And just like you were saying, like, it's important to be on the offensive, but I think like without the cliche of like inclusivity but like it's, I think we need like an offensive movement.
Speaker B:But it's like not, doesn't have to be bipartisan, but it's like, oh, okay, so like all these people that are, let's say left voting constituents, they are not going to vote for anybody that's on the gun control agenda, so to speak.
Speaker B:So man.
Speaker B:Yeah, it's, it's Virginia though.
Speaker B:Virginia is going to like, I want to make sure we're like not the east Coast, California because like, dude, it very easily could be that.
Speaker B:And like you were talking about at lobby day in Richmond a few years ago.
Speaker B:So if you guys don't know, Virginia was, I don't know if it was a super majority of Democrat, but for whatever, whatever was going on, it was basically, there was like a lot of gun control bills where it's basically going to be like, oh, you don't have a flintlock, then your shit, your stuff is illegal, you know, and they walked back.
Speaker B:Most of those.
Speaker B:I think all of those Measures, because so many people, I think it was like 10,000 people showed up in person in the state capitol for lobby day, which is when citizens can come and like, express their grievances and talk about the issues that they want.
Speaker B:10,000 People came, like, open carrying.
Speaker B:Virginia is an open carry state, so you could legally walk around with a rifle.
Speaker B:For the most part.
Speaker B:This is not legal advice.
Speaker B:But, you know, it's like, while that did work, I think that it, it had an unintended consequence of also driving some people away.
Speaker B:Because I was talking about like a lot of my friends and family.
Speaker B:They're like, they're not ultra lefties, but they're definitely not like hardcore gun people.
Speaker B:And so to see like some dude in like ranger panties and you know, like, I don't know, like a stained wife beater with like an M60 on his shoulder, I thought it was cool.
Speaker B:You probably thought it was cool.
Speaker B:But like, I think a lot of the people on the fence were like, oh my God, these people are insane.
Speaker B:So what I would like to do is a similar event, but it's a concealed carry one.
Speaker B:This way, everyone's here.
Speaker B:It's a barbecue.
Speaker B:We've got thousands of people.
Speaker B:We're doing the talks or giving the speeches.
Speaker B:And if any bad actors are there, it's like, you see, again, you know, they're not part of the group because this is a concealed carry march barbecue, whatever.
Speaker B:But yes, I 100% think you're right now that it's like, oh, hey, we're kind of got some momentum here.
Speaker B:Like, let's capitalize on the momentum and get some things moving, you know?
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And I, for that lobby day, I got to take our friends over at VCDL as well for helping.
Speaker A:And Eric Pratt was there and we had a lot of people there talking and, and that's the thing, like, you're absolutely right.
Speaker A:You don't want to scare those people away.
Speaker A:We got to do this.
Speaker A:I've seen movements, concealed carry movements.
Speaker A:I was part of a couple in college where we did a empty holster protest at school.
Speaker A:Because, you know, again, Ohio has weird laws.
Speaker A:And I've said it before to other people, but I'll say to you, you.
Speaker A:The school I went to is owned by the state.
Speaker A:It's a state run school.
Speaker A:Property.
Speaker A:State property.
Speaker A:As a student, I wasn't allowed to conceal carry.
Speaker A:I wasn't.
Speaker A:If I was going to any events, I'm not allowed to conceal carry.
Speaker A:But as a general person, just walking around campus, good to go, Good to go.
Speaker A:So I'm like sitting there going, well, that's kind of not cool, man.
Speaker A:So I wrote my senior thesis on that and I had a very anti.
Speaker B:Gun, anti gun professor.
Speaker A:What do you mean?
Speaker B:He must be the only one.
Speaker A:But I did have like.
Speaker A:And that's the cool part being pro God, but not being like, I am not the pushy, pushy pro God.
Speaker A:I'm like, hey, you want to come?
Speaker A:Hey, you're into this.
Speaker A:Like I, you know, I'm into this.
Speaker A:Come with me, we'll go out, shoot, try it out, give it some, give it some thought.
Speaker A:So I tried that with a. I actually had professors after the fact reach out and like, hey, can you help me with this?
Speaker A:I'm like, yeah, yeah, let's do this.
Speaker B:That's sick.
Speaker A:And we're seeing that.
Speaker A:You know, I was lucky enough to see that.
Speaker A:But yeah, my professor, my first paper, I wrote the, my senior paper dissertation on carry on campus citing.
Speaker A:You know, Utah has it and West Virginia just got it, but they didn't have a time.
Speaker A:Liberty University has it and we're talking about it and my professor goes in the notes, I grew up in Texas and any God fearing guy left his gun in the vestibule and went into church and I'm like, that's dangerous.
Speaker A:Like that's not even safe.
Speaker A:Why would you do that?
Speaker A:It's true, it's true though.
Speaker B:And all those pre stolen guns.
Speaker A:Yeah, pre stolen, that's absolutely right.
