EP. 166: The Value of Mentorship, THC's First Regional Chapter, and Hunters of Color Co-Founders on Achieving Real and Lasting Diversity in Hunting

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:12):
I guess I grew up on a row. Hey everybody,
welcome to another episode of Hunting Collective. I'm been O'Brien
and I'm here with Phil the engine near Philip. How
are you. I'm doing I'm doing very well. Thank you Ben,
Thank you Phil. Yeah, there's thank you. There's there's a
thaw happening in Bozeman right now. It's very warm. I know, dude.

(00:36):
I just stepped outside. Because I spent a lot of
my days on zoom and then talking into a microphone.
I stepped outside and it is very nice. I was
walking next in a T shirt and just like a
week ago, it was like degrees below zero. What's happened?
I'm not even wearing pants right now. It's that warm.
It's a heat wave. Hey. Here's the thing I just
wanted to give, like a quick uh story from the weekend.

(00:58):
I took my son ice for you know, my son
is four, and we went to the local pond. I
used the Lake Pond, small body of water where we
catch a lot of pan fish. We go there all
the time. It's fun. We went there and when we
got there, we I drilled three holes into the ice fill.
Have you ever drilled a hole in the ice. Have
you have been ice fishing? I have been ice fishing.

(01:19):
I have not done the drilling myself. Ah, well, I
I went to Yeah you would. You're a very famous
ice fisherman from the Mediator podcast. My first fish was
caught on tape. You can leave you can listen to
me catching it. Yes, yeah, it'll be similar to the
first turkey. We're gonna catch that on tape to guarantee
that guaranteed, it's a guarantee. Um. But we went fishing.

(01:42):
We did. My plan was to drill one hole and
fish on that whole because we didn't have a long
to fish. Well, I drilled the first hole, we start fishing.
My son accidentally dropped some of the maggots into the hole,
and some of the you know, some of the filling
for like the maggot container goes into the hole. So
I'm like, I'm gonna cover that hall. It just kicks
with snow and then I'm like, hey, let's go drill

(02:02):
a couple holes over here. We had too. We went
about i'd say about eight to ten feet across the ice,
drill two more holes, put put our poles in there,
dropped the line down to the bottom, cranked it up
a few reels, and then it's like, cranked up a
few really reeled a couple of times and started doing
our fishing. And it wasn't maybe fifteen minutes. He gets

(02:25):
so excited. He had just eating a bunch of trail mix.
And when he eats trail mix, he just eats the eminem's.
He doesn't even eat anything, he just eats the eminem
So it's a bag of him. And stopped buying the
trail mix that has any candy in it, even even
the raisins are are sometimes too much for my kids.
They just will only eat the raisins and the banana
chips or whatever. Yeah. So yeah, when when I buy him,
he's like, can I get some trail mix? I'm like, no,

(02:46):
can you get a bag of M and m's with
some some stuff to sort through to get to the
M and m's. At least he has to work for it. Anyway.
He ates, he eats a bunch of eminem's, it gets
all excitable, a little sugar rush. He starts grabbing all
the rods, reeling them in, putting them back the hole.
It just becomes chaos. So I decided at this point,
like it's probably let's just let's just cash this one in.
It's not gonna it's not gonna go well. His attitude

(03:08):
is not shaping up to be great. Other times he
spent hours out there with me staring at a hole.
Doesn't care. This time, I think it was just the
right amount of sugar and the attention span failures, and
I at this point I decided I'm gonna wrap it up.
I turned around to pick up our chair to load
it into the sled, and I look and he has.
He falls directly into the first hole, full leg all

(03:32):
the way up to the hip into that hole. And
now I do you yank him out of there, like
I've just called the biggest fish amount of life. Yank
him out of there, and I run him immediately up
to the truck, which isn't that far away, It's only
five hundred yards away, up a little hill. I get
him into the truck. I get his jacket off, his
get his pants off, I get his underwear off, I
get his wet socc has, wet boot off. It's all chaotic.

(03:55):
He's crying. I'm trying to see if he's injured in
any way. And then I put all I had. I
didn't have like an extra pair of pants form. All
I had was like my knee high first light socks,
which I put on them and they went all the
way up to his his crotchel regions. So he had
pants socks, which he loved, and he started to laugh
hysterically at the fact that my socks immediately became pants

(04:18):
to him. So I put the seat warmer on my truck,
I turned the heat on. I wrapped him up in
my jacket and we were safe. But Phil, I just
tell that as a cautionary tale. Don't buy trail mix
if the kids only gonna eat the M and m'sh.
He was safe, He's fine. Don't be worried. But it's

(04:40):
just like when you have a young child. These are
the things that happened. You can't just go out in
the outdoors without without expecting something like this to happen. Yeah,
I maybe maybe I'm a bad dad. I I when
you have a kid, I feel like you have like
a reset button you on on, like on your entire life,
and you have to be like, well, okay, we've got

(05:01):
about like five or six years before we can actually
start living normal. Lives again. Yes, and so even just
like the thought of taking a four year old ice
fishing is just horrifying to me. It sounds like a
bad time. Um. But honestly, I think you're heroic for
doing it. I think it's a good thing. I'm just
either too lazy or too negligent to have bring my
children to have a fun outdoor experience. Yeah, I mean

(05:24):
it is. And now you know, you when you have
you have two kids, I have two kids. Uh, when
you have when you get to that age with an
older child, then you have a younger one than it's
like cascading limiting and more limiting and more limited. But
I had talked to Rannella one time about this where
you like, you get your kids get to a certain
age where it just opens up to this beautiful experience

(05:45):
where they can now at least do things that you
want to do at the level you want to do them,
and you're not kind of ratcheting down the outdoor experience
for your children. Um. But I try to celebrate the process.
So I I think ice fishing, at least for my
little guy, is a good way to keep him focused.
And he's only ever called one fish. But that fish

(06:05):
was like we won the super Bowl. Actually it was
the day before the Super Bowl. I think I can't remember,
but it was something. The celebration was just about, like
Tom Brady when he won that Super Bowl and me
like when I won my gambling bets when I bet
on Tom Brady. It's all very similar celebrations. So he's
learning man, he's learning patients, he's learning risk and reward
apparently when it comes to ice fishing. So I just

(06:27):
want to put that out there at risk being called
a bad dad. Uh, you know, make sure you alert
your children over and over and over where each hole
is that you freshly drilled into the ice. Just make
sure you do that. So moving on, we got a
lot of sundry things to get to Phil, We've got
a lot of updates to do. Um, I got a
lot of emails, and then we're gonna get to the

(06:49):
folks from Hunters of Color on Instagram, Hunters of Color
dot com soon to be dot org. Jimmy and Lydia
are joining us from Oregon, and we're gonna talk about
their mission to bring more Hunters of Color into the fold.
We'll talk about that before we get to it, but
we got a lot of emails. As always, thank you
everyone for filling the THHC inbox with pure joy. Um Josh,

(07:14):
are freaking email? Or Josh, We're not telling Abody's last
names anymore, Josh e he said, Dear sweet Benjamin and Philip, Ben,
I went for breakfast the other morning at my favorite
breakfast joint in Minnesota, and I swore I saw you.
There's a man with your face, facial hair and even
wearing a hunting hat roaming around in Minnesota. I nearly

(07:35):
poot my pants until I thought it's winter and Ben
lives in Montana. Here's hoping post end of times. Of
course I can run into you one day and genuinely
shake your hand. Give phil my best, Josh. I. I
read this only to say this is like the fifth
or sixth email I've gotten, and all of them are
in Minnesota, and all of them are claiming to have

(07:56):
seen me in Minnesota. So whoever the hell? This is
Prance in a round Minnesota doing Ben O'Brien stuff with
my face, dressing like a turkey. Yeah, wandering through the woods,
wanted for the woods. Stop it, stop it or keep
doing it? I don't know. Whatever, whatever floats your boat.
But if if anybody knows a person in Minnesota specifically,

(08:21):
and Josh, you can right back in and tell us,
like exactly where you were when you saw this person.
We need to we need to figure out who this
is and we need to stop them from just walking
around with my face and doing stuff. Okay, Phil, you
knowing that just a quick check in there. Yeah, I
mean it's I would say, pretty much anywhere in America
you can see like a white guy with the beard

(08:44):
like a hunting hat and be like, oh, that's been O'Brien,
there he is. Uh, you know, you could do that,
You could do it. Yeah, it could be true. But
there's some dude in Minnesota who specifically walks around in
a place where some people that listen to this podcast
hang out. Because that is not the first time that
I received that alert, and no I have no, I
haven't been to Minnesota in some time. I'm trying to

