Gallatin Community Gun Club holds inclusive gun training event

In Montana, guns are a familiar sight — but without an inclusive space to learn, the barrier for entry can be high. The Gallatin Community Gun Club (GCGC) is working to change that, teaching everyone regardless of their identity.

Despite heavy rain and unrelenting wind, members of the Gallatin community joined the GCGC, Queer Bozeman and Big Sky OUT for “More Gays n’ More Guns” on Sunday, Oct. 19. Here, they held an introduction to firearms, with a Stop the Bleed training course. 

The goal was to promote gun safety, reduce firearm fear and create a welcoming space for the LGBTQIA+ community, according to Garrett Grimm, co-founder and board member of GCGC.

“​​[We are] an open, inclusive club that is designed to share knowledge, mostly gun related, but also survival first-aid,” he said.

The GCGC is a social group that brings together people from all walks of life to foster friendship, trust and increase accessibility in gun culture and education. The club is designed for those who prioritize equality and human rights, and believe that everyone deserves respect and fair treatment, Grimm said.

“We don’t really care about your politics or orientation or views — [we believe] the hard line that we do have is human rights,” he said. “If you believe that someone should not exist because [of] their sexuality or something like that, that is something that we do not agree with.” 

Samuel Sumridge is an instructor in the GCGC. While he has been shooting his entire life, he earned his teaching credentials in 2010 and 2013. He said he specializes in taking someone who is completely green — someone who has never held a gun before — and helping them become reasonably proficient within eight hours.

“I get more satisfaction out of this community than I do out of just about anything else,” Sumridge said. “It's sort of like a vicarious reliving of your own [experience] gaining a skill set and getting better.”

Similar to Sunday’s event, the club often partners with other organizations that share similar values.

Maris Fessenden, vice-chair of Queer Bozeman, said seeing people learn about guns in a safe environment was really impactful for them. 

“We heard from several participants in the group that there are guns in the households that they live in,” Fessenden said. “To just simply be able to pick up a gun safely — to understand if the gun is loaded — is a huge thing.”

According to its website, the mission of Queer Bozeman is to strengthen and advance the 2SLGBTQIA+ community in the Gallatin Valley, while working to challenge systems of oppression. They said this event with GCGC fit perfectly within this mission. 

“The reality is that people are armed, and the reality is that queer folks are likely to not be people who are armed,” they said. “So, I think of it as this is enabling that choice to be made with knowledge instead of it being a fear-based decision.”

Fessenden said that gun culture is dominated by white-passing and cisgender individuals, people whose gender identity aligns with their sex assigned at birth. This leaves many others, including LGBTQIA+ individuals, with fewer opportunities to learn about and safely engage with firearms.

“I would like to make [the LGBTQIA+] community difficult to oppress and dangerous to try,” Sumridge said.

According to volunteer and club member Dante Spado, many members of marginalized communities do not feel safe in the Gallatin Valley.  

“I think being able to preserve your life and your wellbeing is a fundamental human right,” Spado said. “It's not only about guns, it is about building community.” 

Spado, an active hunter, said that learning how to defend oneself and having a knowledge of firearms can help build long-lasting confidence. Even if those who attend the events never touch a gun again, they have more information than they had before, he said.

“[Our gun training] gives an option for people of a more diverse background to become knowledgeable and involved in shooting sports,” Spado said. “[It is] a way to offer people who feel like they are — or have been in the past — sort of excluded from being around firearms.”

For more information about GCGC, visit https://gallatincommunitygunclub.org/.