As it has been said many times before, we are now past the point of professionalism. The idea that a person or company can simply not have an opinion is now laughable. Allowing an investigation to complete before weighing in, is now seen as supporting the opponent of whoever reads the statement. Sometimes such controversies can be avoided by small companies who have a niche audience. Large companies do not have this luxury, nor do companies who’s marketing campaigns center around political topics and ham-fistedly imply certain ideologies.
Kyle Rittenhouse’s story is one with which we are all familiar, to include his ridiculous and purely political incarceration. His story gains salience for this particular piece when his $2 million bail was contributed to by My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell and actor Ricky Schroder. A photo was taken after Rittenhouse’s long overdue release in which he was wearing a Black Rifle Coffee Company (BRCC) t-shirt. This photo was posted with a discount code for use on BRCC’s website.
BRCC was the original “politically incorrect” coffee company and played itself against the preening and mewling of Starbucks. The “Black Rifle” to which the coffee peddler’s name refers is the AR-15 and their products are festooned with images of the platform in various tacticool configurations. The preponderance of videos on the company’s YouTube channel have firearms in them and the CEO is in several videos on other channels which essentially amount to gun porn, gun humor, military humor and Con Inc. level mockery of leftists. Their branding and marketing have been built entirely on this strategy.
In regards to the photo of Kyle Rittenhouse wearing one of their t-shirts, many on the Left, who already hated BRCC, complained and demanded the company explain why they sponsor/support the evil Kyle Rittenhouse. The company released an official statement which was accompanied with a video by the CEO. The butt of an AR-15 is just in frame, of course. It is placed in such a way that the viewer will sort of notice it and it further reaffirms in their mind that BRCC is one of the good guys. What it should do is remind the viewer that all of this is carefully staged, and that such manipulations are intentional and span far beyond the CEO’s video.
The official written statement briefly mentions that they do not engage with legal defense funds and strenuously deny any relationship to the “17 year-old facing charges in Kenosha,” referring to Rittenhouse as if he’d been caught shoplifting at Target or a school resource officer found weed in his backpack. In the accompanying video, the CEO says Rittenhouse’s name and says they believe everyone is innocent until proven guilty before talking about how much they support veterans and are veteran-focused.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with the company saying they do not have a relationship with Kyle Rittenhouse if, in fact, they do not. In the before times, it was reasonable for a company to say they believe that everyone is innocent until proven guilty and to not comment on the matter further. BRCC is not just any company and the dismissive, disdainful way in which Rittenhouse was briefly referred to, before clumsily transitioning to singing the company’s praises with how much they love veterans, is telling.
Part of the issue is that once a company steps into politics, they cannot step back out. BRCC was not apolitical and then decided to take a side. They were not forced to wade into politics for the first time by this incident. They built their brand on being political, even if it did involve humor. They pander to right-leaning people, gun owners and veterans. They began peddling coffee wearing the costume of the anti-Starbucks coffee for real men, for warriors and bad ass, right-wing veterans who love shooting guns and freedom. Their CEO has been in videos humorously depicting a gun owner struggling to decide with which gun to address a home invader.
Some may see this as BRCC bending to the pressure of the screeching Left in some deluded attempt to appease them and win their favor. If the company hadn’t wrapped itself in politics and guns from the beginning, there might be an argument to be made there. Unfortunately, this is not the case and this company has shown itself to be an unreliable ally at best. It is becoming more obvious by the day that whatever BRCC began as, they are now a company with typical corporate sensibilities. In other words, the branding is just that – branding. A carefully curated image designed to sell product. They had an opportunity to stand up for someone using a black rifle in self-defense, but couldn’t be bothered to say his name in their statement.
John Stewart used to do a bit on his Comedy Central show where he would take off and put on his clown nose when it suited him. He was very serious while lecturing us about how bad we were for not being as left-leaning as he was. He would then put his clown nose on as soon as there was any kind of reaction other than tearful apologies, claiming to be just a comedian making jokes and further lecturing people not to take it personally. This same technique can be seen by many “comedians” on television, where they pretend they’re just kidding when people get mad about being lied to, about, or otherwise insulted.
What BRCC is doing in regards to Kyle Rittenhouse is not that different. They are loud and proud gun guys and right-leaning patriots – right up until someone, who is enough of a fan of them to buy and wear their merchandise, gets made the center of controversy for deciding he didn’t want to die at the hands of leftists trying to murder him. At the point there is something they could be legally liable or get fussed at by people who already refuse to buy their products, the lifestyle is just an advertising campaign.
Their political stances were nothing but a clown nose to be removed and put on when it suits them, and they appear to think they still live in an age where this is acceptable behavior. There is no more fence sitting. There is no more distancing oneself from controversy, especially after being so vocal about that very topic for so long. It is my fervent hope that BRCC picks its own side, the side of its customers, supporters and more importantly, the side of what is right.
It is not just the tepid, written by their lawyers, disavowal of Kyle without even the courtesy of using his name. That could be chalked up to basic corporate cowardice. No, the deeper issue is that the founder of the company, Evan Hafer, is on record donating money to both Barack Obama and Tulsi Gabbard, two openly anti-2A politicians. A man who names his company “Black Rifle Coffee Company” but then financially supports people who would make it illegal for his customers to own black rifles is a phony and a backstabber.
simply more con inc carpetbagging.
that said, more kyles are needed, but no crowders, and no dylanns either.
Its been brought to my attention that BRCC is in fact owned and operated by leftists one of which is a Yankee Jew.
I have said.this so many times that it bares repeating, subversion is our enemies bread and butter. They will wave our flag and take our positions, except, you know, one or two small things. Those small things are the gradual reconstruction of us from who we are to who they want us to be. They will steal our voices and within a generation our flag will stand for transgender rights or whatever else they want it to mean.
We need running lists that we can all access that tracks people and companies, to separate the real from the fake. Its far too much to keep track of for our beleaguered people, we have to start helping them fill in the blanks. They will buy just about anything with our flag on it and the money could very well go towards their own destruction. Its up to us to help them know better, we have to be more organized, if not soon they will be walking in the door talking about the “new South” and that will be the death of us.
We must organize, or they will do it for us. Their “New South” and their “Southern” leadership will be the end of us, our people and our culture.
We need lists and those lists need to be available for our people and approved only by the most based among us, those with zero tolerance for “just some small changes”. We need them now or the next time you see a Dixie brand product it will fund your own reconstruction.