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Nov. 17, 2022

626: Building a Culture of Liberty with Black Guns Matter

On today's episode, I'm joined by Maj Toure from Black Guns Matter to discuss the importance of building a culture of liberty when reaching out to black Americans.

On today's episode, I'm joined by Maj Toure from Black Guns Matter to discuss the importance of building a culture of liberty when reaching out to black Americans.


Maj is an incredible advocate for liberty and self-ownership. His organization has helped bring many people into the Libertarian movement and he's a true inspiration to us all.


We talk about:


-The importance of building trust in order to reach out effectively to black Americans


-How people can get started on their own journey towards freedom through Black Guns Matter workshops


-A radical program that will help violence reduction in black communities by using firearms as a way to empower young people and teach them how to be responsible gun owners

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Transcript

Brian Nichols  0:04  
Black guns matter. Yeah, let's talk about that. Focusing on winning arguments. We're teaching the basic fundamentals of sales and marketing and how we can use them to win in the world of politics, teaching you how to meet people where they're at on the issues they care about. Welcome to The Brian Nichols Show. Wow, happy Thursday there, folks. Brian, you're on The Brian Nichols Show. And thank you for joining us, of course, another fun filled episode. I am as always your humble vote. Joining you live from our Stratus ip Studios here in lovely eastern India and I don't want cyber attacks or outdated Business Technology, put your company at risk. Learn more at Brian Nichols show.com forward slash Stratus ip Alright folks, black guns matter that has been the calling card you've likely heard and actually I saw it was in a supermarket walking down the grocery store aisle. When you're going past the magazines I saw this on a magazine said black guns matter. And on the face there on the magazine was somebody I was familiar with. And if you're in the liberty movement you're likely familiar with as well. Joining us today from my old home stomping grounds in Philadelphia, Maj. Tori from black guns matter. Welcome to The Brian Nichols Show.

Maj Toure  1:08  
Well, so Brian, thank you for having me, man. Absolutely, man. Hey,

Brian Nichols  1:11  
thank you for joining us. And thank you for doing all we can absolutely hope to try and restore some semblance of sanity there in a place I used to call home. And that's Philadelphia. I was there for just over seven years and the city that I moved into versus the city I moved out completely different. But hey, we got folks like you, they're still trying to fight the good fight what's going on in the city of brotherly love?

Maj Toure  1:34  
Question mark. I think that, um, Philadelphia is an, you know, there's a word in Japanese, they say the word for crisis, and opportunity is the same word. And I think that's the space that Philadelphia is in. Obviously, we have amazing history, our attachment and significance in American history is stamped, there is no America without Philadelphia, that's just the reality of the situation. But we're also in a space where we've allowed, you know, certain public servants, and politicians who run things that, to be perfectly honest, shouldn't be running things. And I mean that in the sense of not as a slave to these men and women. But just as a, if you don't really understand what the definition of a public service servant is, and that job, you don't really listen to read, study or know how to apply the Constitution. If you think that your job is to tell the general public what to do, as opposed to support the general public with with a very, very limited hand, then you are not fit to serve in that position. And I think for some time now, a lot of politicians in Philadelphia have fit that mold, they fit that description. And it's unfortunately, even though you know, the look of Philadelphia in regards to new buildings, new business, new homes, those things have changed for the better, but crime is up, you know, you know, guys are shooting people and we just saw a district attorney crasner being indicted, excuse me not indicted, but excuse me, impeach, impeach Trump. These are the things that you know, make the question mark, so solid, when we say brotherly love question mark. But I truly believe that if the people are being socially aware and responsible, and culturally, you know, the culture is have lived the liberty movement, and if we can shift it from BLM meaning, you know, black lives matter, the foe organization that really didn't help the community, to BLM the black libertarian movement, meaning because Philadelphia is mostly black and brown people, I think we can shift the culture and if we shift the culture, as Andrew Breitbart said, politics is downstream from culture. So I think that that's the next challenge for us as Liberty minded folks in the city of Philadelphia, maintaining the history, understanding, being honest about all of the aspects of history and putting that in a nice, you know, bowl as a liberty, a culturally relevant liberty movement, and spread that throughout the hood. And I think we'll see some changes in the right direction in the city of brotherly love.