(09:04):
think it's been a while. So this guy is an
impostor don't let him, you know, don't let him fool you,
even if he's a nice guy. Don't let him fool you. Ah,
next one, this is something that is really sad. Now,
you will remember, I don't know, a couple of weeks ago,
we were talking about that we might have Phil's first
hunt for turkeys near Kalispell. It's possible. We've been looking

(09:26):
into some things, and we've been even working with some
of the local folks at the n w TF to
to find some places where we can hunt that they
have also done some critical habitat work on. But we
got an email last week from a guy saying there
was a beau Jangles Famous Chicken and Biscuits in Kalispell,
so we could eat there, just like Eric Hall does

(09:49):
every morning before he goes turkey on. So it would
be in fron of seremony every morning ceremonial. We you
have the ceremonial Eric Hall meal. But it turns out
not Nay, it's a fraud. Uh. Joseph P writes an
emergent hunter, a longtime listener, first time emailer. It is
with great sadness, but I would like to inform you
that the bow Jangles restaurant and Kalispell is a diner

(10:11):
and not the renowned bow Jangles famous chicken and biscuits.
I live in the Flathead for almost a decade, and
I too was almost tricked by their name thievery as
a born and raised Southerner with an affinity for all
things fried chicken and biscuits, especially Bojangles. I never set
foot in this impost on principle alone. It could be
the best diner in the world, but I'll never know.

(10:33):
He goes on. But that is the meat of it.
So I I actually I discovered this for myself. Um,
I didn't. I didn't tell you about it. I was
gonna wait to bring it up. I don't know, because
I I served because I was like, well, I've never
even I've never even heard of boj Angles, like the chain. Yeah,
So I looked it up just to see what kind
of fair they serve. And then I went to go
see where the one in Coalispell is and I saw you.

(10:55):
You know, they're just an independent, standalone diner. But on
a sleep, I mean, the decor inside looks fun. I'd
be willing to give it a shot. Well, Phil, I mean,
it's up to you. It's your hunt. I'm not gonna
force anything upon you, but I feel like it would
be blasphemous in the name of Eric Hall for us
to go in there and eat whatever chicken they got

(11:15):
in that place. It's really maybe maybe we can get
Eric called to ship us some bow j Angles for
the hunt. Specifically, he's gonna have to overnight it all
at his expense, but maybe he'll do by the time
it comes here that we'll have some stale biscuits with
some rubbery gravy and so in, some some rotten chicken.

(11:36):
But how to be perfect for our hunt. That's exactly
what I'm looking for in terms of pre hunt prep
for your first ever four into the woods. Um, I
don't know. I just wanted to update people in that
that's a big letdown for us, big letdown, but we
are looking forward to Phil's first hunt. We get a
lot planned for that. It's a sticker stick around, as
I know you will. Here's the next update. I got

(11:57):
an email from James A. James A H. He said,
Ben and Phil, Phil and Ben. I am writing in
regard to episode one six and the gentleman looking for
help starting getting into hunting. I'm no expert, but I
certainly know a thing or two and would love to help.
The Blue Ridge Mountains cover quite a stretch of territory
in the state, and I'm not sure how close he

(12:19):
actually is to me, but I'm willing to help ask
me any questions you need. Now that why this is
important is there's a logo underneath this writing, and the
logo is that of the Virginia d w R Department
of Wildlife Resources. So at first when I saw that logo,
I thought, don't know, the cops got us. They got
us because James is a conservation police officer in the

(12:41):
state of Virginia. So we have we have we have.
Not only do we have James offering help, and he's
a qualified help at that it's a conservation po, but
we have guys like Matt John. I mean, I can
I can list off the We had about a dozen
hunters in Virginia and North Carolina off her to take
our new hunter who we didn't name last week, who

(13:03):
is an emergent. It was a formerly I guess an
anti hunter then became a non hunter. Now he's trying
to be a hunter. And we had at least a
dozen people right in and offered to take him out.
So we will keep you updated on that, but I
just wanted to let everybody know we got it that covered,
and I thank you very much for for helping with that. Now,
the probably the most prominent hundred to offer his help

(13:27):
was that of Eric Hall. So Eric Hall sent us
a litle message filler and played for you right now. Yeah,
the guy they's a mentor. I'm in Blue Ridge Mountains.
I'm not Forginia, but I'm close one county away. I'm
on the Age of Wills right Alleghany County, which he
is one county away from Virginia. But this depends on

(13:49):
worries that Virginia is the Blue Ridge Mountains or alive
right foot and so they're alone. They're a pretty pretty
good mountain, right, So I find out where's that, I
might be a man, Jorian be glad to do it.
So that's air call offering to take over the Blue

(14:10):
Ridge with our new immersion hunters. So maybe we got
some sort of chapter of the Hunting Collective, some sort
of regional chapter of the Hunting Collective forming in the
Blue Ridge Mountains, the regional chapter of the cult. Phil
you feeling that maybe we start regional chapters here. If
we're gonna have a cult, we might as well disperse
and collect people you know where they live. Yeah, so
we'll just have you know, have like American Legion halls

(14:33):
scattered across the country, um full maybe the meeting place. Yeah,
they'll be unmarked, abandoned buildings, but there'll be a graffiti
of the of the White Claw logo. That's how. That's
how you know that. It's that it's a chapter of
the th YEA perfect So if anybody wants to start
a regional chapter, it looks like we pretty much already
have it in Virginia if we connect all these people,

(14:55):
and of course air call to lead them is perfect.
So before we get to the next thing, we had
a lot to say about this. You know, possible regional
chapter of the t HD is called Jonathan F. Wrote
us in. He said, listening to the beginning of one
sixty five and the gentleman who moved to my neck
of the woods and felt compelled to reach out. I'm
a fairly new hunter, so I share some sentiments, though

(15:17):
I never once detested hunting, just bad hunters, which here
in Virginia we have quite a few, but not me.
I'm young, understanding and of access to both my own
families property, as well as I know the area. Dear Turkey,
upland games, small game and amazing trout streams are all
moments away from myself as well as this gentleman. My

(15:37):
property is a place I take new hunters often and
would love to add another to the group. It's a
great quiet place to learn without fear of other hunters interfering.
And he gave his numbers, so there's a lot of
examples of stuff like that. So thank you to everybody
Jonathan included who reached out. And I think we might
be onto something, Phil, we might have ourselves regional chapter
number one of the th H cult. All right to

(16:03):
move on to something very similar to that. We got
an email from Andy t. He has something pretty cool.
I want to just tell you about a little public
service announcement. He said, I'm almost caught up on the
podcast after binger Seving episodes while touring around North Carolina
for work out here we are chasing bushy jails and
chomping at the bit for Turkey season. That's that's true.
That's true. He thanks us for what we do, and

(16:24):
he also says I have to give you guys a
shout out for addressing the adult onset hunter term and
finding Eric's emergent hunter a good friend and I started
a side project we're calling Opportunity Outdoors to grow conservation
through mentorship. We ended up having an awesome season taking
emergent hunters out on different hunts and coaching them towards success.

(16:45):
I heard the request for mentorship again on the show today,
and I was reminded of my intent to write you
guys for some time. So if you want to learn more,
anybody wants to learn more North Carolina, Virginia. But anybody
wants to learn more, look up at Opportunity Outdoors and
you can find more about that. And I'm glad that
people like Andy t are out there doing it because

(17:07):
we need more people like them. And this is the
year the new hunter, Philip, so we got to embrace him,
right Yeah, are you're feeling warm and fuzzy over there?
I mean as as one of these these new hunters,
these emergent hunters, the former onset adult hunter. Um, you know,
I'm right there, I'm I'm right there with everyone. Well,

(17:30):
a kindred spirit, yeah, exact kindred spirit. I'm there well.
And he said he has a North Carolina Turkey camp
and he has some he also has some people in
Virginia who want to be mentors and need mentees. So
if you're out there, go look him up and you
can be that. And uh, maybe we have one guy
who needs to hunt in Virginia. And that guy has

(17:51):
probably more hunting opportunities than me and you in Montana.
He's now he's now full on ready to go. So yeah,
if you're out there and you're emailed in about this,
I am going to connect you to this emergent hunter
in Virginia in the Blue Ridge Mountains we listed we
heard about last episode. So stick and stay and thank
you for for the THHC cult and uh for coming
through for this guy and for all of us. It

(18:11):
means a lot and we absolutely positively appreciate it. So, Phil,
I know we had we had talked about having Kayla
Ray on this week, but she was a little bit busy.
She had to do some stuff. She's on the road,
she's in Texas, the weather is not great. Things have happened,
so we're gonna have her on next week. But to
titillate everyone who took part in the th h C

(18:35):
theme song contest, it's not really a contest. It's more
like an art project that we're all taking part in.
I want to Phil can I share with you another
entry that I really liked? I would love to hear it.
I promise I won't sing it. It's more more. It
kind of feels like a rap song if I'm being honest,
Which is okay? Is this? Kayla Ray is going to

(18:57):
turn it into her own musical accompaniment. But she's gonna
be on next week. We set up a time with her.
We got that locked in, so she's gonna bring your
guitar and next week we'll have lyrics ready. But but Phil,
are you ready for Ryan s and his little his
little ditty about t a c Ready, let's hear it,
let's hear it. Okay, here's some news for the out

(19:17):
from the outdoor life. The cold is back, so work,
sharpen your knife better. Brian talks honey ethics with you.
Phill the engineer might shoot a turkey too. Our topics
for the show will challenge your brain, so write to
our inbox and make it rain. Talk about your hunts,
hikes and recent quarries. But remember Phil said, no more
ship stories. We aim for success and learn from our blunders.

