James Yeager: Gun Channel Bannings on YouTube

Over the last year every gun channel on YouTube has been demonetized, videos deleted by YouTube staff without warning, accounts suspended without explanation, and outright bannings that are obviously targeted at the firearms community. A couple of days ago James Yeager, a controversial figure in the YouTube gun channel community was banned outright from YouTube and many in the gun community are screaming censorship. I do not share this view.

James Yeager is a former private military contractor who served in Iraq. A video of him hiding in a ditch while his buddies get lit up by insurgents has been floating around for several years. He is the owner and operator of Tactical Response, a training facility in Tennessee.



Yeager's training methods are questionable at best and when called out on it he likes to make threats and ban people from discussions about his methods, both on YouTube and Facebook. His threats lead to his CCW being revoked. Of course no one in Tennessee would have even noticed him had he not lied about his state credentials, which gave the police a reason to start digging into him, since said credentials and certs were not offered by Tennessee at all.

Why am I bringing this up? Because the "gun community" is telling me I have hitch my trailer to this asshole and show support for him just because he's a "gun guy". This guy should be arrested, evaluated, and adjudicated mentally ill, his arms seized, and his school closed for the VERY REAL DANGER he poses to the firearms community in particular, and the public in general who may seek training from this guy.

Then there's his support for garbage gun companies like Century Arms International, InterOrdnance, and even Hi-Point. He shills for these companies even though they build sub-par weapons that are more often grenades than firearms. Matter of fact, the more you read about James Yeager, the less and less any person of moral rectitude would want him standing shoulder to shoulder with them on gun rights, or anything else.

YouTube has, in fact, taken a hostile approach to gun channels. But James Yeager has been building himself up to this particular ban for years now. The only surprise here is that it didn't happen earlier.

Be careful who you call an ally.

Happy Shooting.

a reply to: projectvxn

he can use vimeo, or any other free platform no one charges him to pay to upload his videos for free at no cost to him whatsoever and absolutely gratis with no compounding fees or interest no matter what size the videos are.

if i hosted videos for people for free under my rules and there was even a slight indication of obstruction of my policies or ethos, bye bye.

btw there's a million gun channels on YouTube.
this happens to be a twat

a reply to: odzeandennz

I'm well aware.

That really isn't the point of this post.

While people have issues with YouTube regarding gun channels, I generally share your view with regard to how they police their content.

My problem with this fiasco is that people are both surprised AND somehow incensed at the notion that this guy was some kind of victim of YouTube policies, when he shouldn't even be allowed to walk as a free man.

a reply to: projectvxn

I reviewed the video. Its hard to watch, the 'ambush' doesn't occur till near the end and as usual, mad minutes are abrupt and violent.

Comments section is disabled, some narration about what we are seeing might be helpful.

a reply to: intrptr

What you are seeing is an ambush by Iraqi insurgents on Yeager’s convoy.

Yeagers actions helped box in that convoy. Rather than pushing through and un-assing the area, he stopped and hid in a ditch.

a reply to: projectvxn

I've noticed him, too. Not favorably. Hadn't seen the video before...not cool, not cool, at all.

I've my doubts this was "censorship", as much as it was not wanting to get caught by the short and curly's when it, inevitably, went wrong...

a reply to: seagull

Indeed. As I've said, Yeager was on this path for a long time. The ONLY surprise to me is that it took this long. When he made the threats that got his CCW revoked, he did so on YouTube. Why he wasn't banned after that is unknown to me.

But if it were about censorship, I don't think YT would have waited this long to make it happen.

originally posted by: projectvxn
a reply to: intrptr

What you are seeing is an ambush by Iraqi insurgents on Yeager’s convoy.

Yeagers actions helped box in that convoy. Rather than pushing through and un-assing the area, he stopped and hid in a ditch.

Got the ambush part. They were stopped and stayed in their car for some time a), giving time for the ambush to be set up and b), I thought they were all stupid for remaining near their vehicles in the open on the road.

Civilian vehicles aren't good cover, my first thought was to get out of the kill box and seek cover along the roadside, too! Military doctrine says get out of the kill zone as quick as possible, you know that.

