Bass Pro Shops vs. Patagonia: Choosing a side in the camping store divide



There's nothing particularly political about camping. People across the ideological spectrum enjoy overnighting under the stars.

But buying camping gear is a whole different story. Before you pitch your tent, you have to declare where you pitch your tent.

Nowhere is this divide more pronounced than in the rivalry between retail behemoths Bass Pro Shops and Patagonia.

Bass Pro Shops appeals to a consumer who views the wilderness as a place to hunt, fish, and uphold traditional values. Patagonia markets to people who see the outdoors as something fragile, something that needs protection from climate change and corporate greed.

Stroll into a Bass Pro Shops location, and you’re greeted with a rustic, log-cabin feel, stuffed bears, shotguns and rifles, and camo gear lining the shelves, soundtracked by the giant waterfall in the middle of the store.

Head over to Patagonia, and you’re met with minimalist designs, organic cotton, and racks that practically hum with environmental consciousness, under the tip-tap electronica designed to make the customer feel cool.

Both sell adventure, but they represent two radically different ideas of what the great outdoors and America really mean.

Guns or Gaia

Bass Pro Shops doesn’t just sell fishing rods and binoculars — it sells a glimpse of Americana steeped in tradition. Founded in 1972, the brand champions a rural ethos where hunting, gun rights, and personal responsibility hold sway. With deep ties to the NRA and Ducks Unlimited, Bass Pro is more than a retailer — it’s a cultural hub for conservative America, where gun ranges and family-oriented outreach embolden patriotism and self-reliance.

Patagonia, founded one year later in 1973, occupies the opposite end of the spectrum. Its identity is rooted in activism, environmentalism, and anti-consumerism. Patagonia isn’t just a clothing brand; it’s a social movement. From suing the Trump administration over public lands to promoting sustainable practices like its “Worn Wear” program, Patagonia’s mission is to challenge the status quo. Here, every purchase feels like an act of environmental justice, not just a transaction; hence the bloated price tags.

Where Bass Pro celebrates frontier independence, Patagonia speaks to urban environmentalists. One sells rifles; the other urges Congress to take “immediate action” on gun control.

Hoodie activism

Retail companies overall have become social agitators.

Wearing a brand’s gear has always been a highly expressive act, an infusion of political symbolism that has overtaken society the past 200 years but that stretches back to tribal war paint.

Nowadays, any logo or slogan is far more than a fashion statement. It is a political declaration.

Sporting a Patagonia jacket tells the world you care about climate change and social justice. Slipping into a Bass Pro hoodie signals you’re a fan of gun rights and personal freedom.

Logos used to be the fingerprints of design. Now they’re the knuckles of a closed fist. And as outdoor retail continues to grow, brands like Patagonia and Bass Pro Shops will feel even more pressure to align with political and cultural movements.

In an era when every purchase is seen as a vote, companies can no longer promise customer satisfaction.

Giving away the store

Ultimately, what we have is a crisis of authority. Most Americans have lost faith in the traditional institutions but still care about social and political issues and believe that they need to be addressed. Big business, like the state, is just a bad substitution for this need.

As Vivek Ramaswamy points out in "Woke, Inc.," “corporate political allegiance” is little more than a marketing ploy that manipulates democracy and capitalism in tandem.

Vivek’s solution is to rebuild a deep, unifying American identity rooted in excellence. He sees capitalism and democracy as the mother and father of America, where capitalism can save the American dream and democracy can achieve E pluribus unum.

Americans are searching for something more profound than a brand. We’re stung by our profound need for roots: family, community, faith — something real and local.

Meanwhile this twilight of authority has led to outbreaks of naked power, where the warlords inundate the socio-cultural institutions with hedonism and radical “equality.”

And we are left more isolated than ever in this cultural moment, this era of anxiety, infected with moral and spiritual estrangement. Hence the desire to go camping.

Bringing it home

But there is a solution to the political turmoil engulfing outdoor retail and everything it symbolizes.

Civilizations thrive when the family unit is strong. "In societies where the family tie is fundamental, the power of the government stops literally at the threshold of the house," writes sociologist Robert Nisbet.

Authority is constructed from the ground up by each family, each individual, not imposed through a state of exception.

Outdoor retail has turned into a microcosm of America’s broader polarization. Bass Pro Shops appeals to a consumer who views the wilderness as a place to hunt, fish, and uphold traditional values. Patagonia markets to people who see the outdoors as something fragile, something that needs protection from climate change and corporate greed.

