RSWC #242 Tom Knighton

Riding Shotgun With Charlie

#242

Tom Knighton

Bearing Arms, Writer

 

The first time I met Tom Knighton in person was at a Florida Carry event in 2021. But we've done a number of episodes of the Polite Society Podcast, where I was a co-host and he was a guest. Then there were a number of times when we did The Daily Bullet as co-hosts. Tom is a great guy and writes at Bearing Arms. We had a chance to film a show at the NRA Annual Meetings in Atlanta this year. 

 

Tom grew up in Georgia and has been around firearms his whole life. Growing up in a city, he's still pretty country. His dad was a police officer who hunted with his own dad. It seems crazy, but he said his first press of the trigger was at four years old with a .38 Special. His dad had his hands over Tom's and all he needed to do was press the trigger. Eventually, his dad bought him a Ruger 10/22 and an Enfield Jungle Carbine in .303 British. Unfortunately, later on it had to be sold. 

 

As a young child growing up with his parents and their smart aleck attitudes, it's no wonder where Tom got his snarkiness, which has served him well while writing at Bearing Arms. Then as a Navy corpsman, it didn't really help with his sense of humor, either. Being an anti-authorian, he only lasted four years in the Navy. He was in after the Gulf War but before September 11. He could have gone back in, but he had a 2 month old child and a wife to tend to.

 

During high school, Tom found out he wasn't too bad at writing. His writing impressed both his teacher and classmates. While writing for a "table top role playing"  blog, he went to a meet up with local liberty minded folks. He talked with someone and started writing about small local politics. Then a local newspaper got a hold of some articles and ran them there, too. Talking with the editor, he was able to pay Tom for some original content. So he considered writing for a living. The editor ended up moving and selling the paper to Tom. Then he ended up losing the newspaper. 

 

After some life tribulations, he started writing for a start up publication. Then another. Both went under. He was able to leverage those gigs into writing for PJ Media. Another friend worked at Red State and he asked if they needed anything. After some conversations, she asked how he was on the Second Amendment. For the first two years, he was writing solo. 

They talked about hiring an editor and he was a little miffed. But the editor ended up being Cam Edwards. Tom thought that was also a good idea! Like many of us, one of our goals was to be on NRA TV's Cam & Co. but Tom ended up working with Cam instead. A nice consultation prize.

 

For Bearing Arms Tom is cranking out about seven articles a day. Then he's got two for Town Hall. Then his own Substack of general politics gets two articles. And he's doing some videos for his YouTube channel, too. Sometimes people send him tips, leads, and stories. Sometimes it's slow and there's a little rehashing of previous content or reaching out to find stories to write. But the "challenges in the 2A community don't change" or end. 

 

Like many others, Tom has a lot going on. Writing for Bearing Arms, for Town Hall Media, and doing his own articles, keeps his schedule full. There are also times when he's running the BA website, too. Plus he's keeping up with family life. 

 

Just for funsies, we take a call from Mike Piwowarski from Arms Room Radio. I was supposed to meet some folks, but I was running late. The background is that when I did a show with Mike in Florida a few years ago, he forgot all the great stories he has. So I had to bring up that Tom has stories. And he remembers them. 

 

Favorite quotes:

"The first time I ever pulled the trigger was on a .38 Special when I was four years old."

"God forbid we ever in a situation like that, I'm equipped."

"We may not have the same level of training, but you never have enough."

"You need to get your basic marksmanship better than the guns."

"People like when their commentators pop off at the other side."

Bearing Arms
https://bearingarms.com/

 

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