The exodus begins. In the wake of Recoil’s “some guns are just too dangerous for the unwashed masses” review of the H&K MP7A1, online training provider Panteao Productions has decided to cut bait with the now toxic magazine. They clearly don’t want to stand too close to a media partner that has an acrid, Zumboesque odor about them. And who could blame them? Pantaeo prez and CEO Fernando Coelho has issued a statement announcing that they’ve cancelled all scheduled ads with Recoil, both online and on dead tree. He says the mag needs to “(change) their view on firearm ownership and the Second Amendment,” which seems to be a sotto voce way of  letting it be known that they’ll be back when editor Jerry Tsai is tsent packing. Make the jump for Paneao’s full statement, as well as Silencerco’s Dear John letter . . .

To the Panteao Subscribers and DVD viewers:

I learned today about the article in the latest issue of RECOIL magazine on the HK MP7A1, or more specifically the comment within the article by the editor pertaining to who should own an MP7A1. I also saw the follow up in their Facebook page explaining their reasoning behind the editorial. For those that have not already seen the response from their editor, here it is:

“Like we mentioned before, the MP7A1 is unavailable to civilians and for good reason. We all know that’s technology no civvies should ever get to lay their hands on. This is a purpose-built weapon with no sporting applications to speak of. It is made to put down scumbags, and that’s it. Mike Cabrera of Heckler & Koch Law Enforcement Sales and veteran law enforcement officer with SWAT unit experience points out that this is a gun that you do not want in the wrong, slimy hands. It comes with semi-automatic and full-auto firing modes only. Its overall size places it between a handgun and submachine gun. Its assault rifle capabilities and small size make this a serious weapon that should not be taken lightly.”

Panteao Productions has a very clear position when it comes to the Second Amendment. We do not agree with the opinion of the editor from RECOIL magazine and I am personally very disappointed that he would make such a statement about what he views as a firearm that should not be getting into the “wrong hands”. I would have expected that kind of ignorant comment coming from someone not in the firearms community or from one of the anti-gun organizations.

Until such time that the staff of RECOIL magazine changes their view on firearm ownership and the Second Amendment, Panteao Productions will be discontinuing all scheduled ads in their print publication and website and requesting that all Panteao video content be removed from their website.

I hope that someone at RECOIL magazine steps up and issues a formal apology to the firearms community. They have a great concept for their magazine and it would be a shame to see it go away. The ball is in their court with regards to how they handle their mishap.

Thank you for your continued support of Panteao Productions.

Fernando Coelho
President/CEO
Panteao Productions LLC

From Silencerco:

Recently we were made aware of some disturbing “Editorial”  comments on behalf of Recoil magazine, concerning the illegitimacy of a certain firearm ( and by extension, an entire class of firearms)  for “sporting purposes”.

We feel these comments are counterproductive and are certainly NOT reflective of the opinion of Silencerco/SWR or the American shooting public . . .

The statements made by the editorial staff and others interviewed for the article were so poorly stated, factually inaccurate  and so misrepresentative  of the core values and beliefs of our company and our mission, that we have written the editor of Recoil magazine and asked him to discontinue all scheduled advertising for both Silencerco and SWR products.

We sincerely hope that the owners of Recoil will get a strong message from the shooting public and all reputable manufacturers that our people will not tolerate the mindset behind those statements. We urge you to make your opinion known to recoil and their advertisers.

Thank you for your continued support of our company, our sport and our collective right to keep and bear arms.

UPDATE: ITS Tactical’s getting off the Recoil train, too.

An unfortunate turn of events has occurred surrounding the latest issue of RECOIL Magazine. Everyone at ITS HQ was ecstatic when we received our copies of issue #4 and saw our ETA Trauma Kit Pouch gracing the cover along with a slung H&K MP7A1.

So ecstatic in fact, that we didn’t catch the glaring editorial and PR train wreck that Editor Jerry Tsai managed to insert into the article covering the MP7 . . .

The issues with [Tsai’s] statement come down to both the comments made by Mike Cabrera of Heckler & Koch and Mr. Tsai. Talking about the technology of the MP7 not having any “sporting applications” and not wanting the gun “in the wrong, slimy hands.” is just absurd. What gun do you want in the “wrong, slimy hands?” What baseball bat do you want in the “wrong, slimy hands?” See where this is going?

There’s a favorite quote of mine that I turn to often by author Dan Brown. “Knowledge is a tool, and like all tools, it’s impact is in the hands of the user.” Enough of my soapbox; this statement by Mr. Tsai is simply giving those that seek to take away our rights and liberties more fuel for their fire. The Second Amendment doesn’t come with the caveat of being only for sporting purposes and for good reason. The primary purpose for owning a gun is for defense. Maybe Mr. Tsai has forgotten that if it wasn’t for civilian weapons, we’d still be a British colony.

I’ve been watching the train wreck unfold since finding out about it this weekend and Mr. Tsai’s follow-up that he posted to the RECOIL Facebook Page yesterday (that has apparently been deleted) certainly didn’t help anything . . .