Both brands are thriving because they’ve doubled down on their identities. They’ve realized that in 2024, you can’t be neutral any more. Nonpartisanship has become the exception, not the rule.

As corporations increasingly play the role of political actors, the real task will lie in rebuilding the foundations that have been eroded. So for now we pick a side, the retailer that speaks in our voice.

All we wanted was a sleeping bag.

Tim Walz's attempt to woo men with hunting-themed photo op backfires



Kamala Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, have major issues with red-blooded American men and the Second Amendment. In a desperate effort to gain the support of the former and simulate support for the latter, Walz donned an orange hat and participated in a hunting-themed photo op on Saturday near Sleepy Eye, Minnesota.

This attempt to rehabilitate Walz's public image backfired — especially after footage circulated online showing the Democratic governor struggle with his firearm.

On Oct. 3, Trump campaign strategist Chris LaCivita noted on X, "Word on the street is Tampon Tim will be staging a Pheasant hunt soon ... manicured hands and all to prove that he is in fact not really a 'Beta' ... this will be fun to watch."

Sure enough, following days of mockery — during which Elmer Fudd memes and AI-generated images of Walz loading a shotgun with feminine hygiene products figured prominently — the Democratic governor participated in the 12th annual Minnesota Governor's Pheasant Hunting Opening in Sleepy Eye, then promptly shared a video documenting his failure to shoot a bird.

'This is just embarrassing.'

The proud gun-control supporter can be seen in the video walking around with a shotgun, chugging a diet Mountain Dew, and telling the tale of the time he allegedly "got a double."

While birds safely fluttered in the distance, Walz shared a few one-liners, including, "That's why it's hunting, not shooting, right?" and "There's good days and there's great days pheasant hunting."

After his not-so-great day pheasant hunting, critics seized upon a clip showing the governor struggle to load his shotgun.

Former Spartanburg Police Officer Cody Garrett, writing as Donut Operator, noted on X, "For a lifelong hunter, you sure were having trouble loading your own gun."

Another user wrote, "Bruh.. come on. This is just embarrassing. It's a good thing you defected before your deployment."

"Tim Walz claimed he carried 'weapons of war in combat' but he can’t load a shotgun? This guy is beyond weak. My little sister could beat him up," tweeted country music singer John Rich.

Rep. Derrick Van Orden (R-Wis.) was among the many who had some fun at Walz's expense, tweeting, "SLING AND A MISS."

"My prediction was in fact accurate," wrote LaCivita. "Staged ..and watching him bumbling around trying to load his shot gun was fun."

Referring to cable news footage of the outing, the Trump War Room noted, "MSNBC implies that Tim Walz going pheasant hunting is nothing more than a desperate attempt to make up ground with male voters. Sorry Tim, men aren't voting for a gun grabber."

The Harris-Walz campaign has significant ground to make up with male voters in the final weeks before the election.

A recent New York Times/Siena College poll revealed that 51% of likely male voters said they would vote for Trump. Only 40% of men said they would vote for Kamala Harris. This gendered skew is pronounced in swing states such as Arizona and Nevada, where a recent Suffolk University/USA TODAY survey indicated Hispanic men are majoritively keen to vote for Trump.

Although immigration appears to be a top concern for many likely male voters who are now supporting Trump, Harris and Walz may also have alienated men with their records on gun rights.

'The hunting community, in my opinion, will vote for someone that puts America first.'

The Harris campaign website indicates that if elected, she would "ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, require universal background checks, and support red flag laws that keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people."

Harris previously threatened to storm the homes of law-abiding Americans for surprise gun inspections; endorsed a handgun ban without buybacks; and signed an amicus curiae brief both justifying a total handgun ban and suggesting that the Second Amendment does not secure an individual right but rather a "collective" or "militia-related" right.

The Washington Post noted that unlike Harris, Walz was not always hostile to the Second Amendment, having once earned an "A" rating from the National Rifle Association. However, in recent years, he has become a zealous anti-gun activist, proudly earning nothing but straight "F" ratings and publicly blasting the NRA as "the biggest single obstacle to passing the most basic measures to prevent gun violence in America."

Walz has since boasted of his efforts to ban bump stocks and assault rifles, as well as his fight to prevent concealed-carry reciprocity. In June, Walz ratified legislation banning the use of binary triggers. Last year, he ratified a raft of gun-control measures, including universal background checks and a red-flag law.

