Not that long ago, I came across a story that quoted someone talking about misogyny and machismo in the firearm space. I immediately dismissed the claim, in part because I’ve run across too many similar claims in too many other places that, it turned out, were mostly bogus. Plus, hey, it’s not like I’ve ever seen anything like that.
That is, until I did.
Kerry Sloane is a firearm instructor and someone I consider a friend. She normally keeps her educational content off of X, though, because of what happens when she does share information.
Take this one from a few weeks back. At that time, she was simply answering a question about women who aren’t physically strong enough to pull the slide back on a semi-auto handgun. While revolvers are an option for some women, a lot of them want a semi-auto, and there’s no reason they shouldn’t have one…if they can rack the slide.
So, Kerry offered some help and got this response.
Most instructors teach NOT to ride the slide forward in training because you’ll have a failure to fully seat a round when you need to use it under stress.
Push / pull the slide, letting the spring move it forward with another magazine.@johnlovell275
Paul Harrell RIP pic.twitter.com/m8GHeCHNXJ— Cop Cuffs (@CuffsCop007) June 26, 2025
Now, this is just Kerry moving slowly to illustrate a point, but this is pretty normal.
Then, on Monday, Kerry posted about helping a survivor of sexual assault learn how to shoot and protect herself. It’s just a photograph from what could be any point in the training, but it didn’t stop this from happening:
First just be constructive, it’s good of you to do this. But I believe it practicing with a stance that’s “more athletic, more relaxed” the odds of you getting into a gun fight with perfect posture is slim and you can’t move properly. But good job
— Steve (@sfleming2015) July 14, 2025
Now, this encounter looks benign, but it didn’t take long to get creepy.
So the guy makes ignorant comments about my instruction and then leaves creepy comments like this.
Gross. https://t.co/CIqmIohSpA— Kerry Slone(Stilettos&Shotguns) (@thereal_SnS) July 14, 2025
Now, I get that this guy thought it was very clever of him, but since he then devolves into his friends who were part of the bin Laden raid and other nonsense, I really don’t care.
Of course, these are just some randos on X. It’s easy to dismiss them as just that. In fact, I’m pretty sure I did, because I’ve seen Kerry deal with this before, and while I’ve pretty much always believed these guys were out of line, it never really clicked that this was an issue.
So, I reached out to another friend.
Kat Ainsworth is another gun writer who has been in this game much longer than I have, though she’s also a pretty good outdoor writer, too. )Yes, there’s a difference.) She’s been around and done a lot of stuff. I figured if anyone would know, she’d know, so I asked.
The answer was, yeah, she has most definitely experienced misogyny.
One could try to dismiss Kerry’s experiences as just someone not able to take criticism–even though none of these people have any credentials of their own, of course–but Kat’s experiences suggest that this is something bigger.
Of course, Kat isn’t saying everyone’s like this.
“Before getting into this, I will say that this doesn’t apply to all–or even most–men in the firearms industry,” she started. “There are a lot of great guys in the industry, and the industry at large is fantastic.”
But…
“It’s true that there’s a problem with misogyny and harassment.”
Kat then goes on to describe a situation I recall her talking about at least once before.
On an early media trip years ago, my introduction to one editor was his patting my butt. A couple years after that, a gun maker rep who was present on a media trip became increasingly aggressive until he said he’d “take me to bed and teach me a lesson.” There was a witness, and this rep had been an issue the entire trip. It was reported to the manufacturer, and though the company acted apalled, in the end it was me who was cut from trips with them. That was a bit of a lesson in keeping your mouth shut, which isn’t the environment we should be encouraging.
No, it’s really not.
Of course, that’s a gun company. Again, it would be easy to dismiss this as some kind of isolated incident.
Yet Kat has also run into issues that ultimately cause career problems for her and other women in the industry. “A number of editors on the hunting side of the industry refuse or at least heavily avoid working with female writers,” she recalls. “Hunting is left as the purview of men, and that hasn’t changed or improved over the years. These editors may be happy to take a woman’s work if it isn’t about hunting directly–recipes, gear roundups, even gun reviews–but when it comes to hunting, the attitude tends to be that it’s for men. It’s unfortunate, and it makes the hunting side of the gun industry incredibly difficult for female writers.”
Kat’s careful to note that it’s not all editors by any stretch, but how many does it actually take?
Then, as if echoing Kerry’s experiences, Kat said, “Even if you’re established in the industry as someone knowledgeable, you’ll run into men who speak to you as though you don’t know which way a gun points.”
How bad is it? “Once I fumbled my gun belt, not because I’m incapable of putting it on, but because these things happen. A man I’d never met before who was standing nearby took it out of my hands and proceeded to put it on me.”
OK, I just have to ask, who the hell does this?
I mean, I might ask if everything’s OK or if she needs a little help or something–I’d like to think I’d ask the same if a guy had the same problem, for the record–but there’s no way I’d just take someone’s gun belt and put it on them. That’s just…ewwww.
But Kat brought up something different that we probably need to discuss, too. See, the problems aren’t just men.
Something needs to be said about female misogynists as well. When we throw out the word misogyny, people assume it’s men treating women badly. In reality, there’s a more widespread problem of female misogynists in the gun world. Women in positions of some degree of power who will only work with men, or women who only work with the “rah rah sisterhood” women who are part of a rather specific clique within the industry. Gender shouldn’t be the issue, it should be about knowledge, skill, and ethics.
Yeah, that’s a problem, too.
Look, I don’t think this is going to solve anything. Not right here and not right now. Especially as I suspect most of you aren’t part of the problem. It’s only a small group of people who look at things this way, and the truth is that even many of those guilty of this behavior don’t think they’re part of the problem. They see themselves as just trying to help, which is probably worse in some ways.
But the problem is real, and when women are such a massive part of the population and a particularly vulnerable part of that population, we should be doing everything we can to encourage them to be a part of the gun community.
This stuff that I’ve highlighted, which is far from exhaustive? That’s a problem and it needs to be addressed in the right way.
Sure, not every woman has these experiences, but there’s a reason for that.
“And before you throw names like Julie Golob or Lena Miculek out, remember those women are the exception to the rule and benefit from publicists and a not insignificant level of fame,” Kat argues. “Women shouldn’t need a national platform and fame to be respected. It should be about knowledge.”
She’s right. And the fact that most of us know to be terrified of Lena Miculek’s dad probably doesn’t hurt her experiences, either, though again, that shouldn’t matter.
We need to do better. All of us.
It’s not just about not behaving badly toward women in the gun space, either. We need to call out those who do, and do it publicly.
Even if you don’t actually care about women’s safety because you’re a terrible person, at least consider the fact that anti-gun lawmakers depend on women to support them in order to stay in office. Helping make these women pro-gun means fewer threats to your right to keep and bear arms.
Just something to consider.
Editor’s Note: The radical left will stop at nothing to enact their radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
Help us continue to report on and expose the Democrats’ gun control policies and schemes. Join Bearing Arms VIP and use promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your VIP membership.
Read the full article here