One of the truly disappointing things about his statements is that he did it on the backs of RECOIL’s advertisers, readers and everyone that’s made the publication what it is today. ITS has advertised in RECOIL for the past two issues amongst some of our good friends in the industry and on Friday had plans to continue to advertise in the next issue. In light of Mr. Tsai’s comments, we’ve since cancelled those plans.

RECOIL represented a huge shift for the industry into a beautiful publication with great photography and an excellent layout, which is no easy feat. Just picking up RECOIL and comparing it to the typical magazine sitting on the shelf made you want to hang on to it, but I digress.

It will be even more disappointing if Source Interlink Media (RECOIL’s parent company) feels this will just go away as they continue on with business as usual. Continuing with an editor that expresses these kind of statements in a “gun lifestyle” magazine is clearly the wrong direction.

Thank you for your continued support of ITS Tactical, it means more than you’ll ever know.
Bryan Black, Founder and Editor-in-Chief

Hayley Strategic Partners calls it quits, too:

The Haley Strategic Partners team was disappointed to learn of an article and later, public comments, made by a editor at Recoil Magazine which indicated certain weapon systems were not suitable to be possessed or operated by responsible members of the American public. We take issue with this.

At Haley Strategic, we choose to train responsible citizens, law enforcement officers and military professionals in our courses ranging from basic to advanced Disruptive Environments. In short, we help Americans prepare. Weapons systems are tools. Tools built to preserve lives in life threatening situations. There is no reason to prevent responsible citizens from utilizing any tools that will improve their odds of surviving such an event.

We take this very seriously. Every person in at Haley Strategic believes that, as Americans, it is our responsibility to be prepared, both mentally and physically, for worst case events, whether they happen to ourselves and our loved ones, or innocent people caught in an unfolding tragedy.

As such, Haley Strategic Partners will indefinitely suspend all advertising and collaborative efforts with both Recoil Magazine and RecoilWeb.com.

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32 COMMENTS

  4. Hopefully one of the big ones like magpul will drop out as well. I wrote them a nice email telling them I do not appreciate their ad dollars supporting an anti-2A magazine.

  5. Instead of them changing their ideals to be pro 2a someone should create another magazine along the same premise but actually believe what in they’re saying not just collecting our money and promoting anti 2a sentiment.

  6. Wholly depleted funds batman!
    I knew we would see some backlash, but dang. I fully support their move to withdraw advertising, but I figured it might take a while. This blew up in 24 hours and has not let down. Ah the power of the internet!
    It is probably going to spiral down from here. No publisher, advertising dropping like flies. I can’t say I read recoil or ever have, but when you piss off your base customers, and advertisers, I guess it is expected.

  8. Here is something to keep in mind:
    If Magpul keeps supporting that Rag with thier dollars they are useing thier profits (which we give them) to do so.
    In short it’s your money going to Recoil. I for one will stop buying thier products.

    • I think I saw a list of advertisers in the other article about this…Let me pull it over here.

      This is copied from the other post, originally made by Rob Pincus:
      Here’s the list of Advertisers:
      General tire – generaltire.com
      Magpul – magpul.com
      Barrett – barrett.net
      Smith optics elite – smithelite.com
      Streichers – streichers.com
      Daniel defense – danieldefense.com
      Tactical night vision company – tnvc.com
      Daystar – daystarweb.com
      Pioneer – pioneerelectronics.com/android
      Interco Tire – intercotire.com
      Rock river arms – rockriverarms.com
      5.11 tactical clothing – 511tactical.com
      Mechanix wear – mechanix.com
      Swr suppressors – swrsuppressors.com
      Knights armament company – knightarmco.com
      Imminent threat solutions – itstactical.com
      Glock worx – glockworx.com
      Gemtech silences – gemtech.com
      Make ready videos – makeready.tv
      Trijicon – trijicon.com
      Haley strategic – haleystrategic.com
      Larue tactical – larue.com
      Mossberg – flexyourmossberg.com
      Tactical tailor – tacticaltailor.com
      Springfield Armory – xdspistol.com
      Mission first tactical – missionfirsttactical.com
      Silencer co – silencerco.com (two ads)
      Bladetech concealment holsters – blade-tech.com
      YHM – yhm.net
      Bushmaster firearms – bushmaster.com
      Discount tire – discounttiredirect.com
      Fisher’s atv world – fishersatvworld.com
      Advanced armament corp. – advanced-armament.com
      DSGarms – dsgarms.com
      Spikes tactical – spikestactical.com
      Road armor – roadarmor.com
      Juggernaut tactical – jtactical.com
      Winchester ammunition – Winchester.com
      American tactical – americantactical.us
      Gunvault – gunvault.com
      Night optics usa – nightoptics.com
      Tapco – tapco.com
      Itw military products – itwmilitaryproducts.com
      Vortex tactical – vortextactical.com
      Em gear – emgear.com
      Jager products inc – jagerproducts.com
      Precision reflex inc – precisionreflex.com
      Laser devices – laserdevices.com
      Leupold tactical optics – [email protected]
      Harbor freight tools – harborfreight.com
      Oc armory – ocarmory.com
      Tec x knives – tecx.com
      Mega arms – mega-arms.com
      Recoil magazine – recoilweb.com (hey, they advertised, might as well ask them to boycott their own magazine )
      Cross breed holsters – crossbreedholsters.com
      Nightforce optics inc – nightforceoptics.com
      Chiappa firearms ltd – mkschiappa.com
      Tacti – cool guns and gear – facebook.com/TactiCoolGunsGearInc (they didn’t have a website listed, so I think they just have a facebook presence)
      Close quarter battle k9 – [email protected]
      Camillus knives – Camillusknives.com
      Us tactical supply – ustacticalsupply.com
      Sheep dogs inc clothing – sheepdogsinc.com
      Pro tool – protoolindustries.net
      Warrior one guns & ammo – warrioronegunsandammo.com
      Spartan blades – spartanbladesusa.com
      Adam & eve – adamandeve.com (yup, a naughty video and goody company)
      Bravo company usa – bravocompanyusa.com, bravocompanymfg.com
      Falken tire – facebook.com/falkentire

