Meet the Green Mountain John Brown Gun Club!

While not affiliated with other John Brown Clubs across the country, they do have the same goals but prefer to speak for themselves.

Green Mountain John Brown Gun Club

Hello, World!

It’s us, the Green Mountain John Brown Gun Club. We’ve been here in Vermont for about five years. We may sound familiar– you may have heard of other John Brown Gun Clubs in the news. “John Brown Gun Club” is a name shared by dozens of groups who have similar goals, and who participate in similar activities, but we speak on behalf of only ourselves: we are not affiliated with any other John Brown Gun Clubs.

We’ve recently been contacted by several journalists who want to learn more about us, so we thought it was time for a little introduction.

We are a collective of antifascist activists, mostly anarchists, who are passionate about community defense. Community defense is the implementation of the revolutionary philosophy that the working class and otherwise marginalized communities have the right to protect ourselves and our interests. We don’t refer here to the constitutional right to bear arms: we are anti-state and do not align ethically with the U.S. Constitution. We are not a “big tent” organization: people who support capitalism and authoritarianism of any kind are not welcome in the Green Mountain John Brown Gun Club. Rather, our work springs from the understanding that liberation cannot rely on nonviolence alone, and from the reality that those who wish to harm us are both well-trained and heavily armed. Currently, we facilitate community defense by offering basic training to people who are a) often the targets of state, fascist, or white supremacist violence and b) left out of mainstream “gun culture.” In addition to firearms instruction, we occasionally provide community defense for events, protests, or individuals who are at risk of state, fascist, or white supremacist violence. We only provide this when asked: we are one piece of an ecosystem of solidarity, not a disconnected group with a moral calling or chauvinistic urge to protect the untrained and unenlightened. This sense of solidarity –of interconnectedness and radical empathy– sets us apart from militias, and informs the other elements of our work.

In addition to community defense, we participate in other forms of mutual aid, with the goal of limiting our reliance on oppressive state institutions. Over the past five years, we have run taillight clinics, where we check and (if needed) replace taillights. We have cut and split cords of firewood for people in need. We have covered swastikas and racist graffiti on walls and under bridges. We have supported the work of other groups doing similar work, and they have supported us. We recognize that while community defense includes firearms safety and training, it is a part of a bigger system, and it is only effective in conjunction with efforts to keep people sustainably housed, fed, healthy, and free. Therefore, beyond our roles in the GMJBGC, many of us participate actively in the greater community. We are teachers, loggers, artists, and farmers. Some of us are on your town’s select-board or fire department. Others deliver Meals on Wheels, volunteer with refugees, and are involved in other community projects. We see this as part of our work, because this revolution is happening everywhere, every day, in every act of solidarity with our ever-intertwined communities.

To reach the Green Mountain John Brown Club, email them here.