Brian Nichols  4:00  
Let's let's talk about the the idea of bringing the liberty movement to black America. And that's something I think you're hitting the nail on the head. I heard you over on our cohorts there in reason, and you were talking about there's a natural synergy between black Americans in the liberty movement, and a lot of it centralized around a distrust towards government. Can you talk more about what we can do more effectively to message towards black Americans when we're speaking specifically to where we can find those common bonds? Yeah, to highlight

Maj Toure  4:33  
the thing that libertarianism is and the liberty movement is making it available and explaining it in those communities is all you got to do? It doesn't have to be a hard pander. It doesn't have to be a pander at all. When I translate to people in the hood when I say things like, you know, hey, basically libertarianism is don't hurt people don't take their stuff. When I say you know limit Libertarians believe in lip very limited government, if any, you know, because we have a big tent, obviously, right? You know, some guys are just ANCAP. And you know, and whatever. But my point is, when you're explaining that to the demographic and saying, yo, this is what we about the war on drugs should and you shouldn't go to jail because you got to dry up plant that you smoked, right? We say the government should not be involved so heavily in your, you know, taxation is theft. When you say that to the hood, when you explain basic Liberty concepts, they'll get it and they go, yo, what is that libertarian thing again? So it's really just being there. We cannot make the same mistake as the GOP does. The GOP fails, as we saw in this, you know, these midterms, and even though obviously, Republicans took the house, but the reality is, this was supposed to be a red wave by all intents and purposes, like they said, Now, do I think there's some election integrity issues? Absolutely. I absolutely do. I think America has election integrity issues for decades now at this point. And I think that both sides cheat when available,

Brian Nichols  5:55  
pay really quick, Josh Shapiro, didn't he just say he's gonna push some charges for some election fraud issues in Philadelphia, of all places from 2019? Like, yeah, it's happening,

Maj Toure  6:06  
though it's happening. And so Sam is to say, we got to not make the same mistake that the GOP data in that regard. And again, that's not me saying, there is no election fraud or anything like that. That's me saying, yeah, the GOP still doesn't do outreach doesn't help black candidates doesn't do outreach, outreach and black communities. And they should respect the Republican be a layup for as a libertarian, I can be honest, and say, the Republicans should own and dominate the black vote, they should they have the best conservative of all time that they could a few of them that they could utilize as their points of reference, Frederick Douglass, Malcolm X, Dr. Martin Luther King had very conservative. I mean, obviously, these guys were about liberty and freedom, da, but they had very conservative values. And at the time, obviously, the Libertarian Party and libertarianism and that's formed didn't exist. The same is to say the GOP doesn't even have a discussion about those guys saying is to say, you don't have to pander to the Democratic, you just have to be there and tell your story. You have to be there and say, What is libertarianism? Every time that I've had a conversation with someone, front of Hood in my community, or the black community about libertarianism, just like any other community, that libertarianism is being hidden in, because it is being hidden, you know, every time we make a viable, you know, step in the right direction, Libertarian party gets new leadership. Now, here comes the smear campaigns just said, it's, you know, it's a fight and we expect contact and a fight. But my point is, when you explain that to the demographic, they're on board, when you say, oh, yeah, we got this guy named Larry sharp, he's black. We got this guy named Eric, July, he's black. We got this guy named Andre, excuse me, big boy, he was in his group with Andre 3000. You know, outcast. He's black. When you say all these different names, and they like, Damn, he's doing this. And then they see what those guys are about any like, you're a libertarian, what is libertarianism? What's the Libertarian Party, so forth and so on. Then when you say, This party has been around, it's the third largest political party in America. My point in saying all of this is you just have to be there to not make the same mistake that the GOP does. They don't engage black America. They don't engage it. And so when you start engaging, and having solid representatives for the movement, to communicate effectively in a way that's in alignment with the demographics, understanding, then you win. There's no There's there's I've had people that were counting the polls in Pennsylvania last week, right. And they called me several, several, several separate people said, bro, I haven't even seen people vote for Republicans on these I've seen mostly Democrat. But I've seen a lot more libertarians, people voting for libertarians, and Pennsylvania. like, Yo, I think that's got a lot to do with you. I mean, like, Yeah, I'm just telling the demographic what it is. It's not rocket science. But if you are leading with your ego, or if you're looking at these as many GOP, you know, folks do, if you're looking at these demographics as unwinnable areas, right, then you won't do it, you think that the outreach doesn't matter. That's why I love what you know, the guys over at the Mises caucus have done, they understand culture, they understand that importance, they understand maj might be a little rough around the edges, but my just communicating with a demographic in a way that that demographic receives it. And so, you know, kudos to those guys and culture is important. So that's what we have to consistently and continue to do to make sure the libertarian movement not only continues, but expands that's politics. You know, I mean, I absolutely I'm