  9. Last night I sent Bravo an email expressing my displeasure with Recoil and they promptly responded:

    Hi Bill,

    Thank you for contacting us. We do appreciate your business and support of our products.

    We have been made aware of the various statements made by the magazine’s editor regarding restricting civilians from certain firearm ownership, and we share the outrage by the gun community. This position is the complete opposite of our beliefs of the purpose of the 2nd Amendment and shows great misunderstanding of American History and The Constitution. On Monday at 0500 PST we made our first call to contact the parent media company to express our position that we cannot support a company who holds such views. We will be posting more information on our corporate Facebook account as the situation evolves.

    Thank you very much for your staunch support of the 2nd Amendment!

    [email protected]

  10. This whole episode illustrates the blatantly corrupt and anti-2a “sporting purpose clause” crap. I am heartened by the outcry by most proliberty proponents I’ve seen here and the advertisers who know such restrictions are illogical and insulting to our rights.

    The Smith and Wesson cave to procontrol advocates a decade or so ago also proved to be a setback for them. I think the industry may be learning a lesson. Finally.

  12. The advertisers have a great opertunity to engender customer loyality, by being loyal to thier customers in this situation. There are plenty of other venues to spend their ad dollars at.

  13. Good. We can’t tolerate this “sporting” nonsense anymore, as all it does is paint the 2A in the wrong light by attempting to make it sound more comfortable.

    Tsai-onara!

  14. Now we can put pressure on Savage to drop HS precision, who quietly picked up the relationship Remington so wisely dropped. That is unless HS is willing to offer a sincere, contrite, and very public apology.

    Until then, never forget.

  17. There is a problem in producing a “high-class, glossy” magazine that is pro-2A. Most journalists have been “trained” in environments that are very strongly leftist. Read the Columbia Review of Journalism sometimes to see what I mean.

    And no matter how much they try to hide it, these “unbiased” journalists invariably undermine and corrupt the organizations for whom they work. Because they absolutely know that they are correct and unbiased, and that they have to educate us slimy-handed peons. Remember Johnathan Klein who blasted people like Instapundit and Drudge as “pajama-wearing” incompetents, in contrast to the multiple layers of fact-checkers in the MSM?

    We all know how that turned out, and who is truly more trustworthy. But the bias is there, insidious, and dangerous. If it were only possible to deprogram these poor, ignorant, parochial puppets.

    • As Obama knows the only Free Media Mkt is the Internet, it is the only place where these Columbia U. Commies w/their cradle to grave elitist network can be cut out of the loop. This is of course why Obama wants to destroy the net, like they did in China, Russia, Venezuela and Iran

      • What the hell are you talking about? You right wingers have a hatred for smart people, smh. You pay some company that’s probably run buy a person you hate for access to the internet, how are they not controlling it. Face it your a fool

  20. RECOIL has replaced the aforementioned companies. Advertisers for their next issue include: The Brady Campaign, Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Heckler & Koch.

  22. Awesome job everyone! Getting the word out there and fighting to protect the 2nd amendment appears to have killed yet one more “appeaser.”

    We are winning this fight, step by step!

  24. Some people are asking, understandably, why I have been so involved in the Cry Out against Recoil Magazine’s Editor’s Statements over the last couple of days:
    I labored under & against the “Sporting Purpose” concept since the ’90s and have had to deal with several companies/organizations over the last 15 years that were slow to move out from under that politically correct marketing approach. When I taped my first DVDs for the PDN Series distributed by the NRA in the mid-2000’s we weren’t allowed to use human shaped targets. There was no “Tactical” section at the first several SHOT Shows I attended. Just recently, another instructor and friend was uninvited from teaching at a shooting range that claims now to be for ‘sport shooting’ only. I’ve had trouble booking courses in certain areas for the same reasons.
    Especially in an election year and especially from a magazine that has a growing influence on younger shooters new to our community, I won’t tolerate the concept of guns needing a “sporting purpose” inside our own ranks… and Recoil Magazine has certainly put itself into the training community in a big way.
    Do I have a dog in this fight? Yes… and the dog is long in the tooth with a good memory and a perspective on how far we have come in recent history. Let’s not start slipping backwards.
    -RJP

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