(19:38):
Suited for both veteran an emergent hunters Broadcasting from our
studio in Montana, maybe from El Camp or while rabbit
hunting in Louisiana, you'll find asked the Eagle and Eric Hall,
So make a salty vegan and crack a white claw.
Where facts are facts and opinions are subjective. You're listening
to the hunting collective boom in your face. Be my

(19:59):
hype man, Phil, do something to excite the people about this.
I'll play I'll play one of those those those air
horn sounds. Please before and after that little that little ditty,
Ryan s He said at the end, he said, Cult
member number nine four. I didn't know we were giving
out numbers. Oh did she tell you that I was

(20:19):
doing that. I've been sending I've been sending membership cards people.
All right, that's fine, welcome Cult number Ryan s Uh.
So next week we're gonna get into it. Man, I'm excited.
We got all kinds of good stuff. The crack open
next week and singing his songs. Um. But now we
have to get to the topic at hand, Phil, And

(20:41):
the topic at hand is what we talked about it already,
hunters of color, uh and kind of the really the
demographics of the hunting community, and this is something that,
Phil would you agree that. I think everybody comes into
already a little bit charged. You've already had your own
way of seeing this issue. The issue of diversity in

(21:03):
the outdoors, diversity in our society hackles up no matter
which no matter which side you you you know, sides
you fall on. Yeah, and I was, yeah, I was
telling you before we hit record that you asked me
how this went, and I said it was beautiful in
that it is also very bland. It is not there

(21:25):
is not any contentious nature to it. Jimmy and Lydia
from Hunters of Color have an awesome story. They're wonderful people.
They just are looking for empathy and understanding of the
position that they are in and other Hunters of Color
are in. They understand the facts about the demographics, and
they want to do something about it. This is not
a conversation about social engineering. It is a conversation about

(21:45):
what we can actually do to fix what is a
very objective issue within our space. There's no grandstanding, um,
there's no pushing people to believe what you believe. It
is a very objective. Hey, look here's a problem. Here
are the numbers which will year about coming up and
here as how these two people want to address this
issue in our space. And so you know, if we

(22:07):
wanted to be a bombastic podcast that pissed everybody off
and got a much controversy, this I don't think this
one is it. Although there'll be a lot of people
that call us woke and get mad at us just
for doing this, as it seems to be common. But
this is a conversation with where two good people are
trying to make a difference and they're and they're not
just talking about they're actually doing it. So that's how

(22:30):
I see it. I don't see a whole lot, you know,
to disagree with here. That very much goes to hundreds
of colors and organization that's young, but it also goes
to the year of the new Hunter, having mentors and
understanding that it's kind of one step at a time
towards the diversity I think anybody objectively should want for

(22:50):
the outdoors, because that diversity means more people doing what
we love to do and supporting us and touting us
and and coming to this thing. You'll hear, of course,
my analogy about I want to have a town with
with more diversity. As I walked down the streets. I
want to see any collectic group of people doing what
I do, Unlike that dude to Minnesota. I don't want
everybody to look like me, because that's not interesting, that's boring.

(23:11):
And so that's how I believe we can shape this
this conversation with Jimmy and Lydia. They are awesome people
and we're going to continue to work with them because
I think they have a really good handle on on
what we're doing here. So feel any thoughts. I know
this is something that you like to do. Want you
know this, this kind of conversation is something that UM

(23:32):
You've seen is very very good and very valuable in
the past. Yeah, I mean it's it's it's just very easy,
and not even just with the topic of of UM
minorities in in the hunting space, but literally anything in
your life. It's much easier to turn a blind eye
to something that doesn't directly affect you, pretend it doesn't exist.

(23:53):
But this absolutely does affect you. And and I think
it's really important to think about the people whom it
does affect directly and just and just here their perspective
and their point of view and just be a little
bit open to empathy and think about what steps small
or large you can take in your life to keep

(24:16):
hunting and the outdoors thriving and uh welcoming place for everyone. Now,
I will say, look, this is a These topics can
be fraught, um, but they can also be relatively simple
as as the way we approach them. That's the way
I look at them, and I look at this is
a very easy equation to to suss out you know

(24:37):
here that in detail here in a minute, but it's
a very easy equation to look at we objectively have, um,
I a dominant percentage of the hunting culture that is
one skin color and one gender. Really too, Um, that's
not I'm not blaming that on anybody. I'm not asking
anybody feel bad about that. I feel sorry for that,

(24:58):
but I'm asking an open ear for change. And and and
Lydia and Jimmy are asking you for empathy to their situation.
And we you'll hear in a minute some micro and
macro examples of how this looks on a broad statistical level,
how it has become what it is now, and then
on a in a very personal level, how it impacts

(25:20):
people who are both mentors and mentees veteran hunters and
new hunters how this personally impacts hunters of color out
there in the world. And so we'll we'll get into it,
will delve into it. Everybody will come in, hopefully with
all their baggage sluffed off, and listen very closely the
words that Jimmy and Lydia have to say, and we'll

(25:40):
take it from there. With this conversation which will not stop.
We will continue it when we can pick it up
in a constructive way. So please enjoy Hunters of Color Founders,
Jimmy and Lyddy. Jimmy and Lydia, how's it going good?

(26:03):
Are you? Ben? Couldn't be better? We were just talking
about whether differences. It's cold and sunny here, and you
guys are telling me you're in Oregon. What's going on? Probably?
Can I guess that it's raining? I guess it's a
constant drizzle here and the william A Valley of Oregon. Oh,
it's a beautiful place. I have some friends that are
from near there. Um, what is the first question I

(26:26):
have for you? Among many things? What is your what's
the hunting season look like? Yes, turkey hunters, bear hunters like,
how do you how does it lying out for you
at current time? So I'm the resident hunter here. Um
Lydia is going to be my mentee for this year.
Um and right now I'm waiting on my spring bear

(26:49):
hunt results to come up. Uh, they should be available
in two days and then our springs turkey season starts
up in April. Um So waiting on a bear tag
and uh turkey tag me too, me too? Similar? Uh

(27:09):
Solidia never hunted hunt curious Jimmy's making you do it?
Tell us the truth here. So yeah, basically a little
bit of everything. Um. I grew up fishing and camping,
and I grew up in the state of Oregon, so
we're everything's outdoors everything um So, very comfortable outside, done

(27:30):
everything but hunting basically. Um and I grew up in
a hunting family, so I was kind of the odd
one out as far as the rest of my family goes.
And then when Jimmy started up this um jewel, Jimmy
and I started up Hundreds of Color. Jimmy his whole
platform wanted to be a mentorship program. And we were

(27:52):
talking to Chad Brown out of Portland here on Seoul River, Inc.
And Love is King freed to Rome, and he brought
up the idea that we have to have a proof
of concept, and so Jimmy said, Hey, Lydia, why don't
you be our proof of concept? I will mentor you
because if I were to go out right now and
and try to go turkey hunting, I wouldn't have the

(28:13):
first idea even how to buy a tag or a
license or do wear camo like I don't I don't
you know what I mean about to paint my face camo? Um. Yeah,
so that's basically how we got into it. I'm really excited.
That's awesome. Yeah, we have our engineer and my co host,
as it were, our beloved filled the engineer on this show.
He is going to take his first turkey hunt with
me in May. So we have been working through he

(28:37):
took his hunter's safety last fall and then we've been
working through gun safety and we're gonna get in the
soon as it warms up here. We'll be out on
public lands shooting shotguns, learning about how they were and stuff.
Where are you guys at in that process? Have you
have you done the prewhere because the hunter safety and
all that kind of stuff. Yeah? So, um, one of
our first dates so Leady and I are a couple.

