I will be removing Scottsdale Gun Club from our Ladies’ Day Rotation. Following is the review I left on Google:
*Sadly, I haven’t heard back regarding this so have adjusted down to one star.
Original:
(Concern to follow….)
Let me start by saying that Matt and Eric get 5 stars. Skyler, Brian, Melissa, Brett…The SGC team has been very welcoming. Matt & Eric have been integral to my development as a shooter (and now multi-certified firearms instructor), and their jokes are generally underrated – I became an SGC member in 2023 after Skyler assisted me with an FFL. I did not regret it after taking the 2- Day Handgun Intensive with Matt & Eric.
Matt has also been interested in my experience at the club and creating an excellent experience for all members and guests to the range.
The CCW class at SGC is another matter altogether. I should note that I haven’t discussed this matter with him, but I’ve been meaning to leave a 5-star review (with great photos), so I have gone ahead and left 5-stars.
That said, I attended a CCW class taught by attorney Tim Forshey at SGC Dec 16 for hardcard fingerprints and current legal information on civilian use of deadly force.
This was by far the worst CCW class I’ve taken as most try to delicately avoid race.
This class, however, is the one Black folks imagine is happening behind every CCW classroom door. It’s the one that “doesn’t understand why stand-your-ground is racist”; insists that race has nothing to do with police violence; and says, rather, that if the “Black man” running away from the police while holding a knife “had just followed commands,” he would not have been shot in the back multiple times and paralyzed (ask me what this has to do with Arizona concealed carry law).
However, all of these CCW classes are alike in that they insist you cannot legally start a fight and then claim self-defense while on the other hand gingerly conceding that the murder of Trayvon Martin by a racist concealed-carry vigilante was justified:
A teenage boy simply walking home from the store with snacks, talking to his girlfriend on the cellphone, when he is profiled as a thief by a predator concealing a firearm….
His murder is unjustified even by Attorney Forshey’s own description of stand-your-ground.
Sadly, many will find this review all the more reason to join SGC and attend this class with Mr Forshey! This is simply a sign of the times and the current cultural slip back to the “sleep” of American Slavery ‘s practical/civilizing benefits due to ‘Black racial inferiority and cultural irrelevance’ (see Desantis et al). Mr Forshey’s course indeed promotes the age-old anti-Black propaganda that has created the gulf of disparity between justified and unjustified use of deadly force when one defending ones life is Black and shooting a white person versus when the one shooting is white and the victim is Black. —And I have phrased it this way because Trayvon Martin would be considered the assailant when he was, without question, the victim. (Please note that I have not capitalized “white” out of respect for the preponderance of folks identifying as “white” who do not want it capitalized).
It stands to reason and civility that if you do not know why people like me– who think gun rights are basic human rights– consider “stand-your-ground” to be anti-Black, then care enough to do the research instead of treating the issue as if it’s not important. Nothing Mr Forshey said in his class was relevant or helpful advice for a Black person carrying concealed or openly with the intention of defending their life or that of a loved one/another. Instead, what he taught was dangerous to Black lives in general —Not to mention that the CCW unit no longer wants hardcard fingerprints or paper applications.
We need informed CCW instruction that understands 2A wasn’t made for all but is interested in the safety of ALL law-abiding citizens.
This class went over the line and is uninformed, unsafe, and anti-Black.
*Photos are my CCW class feedback form. I almost walked out at one point as I did not sign-ups & pay for this class to argue with the instructor. Was trying not to upset myself– more 1-stars are deserved.
**I was the only Black person in the class.
Update: I started getting false reports on Google and Meetup, where the review was displayed, about how I wasn’t creating real community, was attacking a venue and making members feel unsafe (Somehow these reporting profiles could see content in a private group; my members didn’t contact me about the announcement). Even my Facebook page suddenly went offline. I modified the review to get around the Google censor. It still would not show, so I posted it on Yelp. I then got a report alleging that I was a competitor making a false report. Yelp investigated the matter and left the review up. I hope Scottsdale Gun Club got a warning, at least, for making false reports in order to have one-star reviews removed from their profile.