Speaker A:Don't leave your guns.
Speaker B:Yeah, don't be leaving the guns in the cars.
Speaker A:Yeah, we just went to an event where that happened, but.
Speaker B:Oh God, yeah, that's terrible.
Speaker A:It's terrible.
Speaker B:The mistake you make once, hopefully one time.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah, well, and that's the same, you know, your, your, your car is not your gun safe.
Speaker A:Sorry folks, public service announcement.
Speaker A:But watching people start changing their minds and watching them just being, just being, having a civil conversation which we, we haven't had in a long time, you know, that civility of conversation.
Speaker A:But just talking to somebody like they're humans, like, hey, you want to get into this?
Speaker A:You're starting to get into.
Speaker A:You're interested.
Speaker A:And then they start bringing up like, well, Australia and this and that and this is what they did.
Speaker A:And I'm like, yeah, true, they did do this and they did see a drop in gun crime, but violent crime didn't go down.
Speaker A:And you show them the statistics like, whoa, wait, but gun crime dropped and the news says gun crime and gun crime, gun crime.
Speaker A:Because fear sells folks.
Speaker A:And what they don't want, you to know is, yeah, it might.
Speaker A:Criminals do criminal things.
Speaker A:They're going to use whatever the bat.
Speaker B:Is, what they are.
Speaker A:Knife.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:So like when I was talking to this, this lady about it, she was talking about Australia and I'm like, yeah, but she's like, well, they have no mass shootings anymore.
Speaker A:I'm like, yeah, but they have mass stabbing.
Speaker A:She goes, what do you mean?
Speaker A:I'm like, here's five of them in the last couple months.
Speaker B:It's crazy, you know, it's, it's.
Speaker B:If you want to know what the society would look like if good people couldn't own firearms, go to Manhattan.
Speaker B:Go to Manhattan.
Speaker B:It's exactly like that.
Speaker B:There's cops everywhere that it will be probably too late for them to save you.
Speaker B:Crazy people do whatever they want and it's pretty easy to make a shiv.
Speaker B:So, you know, I will not advocate for anybody doing anything else, but I will tell you, I would probably not leave it up to chance and a strong word to be dispelling those types of people.
Speaker B:But yeah, it's, it's.
Speaker B:I don't care how many cops there are in New York City.
Speaker B:And again, it's no knock on law enforcement at all.
Speaker B:It's just like, it doesn't make you feel safer.
Speaker B:And I think because deep down people know that violence happens very quickly.
Speaker A:Yeah, well, it's the same thing with dc.
Speaker A:Dc like my first time in dc I get there, I just got hired by goa.
Speaker A:I go out, meet Kaylee and Eric and everybody were meeting there and then they're like, okay, we're going to D.C. and I cool.
Speaker A:They're like, you got anything on you?
Speaker A:I'm like, I got a knife to get rid of it.
Speaker A:I'm like, what do you mean?
Speaker A:Like, I'm like, it's a buy a knife.
Speaker A:It's something I carry every day.
Speaker A:They're like, no, that's illegal.
Speaker A:I'm like, what do you mean it's illegal?
Speaker A:So, not to go on too much of a tangent, but yes, it's crazy to think even the small things like that, you know, you just feel.
Speaker A:I felt like so disarmed.
Speaker B:Yeah, dude.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:I don't know, you know, I.
Speaker B:For me, it always comes back to the culture, right?
Speaker B:Because like, we could get all these bills going.
Speaker B:And I'm sure that is a enormous effort.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Even before then, though.
Speaker B:But like, it's so easy to demonize, like all of these different, you know, gun related topics that I think that, you know, we really do need.
Speaker B:We.
Speaker B:I keep coming Back to we got to get like normal people to be like, okay, I'm never going to be like a gun.
Speaker B:How do I. I'm trying to you like change some of the negative terminology that I refer to us as to, to be more family friendly.
Speaker B:I'm never going to be a gun nut, right?
Speaker B:But I want to make sure that those never going to be a gun nut people are still like, but God forbid I have this pump gun, I have this, you know, pea shooter or whatever, or excuse me, or you know, if they want to get a HK Mark 23, then have at it.
Speaker B:But you know, like, I think we got to do a better job of getting these normal people.
Speaker B:Like, for me it starts at the gun stores because that's a lot of times the normal person's first experience dealing with, with the gun industry is like going into their lgs, right?
Speaker B:And I can't tell it.
Speaker B:First of all, I want to give a shout out to Excal in Northern Virginia.
Speaker B:Excal is a phenomenal organization.
Speaker B:They're a world class facility.
Speaker B:But they do such an amazing job of bringing people in that have questions and explaining things in a way that makes you want to learn more.
Speaker B:And it's very inviting.
Speaker B:And I love bringing first time shooters there.
Speaker B:Unfortunately, they are an anomaly.
Speaker B:There are other great ranges out there, of course, but there's so many places special, especially just the stores where the salesperson's first priority is to showcase their perceived knowledge and to explain why they're right about certain things.