(29:00):
One of our first dates totally out shooting. It's kind
of like my my test for her to see how
she handled a gun and she knew how to where
to point it, where to to leave the chamber unloaded
all the time. And um, so I knew that she
had safety um background, and so we kind of just

(29:23):
refined those those skills that she had. And I think
the next step is just for her to get herself
mentally prepared to uh to take a life and procure meat.
So I already do archery too, so that's definitely on
the table. Um. I know that it would be easier
with gun, but it's definitely on the table too to

(29:47):
go archery. Turkey hunting, Yeah, is there anything that you've
worked through thus far? I mean, obviously, sometimes the killing
of the animals is either the first thing you think
about and the last thing you do. Uh and hunting,
and have you thought through that yet? Have you guys
talked about how to prepare for that moment? So there's
a reason that we're starting with turkeys. Um, I think

(30:10):
I know the reason. So I've I mean, I've I've
fished my entire life and I know how to kill fish.
I'm really good at it, and I have no problem
with it. Um, And I also understand the value of
living beings and respecting life, all lives, and uh, turkeys
for some reason, maybe because they're not fluffy and cute

(30:31):
like Bamby, it's easier for me to do that, to
transition that way, and hopefully I can get up to
the bigger game at some point. But that's probably what
you're going to guess, huh exactly. Yeah, you're not alone.
I think that is a I'm not sure. I think
it's the looks thing. I think you'll you know, when
you get out in the fields, you'll find a certain
respect for him, spending a lot of time trying to

(30:52):
get them close to you. But that is a very
common thought that turkeys is the easiest because they're just
they don't have those Joey, I was looking at you.
They're just man, they're you know, they're beautiful in some
ways and not so much in others. So I under
totally understand. Um, is this is that going to be
the first hunt of you guys talked about exactly what

(31:14):
the first thought is gonna be. Yeah, So I have
um a couple of properties here that have like a
resident block or heard of turkey of a few hundreds strong.
Um And last year when I went out, it took
me five minutes after setting up the blind to get
one with my bow. Um. So I'm hoping that, um

(31:38):
it's as easy or not as easy, but I'm hoping
that Lydia find success in a short period of time,
whereas I mean, it took me a few years to
even bag my first turkey. So yeah, yeah, that's the
in that like the thing that you're trying to weigh, right,

(31:58):
how quickly do you want to find success because some
of that hardships would make that makes that success feel good.
So in Philly Engineer's case, I'm gonna take him out
like seven days to where there's no turkeys at all.
We're gonna hike out to like sheep territory and he's
going to be confused, but it's for his own good. Yeah,
I'm I'm laying towards that too. Maybe we'll go hike

(32:18):
and along the beach or something like that and then uh,
then we'll drive back to Corvallis. And yeah, I mean
everything for you guys is a date. So it's you know,
it's just time together until until time to pull the trigger.
It's true, it might be a little bit more romantic
than you and Phil's outing. Well, we're pretty close. Uh.

(32:39):
He knows that he actually helped us get this together.
He's in the background, just doing the tech work. Um.
So we got a lot to talk about. It's it's
good for people to get to know you. So, Jimmy,
since I feel like I don't know if you call
yourself the original founder, if you guys are both co
founders of Hunters of Color, but give us a you know,
how that came about. We kind of got a little
bit of any cling of where where that came from,

(33:01):
but how that came about and and why you feel
it needed to come about. Um. Well, so I let's
start from the beginning. I was born and raised in
Sonoma Valley, California. My dad was he's ex military um
sharp shooting the military, and so I was raised around guns,

(33:26):
had a really strong understanding of gun safety and respect
for her life. Uh. And it wasn't until I was
eight years old when a family friend invited out me
and my dad on a duck hunt and we were
sitting out in the middle of Central Valley, California, where

(33:46):
a set of Mallard's cut their wings and set in
the decoys and my dad shot his first deck. And
at that point I was I was hooked. I was like,
this is something I want to do. UM. And so
I I pressured my dad and let me take the
hunter safety at nine years old in California. And then
UM spent the next couple of years UH trying to

(34:11):
get my first year. I got my first year at twelve,
UM and UM. So growing up in California, there's a
lot of hunt anti hunting sentiment to begin with. And
then on top of that, as I started to try
to find friends to hunt with. UM, when I got
into high school, I started to realize that like, no

(34:33):
one looked like me. UM, no one was Hispanic, no
one was Pacific Islander. And so I started asking friends
if they wanted to go out with me. My best
friends Mexican. He was like, oh, man, that's not something
we do here, even though his dad used to hunt
in Mexico all the time. UM. So I was like,
that's that's kind of weird that you would think that

(34:54):
it's not for you, UM, or at least your your
people don't do this, um and so I kind of
brushed it off. And then it wasn't until the is
Hunting Too White article came out that I saw the
statistics and dove into those and I was like, wow,

(35:15):
my observations growing up are value um so Ah. As
I dug into these, I dug into the research, I
kind of found that there was no organizations working on,
uh doing our three or diversity and inclusion for the outdoors.

(35:37):
There had been some like some pledges that some CEOs took,
but there was no nonprofits. There's no there's nothing set
up in no organization to kind of correct this. Um.
So I looked into it. UM. I originally thought that
I wanted to try to get inner city youth out

(36:00):
on the first times. UM. But then I, after this
article came out, I realized that, well, it's not just
inter city youth, it's it's everybody. It's people who live
out and out in the country who who want to
hunt but just don't know how to get into it.
So that's where Hunters Your Color started. Um. Lydia Ah,

(36:20):
one day she I've been talking about it for like
a year, um and so she she got tired of
me talking about it, and so one day I came
back from work and she was like, hey, here you go.
Here's your U r L Hunters color dot Com, here's
the Instagram handle and all of the other social media

(36:43):
handled have a do what you will with it. And
so originally we thought we're gonna be a shirt company,
but then we realized, well, we need to actually do
more than just making sure its we need to we
need to start an organization. So that's why we went
the nonprofit route and we are today. Yeah, you guys
are five one C three. Uh So we applied for

(37:06):
five status in December, pretty early on in December, and
then apparently it's been taking months for people to get
their official exempt status from the I R S. So
we are still waiting and supposedly going to hear back
by March eleventh of this year. So the government, I mean,

(37:29):
you guys, I was reading on your website. You guys
have only really been doing this since August, right, I
mean we're really talking about six or eight months and
and already have you know, thousands of people connected with
you on social media. That's no small feet, that's not
something that um I want to take a few steps
back obviously and talk about some of the broader topics
you brought up there. But it's no small feet to

(37:50):
to step out like you did. And you're right, there's
not a lot of people in our space that are
stepping out in the way that you have and declaring
things that you declared. But then also, you know, gathered
together that many thousands of people. Don't know what the
number is now I can look, it's over six thousands
that right, yeah, just under seven? Yeah, so you know
we'll just call it seven. We'll round up. Maybe we

(38:12):
can get you there off of this podcast. Um, you know,
just under six thousand people or under seven thousand of
people in in a you know what what turns to
eight months? Um? Have you sat and thought about that? Obviously?
You know Instagram has its own algorithms of things that
help growth, but that your message. Do you feel like
it's connecting in a way that is broader than you

(38:35):
thought or is there something else at play? Yeah? I
actually I don't think that we were necessarily surprised that
people support this mission, especially because we are the only
organization there that's doing this. There are a lot of
organizations that are helping women get into hunting. There are
a lot of organizations that do like ground folks fishing

(38:55):
like that kind of thing, but we are the only UH,
people of color run, people of color based nonprofit organization
hoping to break barriers for people color to get into
hunting UM. So I think that the lack of other
organizations doing the same thing, people are seeing us and

(39:16):
being like, Oh, that's that's cool, that's I'm surprised for us.
I mean too, we're like, wow, we're surprised it took
this along for someone to do this. Yeah. Have you
felt energy around that, you know, from your peers and
other people that are reached out you. Have you felt
that this is created kind of a buzz, at least
in a small way. Yeah, it's I mean, we've had

(39:36):
an overwhelming amount of positive feedback so far, and especially
from other hunters of color. Uh. A lot of people
were saying like, Wow, I wish this thing was around
when I was just starting to get into it, or
I wish I could have looked at an Instagram page
and seeing that my people do this UM kind of thing.
So a lot of positive feedback so far. We also

(39:59):
get a lot of positive feedback to from UM people
who are interested in being allies, are interested in learning more.
We got a message from someone just this last week
who was like, Hey, I'm white, but your page has
educated me so much and I'm so grateful that this
exists because and he told a story about taking his
trying to take his friend who was black out hunting,