Brian Nichols  9:40  
so glad you keep on going back to culture Maj. Like that's, that is so important, like at the foundational level, and I'm glad you brought up the quote too from the late great Andrew Breitbart politics is always downstream from culture. And if we don't establish a Liberty based culture first, then we're just going to be fighting an uphill battle and we're seeing that right now. I think a lot of Republicans are really realizing that is that they've been fighting a different game that they should have been fighting. And they saw that in their election results, the culture game matters. And all of a sudden Gen Z was was the numbers as like 25% of the electorate was actually Gen Z, they never turn out. And yet they did. And that's something I think we also have to address going forward is like, hey, there are folks out there that we can bring to the table that traditionally weren't in the, quote, marketplace of going out to vote that would be open to voting, where they just know that there are better options out there. And I think that's the other thing, too. It's not just that we're a third option, another option, we're truly a better option. And that speaks volumes. So talk to us maj, right? Like everything you're speaking sounds great. How do we create, you know, what, 50 different modules across 50 Different states here in the United States to help actually get some grassroot activism into our black communities more effectively,

Maj Toure  10:49  
if we if we if we continue to fundraise. And we let's say if we raised because I want to do to continue to do to work with Black Lives Matter. And libertarianism and liberty, these conversations, maybe if people don't even want to be in the party if they're independent, but they started matriculating toward Liberty ideology, right. If we can continue to fundraise and get this done, there's no reason why we can't do Liberty based events. You know, as we're doing black guns matter events, as we're teaching about firearm safety, so forth and so on. There's no reason we can't have a kick back a meet and greet in the same day, or the same evening, and really, really have these bigger discussions with deliberately, you know, Libertarians across the country, even if it's a small, you know, county party in whatever major city that I'm going to, it's like, Hey, y'all, after you finished the training, come learn about this if you want to, and I think that's the way and then it won't have to be 50 managers, it will be 100, or 200, of insert whatever person that can take a little bit of the tidbits and points from JJ, and they're actively in that community and continue to expand on it, really, we have to recreate Fight Club. This needs to be, you know, like them, their franchise and all of these spaces. I'm willing to continue to do the work. But we got to hit that number, we have a very, very big fundraising goal for us to hit in order to keep doing these classes for free. And it's very important. So if we can get that done, I'm gonna roll that right up into the conversation with the gun thing, because it's symbiotic. Talk to us about

Brian Nichols  12:17  
you what you're mentioning here. Obviously, black guns matter is the the main focus project you've been spending a lot of your time on, but also mentioning bringing some Liberty based into the outreach. But let's talk about black guns matter specifically, what you've been doing the outreach that you've been specifically having as you're going out to black communities, and focusing on not just guns, right, but specifically, black Americans now being able to defend themselves.