Walz's photo op is unlikely to make critics forget about his record or Harris', just as it appears to have done little to win over hunters and conservationists.

Gabriella Hoffman, director of the Center for Energy and Conservation at the Independent Women's Forum, told the Spectator, "No $40 camo hat will convince most sportsmen and women that Harris-Walz represents them."

"Vice President Harris has been an active partner with President Biden in being the most hostile administration to shooting sports, hunting, and fishing access. Her name is co-signed on closing millions of acres of public hunting lands in Alaska, forbidding lead tackle on national wildlife refuges, and recently shutting down shooting sports opportunities in the entirety of Bears Ears National Monument — 1.3 million acres," said Hoffman. "Hunters and anglers don’t trust Harris-Walz."

Derek Wolfe, host of the outdoorsman podcast "Wolfe Untamed," said, "They have made it clear that they are coming for guns, fracking, gas-powered vehicles, just to name a few. They know that 10 million hunters didn't vote in the last election, so they are reaching out, but it's a waste of their time because the hunting community, in my opinion, will vote for someone that puts America first. And I believe that man is Donald J. Trump."

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North Face offers discount for taking 'racial inclusion' course on 'barriers that people of colour face in the outdoors'



The North Face, an outdoor clothing company, is currently offering a 40% discount to customers who take an hour-long "racial inclusion" course that discusses the "barriers that people of colour face in the outdoors," the Sun reported Monday.

The company's "Allyship in the Outdoors" is a digital course about "racial inclusion and allyship." According to the Sun, the online program was launched last month, offering a discount to those who complete all four modules and correctly answer quizzes at the end of each section.

Once signing up for the digital course through the clothing company's website, customers receive an email with a link to begin the lesson.

"The course will help you understand the challenges that people of colour face when accessing the outdoors. It will also provide training and resources to help you be a better ally and to make the outdoors a safer and more welcoming place for everyone," the email from the North Face stated.

The company's course "focuses on perspectives of race and racism in Europe," the course explained.

Students of the course will "build awareness and knowledge of people of colour in the outdoors," "understand barriers and challenges by listening to lived experiences," "understand the power of allyship," and "adopt effective strategies and tools for allyship in action."

While "the outdoor are for everyone," the course stated, "not all of us can access the outdoors equally and have the resources to do so." It noted that "people of colour are less likely to go climbing, hiking, skiing, snowboarding, and trail running."

According to the North Face, the Black Lives Matter "movement" after "George Floyd was murdered by the police" helped to spark "a new awakening in the outdoors that racial inclusion and representation matters in sports."

The clothing brand aims to "create a more equitable outdoors for everyone," noting that "equity acknowledges that everyone comes from different circumstances and allocates resources and opportunities accordingly, so that everyone can reach an equal outcome."

Another section of the course stated that "privilege can give us access to the outdoors."

"In this context, we refer to 'white privilege' meaning that your race and skin colour can give you access to the outdoors when others can be excluded because of historic, enduring racism and biases," it read.

The course instructs customers to report coworkers to their manager if they call them "woke," the Sun reported.

The founder of Free Speech Union, Toby Young, told the news outlet, "The irony is that The North Face is implicitly acknowledging here that all its customers are white."

"After all, why would black customers need to take a course about 'white privilege' to get a 20 per cent discount? But if all customers are white, shouldn't it be examining the beam in its own eye?" Young questioned.

The North Face told the New York Post, "The North Face has always believed the outdoors should be a welcoming, equitable and safe place for all. This course aims to bring light to the barriers to entry preventing all people from sharing equally rewarding experiences in the outdoors."

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Scandal-plagued Boy Scouts of America pitch a tent for LGBT activists at national jamboree



Working to salvage its reputation in the wake of a multibillion-dollar sex-abuse settlement and corresponding bankruptcy, the Boy Scouts of America has once again signaled whose esteem it values.

Mike De Socio penned a piece for the Washington Post Thursday wherein he lavished praise on the BSA for staging its first-ever "affinity space for LGBTQ youth" — a massive tent erected at the heart of the Scouts' National Jamboree in Glen Jean, West Virginia.

The tent, wrote De Socio, was "decorated with a canopy of LGBTQ Pride flags and a string of multicolored lights, its tables covered with bowls of rainbow bracelets, pronoun stickers and diversity patches."

The "LGBTQ+ and allied scouts" area was one among three featured "community spaces" inside the tent. There were also spaces for "scouts of color" and "women in scouting."