(40:20):
and for some reason, he couldn't understand the trepidations. He
was like, why why wouldn't you want to go hunting? Why?
Why don't why are you afraid or you know, why
why do you feel timid to get out in the
woods with me? And then his friend explained some hard situations,
some hard racism, real racism that he's experienced in the woods,
and and the guy who messaged us was like, I

(40:41):
didn't want to believe it, but I had no choice
because I love my friend and I need to listen
and be a good friend, you know. And then he
said when he found our page, he was like, okay,
like this it validates the experience that other people that
he knows have had in the woods and the marshes.
I think that that as we go alonger in this conversation,

(41:03):
I feel that that's the most powerful way to communicate this.
So certainly I'll read some statistics here from as you mentioned,
Pat Durkin's on article on our website back in May.
Often I believe we get that right yet May seventeen.
So if you want to find that, go to mediator
dot com and searches hunting too White. You'll find it.
There's lots of broad statistics there, um, and those I

(41:25):
think back up a lot of what you guys are
doing and saying and stuff we've said on this show
in the past as well. But then we have to
really then connect that from the macro to the micro,
which is people's personal stories. And I feel that it's
our it's everyone's job if if they want to take

(41:45):
up this this task, and I certainly do of finding
ways to remove roadblocks for everyone to get into hunting um,
and I think this is just one of those things
that we have to do to remove those roadblocks. So
let me read you guys. I know you guys know
these these stats well, but let just read for those
that don't um some of the stats in that and
Pat Dirikins article from nineteen He said, from two thousand

(42:09):
ten to fourteen, the U. S d A Forest Service
reports whites made up of all visits to national forests.
Then a National Park Service study in eighteen found whites
made up eighty percent of visits to National Park Service
parks and monuments. Seventeen report by the Colon Company on
camping participation found whites accounted for eight of campers UM.

(42:34):
In the twenty eighteen study the Outdoor Foundation found whites
accounted for nearly three quarters of all outdoor recreation. And
then to get into the hunting space, specifically, the US
Fish and Wildlife Service most recent participation study found eleven
point five million Americans hunted at least once in sixteen.
Of those hunters, ninety six percent were white and three

(42:58):
percent were Hispanic. Blacks and Asians made up most of
the remaining one percent. But at levels two load to
pinpoint participation rates, and so I could keep on going.
There's more numbers, UM, but they all kind of paint
a similar picture that the bulk of the people that

(43:19):
UM that we see outside are of a single skin color.
So we can start with that. That that that's just
the data. That has nothing to do with UM anything
societal or political. Is purely what we are seeing and
what we must address and any other numbers you guys
want to add to that or perspective to those those

(43:41):
broader the broader context. Well, yeah, I want to kind
of go back into what you said before you started
talking about the statistics, UM, and the statistics are very powerful,
and I think that the key here, like you said,
is recognizing people's experiences, right and listening and empathy. I
think that if there's a word that we can, if

(44:03):
I could suggest suggest to listeners or to anyone entering
this conversation, it to have empathy and to have grace
and to listen UM to each other, because you know,
we all come from different perspectives, and just because you
haven't seen something or experience something doesn't mean that it
isn't affecting people. And as long as human beings are

(44:24):
being affected by something, UM, we all ought to care
and listen. And as long as nature being affected by something,
we'll have to care and listen UM. And the statistics too.
I think that, like you said, it's not it's not political,
it's not and it's not a meant to be divisive,
and statistics are exactly that statistics there UM As Jimmy

(44:49):
is an engineer, so he always talks about how there
are some things that are just facts and it's not
an opinion, it's the actual data itself. So that shouldn't
offend anyone, and it really should um scare anyone either,
um and I don't think the say anything. It's the
history that we need to look at though that does

(45:09):
to that like the national parks statistics for example that
you mentioned, National parks were segregated until the nineteen fifties, um,
and it was illegal for black people to go to
national parks or visit white sections of national parks. So
there's there's history like that that we often most people
don't know about and most people don't talk about. And um,

(45:30):
there's no reason why we shouldn't talk about it because
the history that we don't know is the building blocks
board where we live today and what we inherited as
today's America and today's hunt things for you're in the
outdoors world. Yeah, that's it's well put. I mean, we've
struggled with how to use history in this in this

(45:50):
context to represent what we do now and what we
do in the future. People struggle with that. I think
there are some some latent guilt in a lot of
places but also people that just want to help and
they don't want to have to be of one political
ideology or another to help. UM, I've I've heard that
from a lot of people. I just want to help

(46:11):
people get into hunting, no matter what where they come from,
who they are. So I think I think that recognition
um is the first part, and what I think you
said lydia Um is maybe the most impactful. And something
that I've learned is you gotta everybody's perspective is going
to be different on this. Jimmy. You you told a
pretty a brief but powerful story of of your friends

(46:33):
saying we just don't do this. It's not something that
we do here. Maybe it's because here in California, but
I suspect not. There's a lot of hunters in California. Um,
it's because of where you grew up and the people
you're around, and your heritage and the color of your
skin has a huge part of that. So I think
we start by recognizing that, not like you said, not
being scared of it or afraid of it, not being

(46:55):
triggered by it. I hate to use that word, but
it's true, and moving toward it with some courage and
it sounds like, do you guys feel like it takes
a little courage to step into this or this is
just innate to who you are. I mean, what's what's
the feeling stepping into this conversation? Well, uh, one thing
that really helps understand where or why the statistics got

(47:18):
to where they are today is understanding the history of it. Um.
I mean it all started with removing Native Americans from
their inncestral hunting grounds. That's I mean, if you start
there and then you go follow history, you kind of
see this trend where this country was designed with ah,
the white man in mind. You even look at like

(47:41):
some of my heroes, um like thorough and uh Roosevelt
and uh Ner Um I grew up just down the
road from John Muar Woods in Marine County, and uh
you if you look into them, they they were pretty
biased and who they wanted or they're designing to these

(48:02):
outdoor spaces for um. So if you start with history,
you kind of understand where the statistics come from. But yeah,
I think everybody can dive into the history and kind
of learn themselves. Um, kind of have more more empathy
for where people in hunters Color Company. Yeah, no, I agreed.

(48:22):
I think you like I would refer folks back to
our last conversation. Everyone that listens to the show weekly
will remember our conversation with Dr Caroline Finney. She wrote
a book called Black Faces and White Spaces, and it
was powerful to hear some of the history that I
didn't even know about John m yours. Specifically, she did
some performance art around her relationship with John Muir, both

(48:43):
of respect and really damnation at some level. There's a
duality in that feeling about the outdoors that it both
inspires people but sets a feeling in them of segregation
and of hate and of of something that was separate
for so long. Oh, I I think you can. You know,
I don't want to focus there all that much, not

(49:04):
to say it's not important, but I want to find,
you know, really find a way to as you just said, Jimmy,
tell people go look at the history. It's not hard
to find. There are many good resources. We spoke about
some of the resources, um even in the Second Amendment
community a couple of weeks ago with Ian Harrison on
this program. So there's a lot of resources. Do you
guys have resources where you would refer people that where

(49:25):
they can to get some of this information or get
the perspective that maybe you've gotten over over the years
as you learned. So we're actually building up a resource
page specifically for our mentors. UM. We want mentors in
the Hunters of Color organization to be both safe as
any hunting organization would expect their mentors to be, and

(49:46):
committed to empathy and anti racism and community UM. And
so we're building up not only the history like Carol
Finny Carol Finny wrote like her book, but all so
just basic understandings of how to listen to each other,
how to empathy for each other, um, and how to

(50:06):
share our perspectives in a respectful way. And I don't
jimmy on something you wanted to add to the well.
I always say, if you remove anybody from anything for
one generation, it's really hard to get into it. Um.
This kind of moves into like how do we solve
the problem, um. But yeah, I always say that if

(50:27):
you remove anybody from it one generation, it's really hard
to get back into that one thing. So if you're
removed from hunting or one generation and your grandfather, your
father don't hunt, and you've become a person who has
to be self taught, or you look for somebody who's
going to mentor you. Yeah, yeah, Patrick line will dissent
is huge in hunting. It is one of the things

(50:48):
that we celebrate without pause. I celebrated every day because
I was sitting in my office right now looking at
a picture of my dad and I from when I
was ten years old, with fond memories. Um. But anyone
who doesn't have that experience comes to it in a
different way. We have a new term. We we started
with adult onset hunters on this show, as everyone else,
we have erased that. We're no longer using that. It

(51:10):
sounds like something that you picked up and you don't want. Uh.
So we're gonna we're talking about emergent hunters as are new.
We're gonna change. We're gonna change that term. And I
think that's really a part of what we're talking about
here too. Um. This happens across the spectrum, but it
happens just with more weight in in hunters of color.