Maj Toure  12:42  
Yeah, we start highlighting how gun control literally, because everybody tosses this word racist out real loose right now. But, you know, gun control was literally started to stop black people from having the human right to defend themselves. And just because they changed the veneer of it doesn't mean that the outcome isn't still the same. Black and brown people are disproportionately impacted by firearms charges. And I'm not talking about guys that shoot somebody or rob somebody with a gun. I'm talking about possession of a firearm, you know, and things like that. So our classes, we do free classes around the country, firearm safety, conflict resolution, some history, the Second Amendment, some history about the racist roots of gun control, so forth. And so when we do that in the classroom, and then some most of the classes we take people to the rain, so forth, and so on, to get them participating in the Second Amendment. The reason why I say that symbiotic And damn, they're necessary to merge that with the liberty movement. Because once you start talking about the Second Amendment, you're talking about the Bill of Rights, you're talking about the Constitution, you're talking about the framers who want it limited government, by all intents and purposes, before libertarianism existed. These guys were libertarians, you know, and so saying all of this to say, this is a part of why we do this outreach. And the reason why we do it more specifically in black communities. It's not that we're trying to be tongue in cheek or disrespectful to other ethnic backgrounds of Americans, we just have to go where the disease is the most prominent, and the disease of gun control the disease of making sure that the liberty movement is not in. It's not flourishing, they concentrate specifically on high populated cities, Chicago, Detroit, Philadelphia, New York, Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston, all of those little rock. The cities were in that just ironically, this also happens to be areas that are highly populated by black folk. Yep. So we got to go to these places, that it's more difficult where anti freedom and anti Liberty guys have a stranglehold on the conversation. You know, the fact that most of the people that I talked to when I heard about libertarianism, agree with it, and then right after that go, yo, how come I never heard of this. That speaks to the PR greatness of our opposition? Yep, speaks to and it shows us again, price is an opportunity. It's a crisis, but it gives us an opportunity, we know where we can go to fix it. So that's what we did with black guns matter. For years, we had a stated goal of making the black community be the largest gun buying demographic in America. We did that three years ago, within three years with less than $300,000. To keep these classes free, there's absolutely no reason that we can't do the same thing with the libertarian movement and merge those communities. Right. So that's what we've done. We are to be quite honest, we are at a risk, and we need everybody's help with his fundraising, the flights that stand in the hotels, the handouts to all this stuff costs money. If you guys are seeing us and you're liking what we're doing, I want to expand on this, I want to continue to do the gun stuff, the conflict resolution stuff, but we got to get the hood on board with the libertarian stuff, too. So if everybody can donate, we got like, $200,000 to raise by January, you know, that was our cutoff date that we gave ourselves. Because if the people don't want it, I have to respect the Liberty cut both ways. If the people don't want it, I'm not gonna force it on. You know, that's like somebody asked me one time, if you could wave a wand and make it mandatory that everyone had to have a gun? Like, no, I wouldn't do that. I would just rather educate people. And they go, Yeah, I want to do this, you know. And so this is the same thing, if we can get these numbers, there's no reason that we can't have, you know, few years ago, we did classes, black guns matter classes. And this was through like libertarian, you know, folks, all through leftist colleges, UC Berkeley, like we did, we did these in these spaces. So we can do that again. And there's no reason that we can't do that, and merging liberty movement. But in order to do that we need we absolutely need more resources. So anybody watching this, if you want to support please give some go.com Ford slash solutionary make sure you donate whatever you can, whatever you comfortable with. If some of you guys are really really rich, you know you Bitcoin whales and shit like that. And y'all want me to come work with sharks for the next two years, donate the 200 Grand, if you got that in Bitcoin, if you're, well, it's not a big deal. You can donate it and Bitcoin will still figure it out. But um, we just want everybody we want this to be voluntary. You know, we could probably get a company to say, Hey, give me 400 grand, and I'll work for you. The problem with that is that means I'm literally centralizing the power in the hands of the one or two donors. And this has to stay viable, because I want to work for you guys collectively, you know, not the three or four donors. Now if he got to get to that then cool, but I would prefer the people being my boss, you know, and so, Gibson go.com, forward slash solutionary, guys, we've been good stewards with the resources. And I want to continue to do this work and expand on

Brian Nichols  17:39  
the alternative. And as we go towards the end of the episode here margin, I think this is important for the audience understand as well. The alternative to this kind of sponsorship model, the crowd source model is the sponsorship model, right? And the sponsorship model as you grow and grow and grow, comes with more strings attached. Right. So what we're doing here in the liberty movement, what we're doing at The Brian Nichols Show March is doing over at Black guns matter, you go across the board, Dave Smith, Tom woods, you name your podcaster you name your liberty based entity, we are, by our nature against the state in some way, shape or form, you can be the most milquetoast libertarian in the eyes of the state, you are still a threat. So when push comes to shove, those competing interests are going to be utilized by the state to then try to silence us we're seeing that we've seen that my God for the past, what 1020 years and it's only gotten worse over the past five, especially under the era of Trump. And then you look to where we are right now. Now, we're at a turning point, Elon Musk, taking over Twitter, getting some glimmer of hope. But still, there's been an increase from the government trying to increase the level of censorship. So if you don't want to see your favorite entities like what we're doing here at the program, having conversations with folks like magic requires you to yes go out support not just by watching the show and sharing the show but also supporting with your dollars and that's why frankly, we want to have Marsh on the shows because maj is doing amazing stuff with black guns matter your community outreach, it cannot be understated the value of that. And we talk about this in the show all the time planting seeds the importance of planting seeds. If you aren't going out and planting seeds, you're just expecting the tree to grow overnight, you're going to be reliving a fool's errand. So let's spend more time being effective, being smart going towards folks who are open to a new different way of doing things but also a better way of doing things Mosh final thoughts you have for the audience today.