After he comes back a mortar round impacts right there, right? Those vehicle's should be hauling ass long before that. I can see one try turning around. I can hear one person yelling,

ETA: At 34:55 :

"We gotta gethafkoutta'ere!"

a reply to: projectvxn

Good ole James Yeager.

As I have said many times, it is the gun nuts and such that pose a bigger risk to our 2nd amendment rights than any other group.

That being said, I believe Yeager is banned from holding his classes at a few ranges and clubs. Not entirely sure why, but I seem to remember that there were incidents that occurred in which people's safety was compromised.

a reply to: intrptr

Military doctrine says get out of the kill zone as quick as possible, you know that.

Yes it does.

They did EVERYTHING wrong. Paid for it.

Once you're in the killbox, You seek cover, yes, but you have to FIGHT your way out now. That is not what happened. Yeager's actions forced the convoy into being stuck in the box. Instead of fighting his way out(which is the right move)he HID in the ditch according to the others who survived. In the initial 30 seconds all vehicles were disabled and 3 guys were KIA.

a reply to: introvert

Not entirely sure why, but I seem to remember that there were incidents that occurred in which people's safety was compromised.

He thinks it's good training to shoot while there are people down range.

a reply to: projectvxn

They did EVERYTHING wrong. Paid for it.

Agreed. WTF where they doing sitting so long in the middle of the road, all grouped together?

"Shoot at me."

Why am I bringing this up? Because the "gun community" is telling me I have hitch my trailer to this asshole and show support for him just because he's a "gun guy".

You're following the wrong fellas then. All the ones I've seen have been putting him on blast left and right, amigo.

a reply to: Shamrock6

Well when hickock45 and others go to bat for this guy you kinda start running out of options.

a reply to: projectvxn

I'm surprised this didn't happen years ago!
James Yeager doesn't know his stuff about firearms no matter how much he professes to be an expert,this is abundantly clear to people who actually know a bit about firearms,much like the over the counter guys at a Cabela's.
A lot of self-professing "experts" are nothing of the sort,I know more than most about firearms but I do not claim to be an expert because there is always something more to learn.

a reply to: projectvxn

True. To be fair, I don't watch much/any gun-related stuff on YT. I follow several pages on Instagram though, (OAF, some LEO pages, etc) and basically to a man they've all had something megative to say about him in the last few days.

I watched the video you posted in your OP and once the ambush kicked off it dawned on me that I'd seen the video before, except when I saw it years ago it was posted as some sort of illustration as to how "bad ass" PMCs were. Had no idea that was the video everybody was referencing with Yeager.

I'm currently trying to sign up for classes with him, because if there's anything I like more than having somebody following me on the range and shooting live rounds at my feet, it's having a guy who did the only thing dumber than standing and fighting in a kill zone (y'know...because trying to hide and not fight manages to be even worse than at least fighting) be the one shooting at my feet. You want in?

Let me tell you what kind of man James Yeager is. I took Fighting Pistol from him years back when he was giving one of his satellite classes away from his facilities in Tennessee. I was a broke college kid and I even had to use a coupon I'd gotten from a magazine to pay for the class.

Yeager found out from a mutual friend that'd done some work for him that the weekend of the class I'd planned to camp out because it was cheaper. Weather wasn't terribly great that weekend and upon confirming this after the first day of the class he demanded in very loud and profane terms that I pull up stakes and come crash in the condo that he and the other instructors rented for the weekend.

The next morning breakfast was on his dime.

Take from that what you will.

a reply to: netwarrior

You can be a nice guy and suck at your job. Lots of people do it

You can strongly disagree with Yeager, and still not agree with banning him. What'd he do? I don't know much about his history, other than he did some bad work in Iraq and whatnot; I know he posted a video on youtube where he talked about killing people if his guns were ever taken from him. I provide videos about this below the first video. The first is another gun advocate commenting about Yeager and what his thoughts are on youtube banning him:

a reply to: jonnywhite

Yeager made his bed. More than once.

This was inevitable and Yeager has no one but himself to blame.

There is no right to remain on YouTube and I don't think YouTube should take on the potential liability of allowing this unstable nutjob to promote his fake training facility and fake training tactics on their platform.