(51:32):
You know, more more things to explore, more barriers that
are perceived and not tangible. Um. And those are things
that I think we can all recognize now, if if
even if you're you're not so uh inclined to recognize
those differences and those those perceptions about the outdoors. You
may run into, like you said your friend did, bringing

(51:56):
a person of color into the outdoors and them being
uncomfortable when you take them there, and having and having
no understanding of why they are uncomfortable. And so you
may anyone out there listening may want to not address
this or not think about it or call it woke.
That's okay, but you may run into it. And when
you try to broach this topic and try to bring

(52:16):
someone out. So I think, I hope you're listening to
this to be a part of um opening eyes and
bringing people along. So yeah, go ahead. Oh, I was
just gonna say, that's part of how we are building
hunters of color, because there's a difference between saying you're
welcome here and this was made for you. And so

(52:38):
if there is an understanding that the outdoors weren't made
for certain people, are hunting isn't made for certain people,
like Jimmy's friend um Raoul had said to him when
they were a little uh, that's obviously got to change somehow,
because our whole slogan is that the outdoors are for everyone.
And the point behind our name Hunters of Color, um.

(53:02):
You know, we one of our first Instagram posts was
why do you have to see color? Why do we
have to talk about it in this perspective? And I
think that I do want to add that some of
these barriers aren't necessarily perceived. Some of them are very
tangible and very real, such as the fact that of
the land that's owned in the United States is owned

(53:22):
by white people. And and when I say things like
that too, I hope that people know that that isn't
the condemnation. That isn't a bad thing in and of itself.
The bad thing is that they're white people make up
of the United States, and so the rest of us,
you know, UM, that that is the problem. It's the
It's not the fact that people own white people own land,

(53:44):
it's that what about the rest of us, especially when
we want to go hunting, um, Because obviously you need
land to hunt, and we're blessed out here to have
lots of public land, but some states are not so lucky.
The challenge here with our political environment. We've talked about
this on this show as well this year, is that

(54:06):
even a topic like this doesn't seem inclusive because a
lot of people want to just say I don't see color.
I don't care about this topic. This topic isn't for me.
I don't want to be forced into anything. I never
did anything to hurt anyone. And I you know, I'm
a white guy. I see those I hear those things.
I understand those things. But again, you kind of have

(54:28):
a choice to make here. Yeah, I say, if you
don't see color, you didn't do anything wrong. I say,
good for you, But help end these barriers. Have a
part in ending these things that some people feel, because
I mean, it's the love of humanity that we're kind
of reach out and I mean, I love your neighbor.

(54:48):
It's just yeah, yeah, basically what Jimmy always says to
even if you didn't do anything, even if you weren't
a slave owner, even if you didn't hurt anybody, you
can make a difference in making outdoors more inclusive. Absolutely yeah.
And I think, as we really like, one of the
tenants of of telling good story and one of the
tenants of journalism and tenant and one of the tenants

(55:10):
of really objective thinking is searching for truth. Um as
we talked about at the beginning, and we can read
the statistics that is true. Those those statistics are as
true as true gets, and then we can learn from
each other. Um those those personal experiences, those also are true.

(55:31):
And so I just wanted you I would I would
just say I get it. A lot of people who
don't agree, I've probably already turned this off, and that's okay.
But the folks that are still hanging in there, we're
gonna get to the point where we tell you what
what uh Lydia and Jimmy are doing. But um, I
think that question that you guys got is probably a
question that most people get stepping out in this arena.

(55:52):
Why has it got to be about color? Um? And
here's the one one analogy that I've been using on
the show for a long time, which is, if Hunting
was a town, right, if Honey was a place in
Oregon where you could go and visit, and that had
a tourism board, and it had a downtown with shops
and nineties some percent of those shops all the and

(56:13):
nineties in the streets of the town, and everywhere you
went there was one culture, one color. I wouldn't feel
like a welcoming place for people that weren't in that group.
So if we want to make the hunting that the
place of hunting, the community of hunting, we were we
were to make it tangible today, Flippus Witch, and make
it tangible, we would start from a very diverse place.

(56:36):
We can't do that. We're starting from a place that
isn't diverse. And you know, somebody like you, guys walking
around on the streets of our town, you might not
feel welcome. And if we would, if we would make uh,
if we would make it a step to improve that.
We can't go back in time and erase all that's
happened to this point, but we can open up um

(56:57):
our streets to the people that want to see themselves
reflected in our town in this big, long analogy. That's
probably confusing it at this point, but that's how I
generally think about and that's how um I've tried to
approach it, and I hope that at least conversations like
this can make a difference. I think that's a beautiful
way of putting it, and it made sense to me.

(57:18):
I didn't think it was too drawn out. But I
also when you said that there are towns in Oregon
that are like that. Um, there's you know, my cousin
was hunting with my other cousin in eastern Oregon, one
of them as a person of color and the other
one is white. And in a little small town they
went to a grocery store and my my cousin, who
was a person of color, got followed around by the

(57:39):
security guard the entire time he was in the store,
and my my cousin is white, didn't and it really
pissed both of them off. And it's just something another
one of those things that it's like, you don't you
don't understand that it's happening until it happens to you
or someone you love. And so it shouldn't have to
come to that, right, We should be able to have
these conversations and love each other, love one another's bread,

(58:02):
love and in these in these conversations. Well, and I
think we you know, I think we've touched on kind
of what we can do as as people in the community,
because I think that's a huge part of this. And
a lot of this is just that empathy that you
talked about Lydia, But you guys also have a tangible
thing that you're doing. Um, and so I guess I

(58:23):
would first say that I definitely know that I want
for people of color to see themselves reflected in our
community as prominently as we can. Now that brings up
its own tokenism conversation. It is as fraud as anything else.
But I still believe firmly that we have people want

(58:43):
to see themselves reflected in the outdoors and reflected in hunting.
So we have to do that. Um. But what is
the thing that you guys are doing tangibly? I know
you have mentors and mentees. How have you kind of
set up that model to do something a real um
and on the ground to grow diversity and hunting. Yeah,

(59:04):
I want to I want to touch one last thing. Uh,
there's one thing where people say like, well, why should
I care? So something that's touched in on on the
article too, is that the Census says that by the
year the US will be a majority minority people. And
so when you look at current trends, if we aren't

(59:25):
recruiting people of color into hunting, then you're gonna see
this huge die off, or not die off, but you're
gonna see a huge decline in the number of hunters
that are participating and then giving money towards conservation efforts. UM.
And so the North American model conservation will will inevitably
have to change because of that, UM and so instead

(59:49):
of getting to that point, UH, we should try to
stomp it out now, or at least address it now
so that we don't have to readdress or readdress how
we serve our wild resources here in the United States.
One person who's who I talked to, UM you recently
had him on as Ian from the Carnivore magazine UM

(01:00:12):
and he wanted he wants to partner or he wanted
to highlight us in his magazine. But he mentioned, oh yeah,
like in the in the UK, hunting is a very
um an aristocratic kind of elite class activity. And I

(01:00:33):
think the reason why he came to the United States,
at least what he told me, is because it isn't
that in anybody can get into it. UM. There are
certain barriers to entry, but if you do push past those,
you can be in the hunting community. M so and
then I mean, that's all I had to say on that.
But so, what we're cansibly doing with hundreds of colors,

(01:00:55):
we have a mentoring program setup where we were. We're
planning on having like a a network of mentors spread
out across the country where if anybody who has interests
and needs somebody to teach them, like they don't have
somebody within their meedi circle, uh to teach them how
to hunt, but they have interest in procuring their own

(01:01:17):
meat going outdoors, UM, we will set them up with
somebody who has qualified, trained and stay for them to
go out into the woods with. And UM. You can
start out with just a hype or maybe just a
beer conversation. UM. And then will eventually, hopefully we get
to the point where our men mentees become mentors. Yeah.