Speaker B:And I have had so many issues of going to gun stores, like with my parents as an adult, like where if I was not there, they probably would not have walked out with anything.
Speaker B:One time I was in Bass Pro down in Florida and the salesperson was arguing with my father that his pistol that he already purchased at this store was the wrong choice for concealed carry.
Speaker B:I will tell you, like, I couldn't remember the last time.
Speaker B:Like, I was like, I was like, I needed so much restraint to not like absolutely flip out.
Speaker B:Because I'm thinking like, first of all, you should be first of all, terrible salesperson, like in any industry.
Speaker B:Like, hey, nice job, idiot.
Speaker B:You brought the wrong thing.
Speaker B:You know, it's like, like, who hired you?
Speaker B:But the other part is like, dude, my dad's not a gun guy and I'm there in Florida a lot of the time and dude, there's some rough areas and I want to make sure that, you know, they have something that if God forbid something happens, it's not like, hey, please don't Rob us.
Speaker B:It's like you have.
Speaker B:You are.
Speaker B:You've been neutralized, right?
Speaker B:I guess that's a good way of putting it.
Speaker B:I don't know.
Speaker B:Anyway, but going back to the gun stores, it's unfortunately, at least in my experience, very common to go into places where the gun store employees are, like, very egotistical, very, like, macho.
Speaker B:And unless you have a high level of knowledge yourself, you're going to be talked into something that you probably don't want.
Speaker B:Or something is going to happen where you're just never going to go back to the gun store.
Speaker B:And honestly, shame on those people.
Speaker B:Like, we should shame those people super hard.
Speaker A:Shame, shame, shame.
Speaker A:No, I.
Speaker A:And that's.
Speaker A:I worked behind the gun counter for a long time, and that is one thing that I focused on.
Speaker A:It's like, okay, tell me what you.
Speaker A:What you're looking for, what you want.
Speaker A:Be very open.
Speaker A:I think I've only told one person that I don't think this gun is right for you.
Speaker A:I'm not gonna name the brand, but it was our most returned gun.
Speaker A:Okay, most gun.
Speaker A:And I was like, listen, this gun has come back.
Speaker A:We get these in, they buy them, three weeks later, they come back to sell them back to us.
Speaker A:Often, like, this is.
Speaker A:And I felt bad because he was like, I really like this guy.
Speaker A:And it felt.
Speaker A:I'm like, I know I just spent like three hours, two hours with you or talking.
Speaker A:And I just gotta be honest because I don't want you to come back, you know, be upset.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:He's just like, yeah, I'm gonna get in.
Speaker A:He was, all right.
Speaker A:Three weeks later, dang.
Speaker A:And I was like, yeah.
Speaker A:Because I'm just so disheartened.
Speaker A:And I'm like, let's get you into something a little bit.
Speaker A:Here's some suggestions.
Speaker A:Here's this, here's that, you know.
Speaker A:But I am getting the wrap up sign from the production team.
Speaker A:So before we go and before we wrap up, got a little gift from you from Palmetto and aac.
Speaker B:Thank you.
Speaker A:Palmetto and AAC have sponsored the show for season two to give gifts to all our guests.
Speaker A:Very cool.
Speaker A:Thank you so much.
Speaker A:So we'll be receiving a gift package from them at the.
Speaker A:After the show's over.
Speaker A:Ben will get with you.
Speaker B:Thank you.
Speaker B:AAC and Palmetto.
Speaker A:Super cool, super cool on them for doing that.
Speaker A:So before we go, I know this.
Speaker A:We could go for, like, another hour, but I'm being told no.
Speaker A:So go ahead and shout.
Speaker A:Socials, website, all that fun stuff along the way.
Speaker B:So best place to get in touch with us is probably Instagram.
Speaker B:Leave a comment on one of our recent posts and somebody will answer that in an extremely polite and definitely not snarky manner.
Speaker B:Our Instagram is goon underscore tape.
Speaker B:Pretty much.
Speaker B:That's where we live on Instagram, man.
Speaker B:But yeah, if you're, if you're out at shot show this year, hopefully I see you guys same thing at the Gundies which I'm super pumped about.
Speaker B:I think we're nominated this year.
Speaker B:Yeah, I think so.
Speaker B:If not, let's make that happen guys.
Speaker A:Hey, we'll just go poke it.
Speaker A:Ben.
Speaker A:Ben.
Speaker A:But yeah, dude, I appreciate you being on.
Speaker A:Yeah, this is great.
Speaker A:Had a great conversation.
Speaker A:I look like just the local gun store thing.
Speaker A:I could go for another hour.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:But thank you again for being on guys.
Speaker B:My pleasure.
Speaker A:Make sure to like share and subscribe.
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Speaker A:Leave us five star review on all podcasting help and we will catch you on the next one.
Speaker B:Yeah, thanks guys.