Maj Toure  19:39  
Be kind to each other guys be kind lead with empathy. Let the other person know that you care, that after empathy go to let's work on the facts. Because facts without empathy, you're going to lose the person and then after we go through empathy and facts, let's get to the solution together. But just you know, that has a basic understanding of being Find, be kind to each other, give where you can support folks doing Liberty work, support folks doing freedom work, support them with your dollars, we vote with our dollars, guys. And so support, you know, The Brian Nichols Show, make sure that you're continuing to make sure that you're sharing as well as Yo, I got a couple extra bucks. You know, it's tight right now for everybody, you know, this, this, this inflation of money printing, it's not like, Austrian economics is a thing, guys. And so like, even though it's tight, you know, I'll cut back on, I won't have that six pack, maybe I'll have one beer this week, I'll find somebody that can donate 20 bucks to, if we all do that, we can stay afloat, you know, and we can not even just stay afloat, we can actually excel. So not only just, you know, to myself, and you know, Brian show and things like that, find Liberty causes local causes, especially to get behind with your dollars. And I don't care what anybody says, Man, if it's a $10 donation of our work at the solutionary center, and our classes, and all that it gives him go.com Ford slash solutionary. If it's a $10 donation, somebody donated $20, and commented, I would love to donate more. But this is all I have right now, that is bigger to me than $1,000. For somebody that's a millionaire, you know what I mean? So, if you're a billionaire, my point is, let's be kind to each other, let's be supportive of our causes. Even if that means we got to, you know, cut back a little bit on our vices, because we have to collectively volunteer, to get ourselves and get our nation out of this situation. And the powers that be are only going to respond to, you know, violence, and money. And if the money is flowing towards Liberty candidates, the views are flowing towards Liberty folks, you know, and things of that nature, quite late, quite naturally, the beast is going to support those things as well because there's a financial interest for them to do it too. So if you can't convince people or the system one way, you can influence it by influencing your choices be unkind, exercising, voluntaryism. And just supporting with your dollar I think is very, very important guys, because that's all under the umbrella of being kind.

Brian Nichols  22:04  
Yes, as I say in stop supporting companies that frankly don't like you that actively go against you, like go support folks who are trying to build something better and frankly, like, hey, when you're going out trying to get your stuff for Christmas presents this year, don't go to Walmart well, maybe as Walmart that that I don't know. Don't go to walk store and get us a t shirt, go to The Brian Nichols Show store, get get your magic money tree shirt, where it is the Fed obviously that's the magic Money Tree Of course, and get your shirts that just use code TBS at checkout, get a discount applied, and also go and please help support amazing Liberty based organizations like black guns matter. We'll include all those links by the way, folks, I know a lot of you listen to this as you're driving working out and stuff so don't worry, if you didn't get a chance to jot that down Show Notes head there. Links will be there. Also, if you're watching us here on the video version of the show. Hello, please do me a favor number one hit that subscribe button and yes, we are here on YouTube on rumble in an odyssey so please pick your choice but also when you do that hit that little notification bell so you don't miss a single time we go live and with that being said tomorrow we have a great episode IFBB Pro from Tiger fitness Mark Loeb liner returned to the program talking about what's next for Magga and now that Trump is running again in 2024. Will Mark Mark be supporting him? We're going to find that out but with that being said Brian Nichols signing off. You're on The Brian Nichols Show for Mosh Tory.

Disembodied Voice of Matt Ultan, Vocal Artist Extraordinaire  23:21  
We'll see you tomorrow, listening to The Brian Nichols Show. Find more episodes at the Brian Nichols show.com

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Maj ToureProfile Photo

Maj Toure

Founder

Maj Toure is a Solutionary Hip Hop artist turned 2nd Amendment activist from North Philly. His following began after he was featured on the cover of the Philadelphia Weekly as “the Prophet of Philadelphia.” He founded the Black Guns Matter movement in 2015 and advocates for 2nd amendment education and information for urban communities. Maj has been featured in the New York Times, Time Magazine, National Public Radio, Fox News, CNN, BET, Essence, and NRA News for his out of the box approach to 2nd amendment advocacy. He’s been awarded by the National Shooting Sports Foundation for his work in inner city communities. Maj is currently on a 50 states tour educating urban Americans on conflict resolution, 2nd amendment rights, and responsibilities.

STORE: https://blackgunsmatter.myshopify.com/