(01:01:38):
And did you feel like you guys feel like this is?
How would you describe it? You? Are you trying to
start a movement? Are you trying to take it one
hunter at a time? How? What's the mission in your
own minds? I know, you know everybody has their website
about section. But as you guys think of the next
three to five years, let's send your head. So our
ultimate vision, which I don't think it's actually on our website,

(01:02:00):
our mission statement certainly is that our ultimate vision is
to have a world where organization doesn't need to exist.
So it sounds kind of kind of deductive, but I
think you probably get the gist of it. Right. If
if hunting demographics met match the demographics in our nation,

(01:02:21):
then we wouldn't be having to do this push to
try to get more people of color into hunting. And
so can we stop there a second? That is the
most important thing that effort anybody say in any of
these conversations, And because because it comes to it comes
to the thing where this is emotional for you guys,
because you've experienced it and there's people around you that
experienced it, we can move through those emotions and get

(01:02:44):
to the to what you just said, which is important.
We look at the numbers, we see there's a problem.
We want to address this problem. But once we've addressed
it to the point it needs, you know where it sits,
even with the culture of our society, and we can
all agree that where you know we have rested and
are progressing and moving in the right direction, there's no
need to continue it um because I think, really, what

(01:03:08):
I think that does is help people think of it
objectively right, and that is an important thing. And I
always push for for situtions like this where people get
emotional about a certain topic. Um, I mean I think
just that that that commentedly is I think powerful just
in its objectivity, right, Yeah, And and uh, that is

(01:03:28):
the ultimate goal hopefully in any conversation right And obviously
people with different perspectives are gonna everyone has bias. Um,
but yeah, hopefully that is the end goal and that
we don't exist kind of sounds funny, but it's the truth.
Well yeah, I mean I don't want to have to
tackle this huge problem myself, but I love my community

(01:03:51):
of hunters and I love my community of fellow people
of color, and I want both to be able to
enjoy the outdoors. Or I want them both to be
together if you can only get better when they're together. So, um,
my drive behind doing this, and um, I mean I'm

(01:04:12):
doing it for the love of both nature and people.
So yeah, I mean there's so many stories of this. Um,
there's a gentleman named Dennis. I don't know if he
would give Dennis his last name, but this would have
been and I talked to Dennis over Instagram a little bit.
This would have been back in what September of last year.

(01:04:32):
We won't give Dennis his last name. You guys can
share his his Instagram if you'd like to. But Dennis,
I was African American and he was hunting in Florida. Actually,
let me just let you guys say the detail, because
you know better than I can. You tell us a
story of Dennis and what he posted Instagram and kind
of what that uh started online? Yeah, So I mean
I was, I was at work and I got this

(01:04:55):
message from a follower on Instagram and they said, hey,
you should probably we checked this out. So I opened
it up and it was a series of videos of Dennis.
He was up in a deer stand. He's a he's
a new hunter. Um, he is archery hunting for his
first time. He was working with a landowner and got

(01:05:19):
permission to hunt deer on the property. While he was
up in the tree, an aggravated person realized that he
was hunting on either nearby property that he had permission
to hunt or I don't know the exact scenario, but
he started to play obscene racist music, started yelling at him,

(01:05:40):
telling him get a tree, calling him all these obscenities, obscenities,
and and Dennis, you can in his voice, you can
hear him just breaking down. Uh, I've never experienced anything
like this before, and I think he handled it like
a true gentleman. And even at one point he talks

(01:06:00):
how he's a first responder and if he got a
call to go save that man right now, he would
he would hop out of the tree and go help
that man out. Um. But he says that this man
probably wouldn't do the same for him because of the
color of his skin. And I was at work and
I broke down. I was like, we need to this

(01:06:21):
needs to stop, We need to share this, and so
we reached out to him. We ended up sharing it
because he gave his permission and the community stepped up. Um.
It was really nice to see the community of hunting
was uh so against what had happened to him that
they uplifted him to the point where he wasn't gonna

(01:06:41):
quit hunting. He was gonna be a lifelong hunter. And
and we get pictures from him every once in a while,
and he always a huge smile on his face, and um, yeah,
I mean he we're grateful for the way he handled
the situation, and I think he's grateful for us for
showing that like this does happen right now. It's it's

(01:07:03):
nine or as it happened. So um, you can say, oh,
well it's the it's distant past, but no, it happened
a few months ago. And I think for every video
like that of Dennis that we have, there's a video
that didn't get recorded or they didn't get posted, you know,
and there's people with fears of things like that happening

(01:07:25):
to them in the woods. And I doubt that Ben,
you've ever thought, oh, no, I don't want to go
hunting because someone might be racist towards me, you know. Um,
And so that's something that I think is another way
to have empathy and think, wow, that would that would
really stuck to have to think about that, have to
consider that very real possibility when you're just trying to
go out in the woods, when you're number one concerned

(01:07:48):
should be getting an animal. Yeah, yeah, I mean, you know,
the definition of community is, you know, it talks about
a shared common attitude, interesting goals, feeling of fellowship. I
mean in the dictionary that Webster will tell you, you know.
And so when you think about community, we can build
a community around hunting. Our building a community around hunting

(01:08:09):
that has to do with those interests and goals and attitudes.
I mean, if you're if you're a member of Backhuntry
hundred anglers, you're gathering together around the idea that public
land is for everybody. Um, really, you at some level,
if you're a part of um a Second Amendment group,
you're gathering on the idea that the Second Amendment is

(01:08:31):
for everyone. That's easy to say, but it's not. It's
not easy to create. We certainly haven't done a great
job of creating that in the space that I spend
my life working in. So we really aren't the definition
of a community in the tangible sense. UM. I feel
like I share interests with you guys, and then as

(01:08:51):
soon as Lydia kills the turkey, we're gonna share even
more interests together. But I would just rather talk about turkeys.
But we can't right now. Um, we can't ignore what
this topic brings to the four. So that's that's how
you know. Examples like Dennis's is are certainly his. If

(01:09:13):
you haven't seen that, certainly, you go to the Hunters
of Color Instagram page, scroll down, you'll find it. You'll
find some content about Dennis. But when when you see
a grown man in tears and as emotional as he was,
it makes it real for everybody UM, because he certainly didn't.
All he asked to do is go sit in a
tree stand and have a good time, and that was Ah.

(01:09:37):
It didn't turn out that way, that's for sure. So
it's just it's hard to ignore at this point for me,
and it should be hard to ignore for anyone else.
I know, companies in our have you have you seen
companies and and folks in the hunting industry of prominence
reaching out more and more trying to to bring you
guys in. I know you mentioned Ian was I was
talking to you. He's a he's a lyn Me bastard,

(01:09:59):
but I love him, uh so apologize that he had
to represent us. But but have you seen other have
you had other encouraging conversations with companies or individuals that
you see in the hunting space. So hunt Eat was
really big in with the Dennis UM when that video

(01:10:23):
came out, and they kind of took the reins on
doing something for him because we at that point where
only just getting started off. And so a few other
uh companies reached out, I know Ryan Callahan reached out
and offered him to come hunt with him in Louisiana. Uh.

(01:10:46):
I mean there's a few other big names. Um. But yeah,
for the most of our companies really didn't do much. Um.
I guess as a side note, or I mean, the
most prominent thing that we're working on right now is
we're working with the Nature Conservancy, who owns millions of

(01:11:07):
acres across the United States and they have they are
working with US v h A and NDA to set
up a mentorship or one of our programs on their properties. Um.
So they're opening up their gates and it's started off
in New York, New York State. Uh, and then hopefully

(01:11:28):
we spread across the country. And with that we are
we're building this community of mentors and mentees um. And
I think that's what it's all about. Were billion a
community that anybody who's interested in hunting can look to
hunters of color and and be like be interested in

(01:11:49):
see that. Oh, yeah, this is what might people do? Yeah.
I think that's the Yeah again return to it. If
people can see themselves reflected in this and then meet
people close to them that they can learn to trust,
uh that do what what we do. Those are two
huge steps I think that um, you know here on
this show. We proclaimed back and when we did our
first show this year that this is the year the

(01:12:11):
new hunter we we we we renamed adult onset hunter. UM.
We're taking Filthy Engineer on his first hunt, and we're
really trying to understand every avenue into helping new hunters
that are already there, because, as you guys probably know,
COVID is creating a lot of new hunters. UM. A
lot of people are like, I just got to go

(01:12:32):
outside and it would be nice to eat when I'm done. UM.
So a lot of that going on, UM, and it's
it's it's good to have you guys involved in that.
Do you feel like, do you guys have a lot
of mentors out there in the field already? Is there
anything that anyone listening can do to help either be
a mentor themselves or UM point folks in the in

(01:12:54):
your direction, what's the what's the best thing that people
can do? Um? And what do they joined when they join? Yeah,
so we already have thirty mentors in eighteen states, which
is super exciting because we just opened up the application
process like a few weeks ago. Over something like that. UM.
So an outpouring of support which has been validating and

(01:13:16):
amazing and really encouraging too in building that community that
you've talked about. And I like the dictionary definition you
brought up. UM, it's also part of the building blocks
of this organization. I'm a history major, so find the
whole context comes from studied civil rights history. So my
whole context comes from UM that perspective and the idea

(01:13:39):
of mlk's beloved community or Malcolm X's the brotherhood of humanity.
You know that we're all there for each other. And if,
like what you said, the hunting community doesn't reflect that
truth right now, UM, at least hundreds of colors trying
to reflect that truth and then eventually, like we said,
hopefully won't exist at some point. Well, you got start somewhere, right,

(01:14:01):
I mean, you have to start somewhere, And we are
where we are, so we have to we have to
do something. UM, And you guys are taking action and
that's what's admirable. Yeah, and if and if people want
to help, UM, the application is up on our website
Tunter's Collar dot com. Uh, soon it will be Hunters
of Color dot org once the government is back to us.