De Socio intimated that the popularity of these spaces late last month among members may signal a victor in the battle between "champions of diversity and inclusion against conservatives and the religious right," at least where the BSA is concerned.

Woke scouts

The BSA, founded in 1910, is one of the largest youth organizations in the U.S., with purportedly over 1 million youth members and 628,000 volunteers.

Its stated mission is to "prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling them the values of the Scout Oath and Law."

The Scout Oath binds scouts to do their best to do their duty "to God and [their] country and to ... help other people at all times; to keep [themselves] physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight."

In 2019, it changed its name to Scouts BSA to reflect its decision to allow girls to become scouts.

Years earlier, it ended both its prohibition on openly gay scouts as well as its ban on openly gay scout leaders and had even welcomed girls who claimed to be boys.

In recent months and years, the organization has embraced woke initiatives, evidenced by its:

  • appointment of "DEI leads for each of our 16 National Service Territories to partner with the leaders and troops with the leaders and troops within their territories to implement and advance our commitment to DEI";
  • introduction of "training that will empower participants to identify and recognize implicit bias" along with race, sexual preference, and gender-based resource groups; and
  • roll out of a "Citizenship in Society" merit badge, "encouraging Scouts to explore important topics around diversity, equity, inclusion and ethical leadership and learn why these qualities are important in society and in Scouting."

During the BLM riots in 2020, the BSA announced it would require that Eagle Scouts earn a diversity and inclusion badge, force all BSA employees to undertake diversity and inclusion training, and altogether "ensure diversity and inclusion are engrained at every level for participants and volunteers."

Earlier this year, the BSA began surveying members over whether it was time to jettison century-long traditions and practices that may upset iconoclasts and activists worried about "cultural appropriation," reported NBC News.

It does not appear the BSA is done revolutionizing itself.

LGBT activists' latest forward operating base

The Washington Post reported that thousands of kids trafficked through the LGBT activist tent at this year's BSA National Jamboree where 18-year-old River Capell, a self-declared "pansexual" scout volunteer from Northern Virginia, joined other activists in peddling advice.

"There's been days where there's 2,000 kids in this tent alone. And that is just, like, absurd," said Capell. "I've had some scouts asking genuine questions, like 'What does it mean to be this? What does it mean to be that?' ... But it was all curiosity, and how do I help, rather than [hostility]. So it's all been incredibly welcoming and positive."

While the feeling was purportedly positive, the 10-day jamboree saw a significant drop in attendance in recent years.

The group of scouts former President Donald Trump addressed in 2017 — a speech the BSA later apologized for — comprised an estimated 40,000 souls, whereas De Socio observed a crowd no bigger than 15,000 scouts and volunteers this time around.

Dwayne Fontenette Jr., DEI lead at the Jamboree, told De Socio earlier this year that the plan with the tent was to enable scouts "to engage with the DEI programming throughout the day" and "share additional resources that leaders can take home, so that they can improve the culture within their local programs."

In some of the progressive "community spaces," De Socio indicated kids could find guidance on "how to be an ally" as well acquire agitprop.

Paige Morgan, a self-identified "bisexual" who spoke to De Socio, suggested that "the people that are coming through here, like trans, nonbinary youth, the queer youth, are having a great time seeing themselves represented in a space that they love so much."

The Post indicated that Christian tents appeared far less popular this year, although that may be a result of conservatives and Christians sending their kids elsewhere for strengthening and edification.

Some BSA alternatives

For instance, some might turn to Trail Life USA, an explicitly Christian BSA alternative that rose to prominence in 2013 following the Scouts' announcement it would begin admitting openly gay members.

The male-only organization's stated mission is "to guide generations of courageous young men to honor God, lead with integrity, serve others, and experience outdoor adventure."

Unencumbered by a debilitating sex scandal or deference to corporate donors, Trail Life has partnered with over 1,000 churches in all 50 states and presently has north of 50,000 members.

The Columbian Squires, a youth fraternity run by the Knights of Columbus for Catholic boys ages 10 to 18, was formed nearly a century ago and presently boasts around 25,000 members.

The Squires is touted as a program "to develop young men as leaders who understand their Catholic religion, who have a strong commitment to the Church and who are ready, willing and capable of patterning their lives after the Youth Christ."

The North American Division of Seventh-day Adventists has the co-ed Adventurers, the Pathfinders, and Master Guides ministries on offer.

The Calvinist Cadet Corps, established in 1952, is another option with tens of thousands of members in the U.S., Canada, Kenya, and Uganda.

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