(01:14:24):
Is there any emails you want to give out? For
listeners of the show to email anybody in the five
one three department that we can get it done. Come on,
they kind of lost our application to UM and so
we had to call them and tell them to find it. Bastards. Yeah,

(01:14:44):
they're not really bastards. They're fine people. Yeah, But so
there's there's that way you can help us UM. And
if you know anybody who wants to be mentored, have
them fill out our mentorship application to U. And I
mean hopefully we are creating a system where uh yeah

(01:15:07):
I mentioned earlier, where the mentees eventually become mentors and
this community continues to build and UM yeah, it's just
the start of it. So we're six months in and
it's been great so far. Yeah. I mean, there truly
are no small actions, especially at in this time where

(01:15:27):
people are looking for things to gather around. We're looking
for things, for ways to be Maybe we're not looking
for things, but on this show we're looking for things.
We'll name it out all of us, but I am
looking for things to gather around, looking at for ideas
that are easily understood and easily celebrated, and I think
this is one of them. Regardless of UM. How other

(01:15:49):
folks see it or might label it. I truly do
feel this is as simple of an effort as you
could possibly make it, but also an impactful one as well. So,
um man it it's good to see you out there.
Um are you guys? But you guys are millennials, right,
you're younger. You don't have to see your age. I

(01:16:11):
think I'm I think I'm whatever, the one before Millennia
lives hopefully. Well, I'm like, I'm like an old millennial.
So I guess I don't really know how it works.
I'm like the oldest millennial ever, like an old old man. Um.
But I mean it's the generational thing too. As you
guys said, both both with Race and Jim Crow and

(01:16:34):
the changes we've seen and celebrated over the last two
decades to how when you're in your early twenties right now,
how you see the world and the world you experience
is so much different than the world that your parents
experienced at that same age. As I'm sorry, no, go ahead.
We were just talking about My dad was born at
these and so whenever I read anything about civil rights

(01:16:57):
and like, hey Dad, what was that like when that happened? Know,
I make fun of my dad. I'm like, hey, Dad,
what about the typewriter when that came out? What was
that like? Remember the Purning Press. Yeah. I can tell
you impactful stories that I've heard, not from my dad,
but from other folks in my dad's age range about

(01:17:17):
schools being segregated and and the stories and perspectives from
young white males at the time and not really knowing
anything different than segregation. And we've had Charles. Charles Rodney
is a man we've had on this show. He's a
seventy one year old rabbit hunter from Maryland. He's African
American and he grew up actually in the Jim Crow

(01:17:39):
South in Louisiana, the son of a sharecropper um. He
grew up in poverty. He couldn't swim in the same
swimming pools as the white kids, and he struggled with
that throughout his life. But he overcame it and now
is had a successful life, lives in Maryland, has three
successful children, and has over came where he started. So

(01:18:01):
I think he's a great analogy for where we need
to go as a hunting community. We need to overcome
where we are right now, and every roadblock I certainly
am glad you guys are kicking them down, and I
will kick him down right there with you. So I
guess that's a pledge. I know what you call that.
Oh yeah, that's what we're looking for, that kind of support.

(01:18:24):
And also I think that UM, like you you brought up,
it's it's not ancient history the stuff that we're talking about, right,
it's people that you're having on the podcast. We're talking
about what it was like growing up in the South
during these times and all over the country, UM, during
civil rights. And I think that that helps people to
gain gain empathy and game perspective, UM, because you know,

(01:18:48):
what affected our parents and what affected our grandparents still
affects us today. And it's what we inherited today. And
you know, while we can't change what happened in the past,
we're responsible for what happens in the future. So hopefully
we'll be a positive change. Yeah. The last thing I'll
say about this, UM, because I gotta run. But the
last thing I'll say is if another human is seeking

(01:19:09):
empathy from you and you deny them yours, what they
call an asshole. So you know, I I love that
you use the word empathy I think it's one of
the most important things that we can have as a
characteristic UM, both individually but as a community. UM. And
and the desire for it I think is um as

(01:19:30):
true as the lack of it in some places. So
I really do appreciate you guys. UM. Give everybody the
exact details hundreds of Color on Instagram, hunters hundred of
color dot com, any anything else they need to know
before we get out of here. UM. Now, I'll just
give us follow uh sign to be a mentor if
you if that's something that you think you want to do. UM.

(01:19:53):
If you know anybody who wants to get into hunting, UM,
have them thought the mentee application uh and spread the word. UM.
It's gonna take an army too to make the world
that that we envision UM. So we're welcoming everybody who
is on on board with this. If you have questions,

(01:20:13):
or if you want to talk to us or bug us,
or if you're mad about something that we said, please
send us an email. You don't have to bug ben
about it, bug me, bug me, I like it. Let
me go ahead. Lydia at Hunters of Color and Jimmy's
it's Jimmy at Hunters of Color dot com. So, um,
pretty easy to get a hold of us if you

(01:20:34):
want to talk, all right, easy to remember. And here's
the other thing I'll promise to you, guys. You pick
a mentor and mentee from your your list that have
a great story of a hunt together, and you tell
me who they are, and we'll have them on the show. Uh,
and we'll hear their story and we'll talk to him
about what they went through and the good and the bad,

(01:20:55):
and um, we'll continue to get this message out there.
Is that sound good? Awesome? Sounds awesome? All right, We'll
keep in touch guys, and um, thank you on behalf
all of us for what you're doing. That's it. That's

(01:21:15):
all another episode in the books. Thank you to hundreds
of color founders. Jimmy and Lydia. We're coming and talking
to me. We had a little bit of audio trouble
here and there with that one, So hopefully that sounds
really good. Did you clean it up? Phil? He made
it sound really nice. Oh yeah, it sounds like it's
coming from a professional recording studio. Boom. That's that's where
filthy engineer makes his money. He's not he not only

(01:21:36):
is uh, soon to be expert turkey hunter. But he
gets the audio, makes it, makes it sound good. Um, listen,
there's a lot going on for next week. We're going
to continue this conversation about diversity in the outdoors and
diversity and the honey community. We're gonna do it a
lot as much as we can. And again, as I
said at the end there, we're gonna try to grab
a mentor and mentee from from the Hunters of Color

(01:21:57):
group and talk to them about their experience out there
and get some of their personal stories, because I think
that's also pretty pretty damn important. But we're gonna turn
next week too something of a response. Now, do you
remember a group called Anonymous for the Voiceless film Anonymous
for the Voiceless. Of course Paul was here. Paul, but

(01:22:19):
sheer couldn't forget that name. Now we had him onto
some acclaim. Uh what was it was last year? It
seems like every month is a year in the pandemic.
But we had him on. It was too much conversation
about what was going on with him, and one of
the big topics there was around how many animals were
killed by large scale agriculture, meaning you go to the

(01:22:42):
girl store, you buy a head of lettuce or in
this this case, I think we talked about rice as
a strange kind of way to center the conversation. We
had a guy named Jack Henry. That seems like a
fake name, Jack, but we'll go with it. Jack Henry
his greecent graduate of cal Polly San Luis Obispo biological Sciences.
He wrote me a whole email breaking down you know,

(01:23:07):
death and agriculture. He's done the studies. Uh he he
really quantified it, even like metabolic needs, detection, probability, all
of predat predation from eagles, hawks, foxes. To try to
suss out that point of that podcast with Paula Sheer.

(01:23:29):
So luckily this guy knows the facts that I didn't
know at the time that we recorded Paul. So we're
gonna go into kind of the history next week of
the anti hunting and the animal rights philosophies, where it began,
how it came to be a thing historically, how long
it's been around, how it's become what it is today.
But then also look at Jack's numbers around vegans who

(01:23:53):
might go shopping at the grocery store and feel like
they removed from the cycle of death in in our world.
So I think that's a very important follow up from
a long overdue conversation. So you decited about that, Phil,
you titilated? You ready to go for next week? Oh yes,
my my, My tittles are lated. Nope, nope, nope, but
all the things you should cut out that ship. You

(01:24:14):
can't say your tittles are lated. That rhymes with something inappropriate,
so you can't do that, all right, Phil, Just say
bye to the people and be excited for next week.
Goodbye people, because I can't go a week without doing
wrong with drank

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