Ok, been sick in bed all weekend, ended up with Strep Throat and it's time for me to RANT since I can't talk.
When I started this site, and not with the core guys Like Greg L, but once we hit about 2000 members people used to fall over themselves trying to claim I lied about everything. I was accused of forging my Sniper School Certificate, not being a Marine, to the point where the President of the USMC Scout Sniper Association had to say, probably more than once, "Hey he is vetted knock it off". It was pretty common to hear stories of people saying I was full of shit. Or when proven wrong that my actual service didn't amount to anything.
Now I am not expecting people to like me at, I never operated with the motive of making friends, I did what I wanted to do, my way. I purposely avoided having accounts on other boards, and did not spend any time watching the other guys in order to position myself better. Instead I went out and did things like teach, shoot competitively and never backed away from the idea, I am happy to fail in public rather than build up my resume online. I have no reason to inflate my personal experiences because let's face, nobody pays it no mind. It's my experience and it doesn't matter to the next guy or to someone reading any posts I made. We all have the ability to take or leave it. It's TV, if you don't like the show we can all change the channel.
But over the years, we have been the launch point for a lot of "other sites" out there. And if you have a good reason to start another site, good on you. One example is Paul over at 6mmbr.com / Accurate Shooter... he expanded the niche and does a great job. But there have been a lot of others who's sole reason for starting a site has been to poke me in the eye. They don't like me, they can do it better, yadda, yadda. I'm this, fuck Frank on that, he's an Asshole... I have heard it all, and I have seen them come and go. They start a site, stick ads on it from day one with 300 members (after PM'ing people on here) and call me greedy. We went over 8 years here before a single ad appeared on this site... to keep that in mind.
In the last few months, you had Sniper Company come and go, and that was direct offshoot of this place because originally I insulted the Shawn, and then banned a bunch of guys who were having fun taking pot shots at me on here. Sure I saw them poking me daily and finally said fuck it and banned them. At which point SC was born.
People were all too happy to believe everything they read, you didn't see much, but you heard an awful lot. You had pictures with celebrities in the industry, big names who bought the BS and were happy to pose. Fast forward to today....
Now I have no ill will against Shaggy, I have stood face to face with him, and listened to what he had to say. But I never once believed anything he said. In fact I called him out in 2010 and said as much. Still people were happy to jump on the bandwagon because the story sounded great and he wasn't Frank.
There is a reason people will entertain stuff that really makes no sense, they want you to like them. They believe this is a popularity contest rather than a meaningful exchange of information. If you are willing to embrace something that doesn't pass the sniff test, you aren't looking for valid information, you're looking for someone to agree with you, or you're looking to make friends u'd we all know how well I do that. The difference is, I don't care if you like me, I don't care if you need me to agree with you, none of that changes anything. The only reason that matters is if you are looking to collect FB Friends. If goes against my personal experience I will say so, and while people will complain about my "tone" it's nothing more than straight forward.
Tone over the internet is nearly impossible to determine, yet I get comments about my "tone" all the time. It's usually because I poked a hole in their theory as to why. Sure I am quick to blame the shooter over some microscopic variation but that is what my experience has taught me. Yes David Tubb might be able to discern the difference, "Bob" with is new 5R cannot. That is my Tone... I do classes every month, mostly brand new shooters, that illuminates a lot of things.
Well I have made my point about as well as I can with a head full of DayQuil, so take if from there... but understand SH has been doing this a long time and it's not because of me winning popularity contests, but because we don't suffer fools and we value solid information over the talk. You can question my tone, it's a lot harder to question the level of my experience when it comes to a precision rifle.
When I started this site, and not with the core guys Like Greg L, but once we hit about 2000 members people used to fall over themselves trying to claim I lied about everything. I was accused of forging my Sniper School Certificate, not being a Marine, to the point where the President of the USMC Scout Sniper Association had to say, probably more than once, "Hey he is vetted knock it off". It was pretty common to hear stories of people saying I was full of shit. Or when proven wrong that my actual service didn't amount to anything.
Now I am not expecting people to like me at, I never operated with the motive of making friends, I did what I wanted to do, my way. I purposely avoided having accounts on other boards, and did not spend any time watching the other guys in order to position myself better. Instead I went out and did things like teach, shoot competitively and never backed away from the idea, I am happy to fail in public rather than build up my resume online. I have no reason to inflate my personal experiences because let's face, nobody pays it no mind. It's my experience and it doesn't matter to the next guy or to someone reading any posts I made. We all have the ability to take or leave it. It's TV, if you don't like the show we can all change the channel.
But over the years, we have been the launch point for a lot of "other sites" out there. And if you have a good reason to start another site, good on you. One example is Paul over at 6mmbr.com / Accurate Shooter... he expanded the niche and does a great job. But there have been a lot of others who's sole reason for starting a site has been to poke me in the eye. They don't like me, they can do it better, yadda, yadda. I'm this, fuck Frank on that, he's an Asshole... I have heard it all, and I have seen them come and go. They start a site, stick ads on it from day one with 300 members (after PM'ing people on here) and call me greedy. We went over 8 years here before a single ad appeared on this site... to keep that in mind.
In the last few months, you had Sniper Company come and go, and that was direct offshoot of this place because originally I insulted the Shawn, and then banned a bunch of guys who were having fun taking pot shots at me on here. Sure I saw them poking me daily and finally said fuck it and banned them. At which point SC was born.
People were all too happy to believe everything they read, you didn't see much, but you heard an awful lot. You had pictures with celebrities in the industry, big names who bought the BS and were happy to pose. Fast forward to today....
Over the last few months, we at PRE have been dealing with the personal struggles of Pete Petersen (aka Shaggy). Wil and I have spent that time trying to help someone we thought we knew well through what appeared to be a severe struggle with PTSD and alcoholism. In the course of helping this person get back on his feet, we discovered that he's been lying to all of us, about everything.
As far as we've been able to confirm in the last two weeks (and now by his own admission), Pete's "career" since at least 2005 is entirely fiction. To most of us, Pete's portrayed himself as a SWAT Sniper for various Police Departments & Sheriffs Departments in Texas and recently as a member of the Louisiana State Attorney General's office investigating child pornography and other sex crimes. To others, we're now learning he's claimed to have been an Army Ranger Sniper, or a Scout Sniper with 3/2 Marines. He's also claimed to have worked for Blackwater as a DDM/Sniper at some point between 2004-2007.
To put it bluntly, none of that is true. We have now been able to confirm, and he has admitted (in recorded phone call) to the following: He has never been on any SWAT team, he has never served a day in any military service. He has never worked for Blackwater in any capacity. He has never worked for the state of Louisiana in any capacity. He worked as a part time dispatcher for UT Arlington's PD for a period of 5 months before a very short stint as a police officer in the DFW area. Since 2005, Pete's worked for Dell computers as a sales associate until recently, when he moved to New Orleans where he currently works as an IT associate for PoolCorp, a national swimming pool supply company, located in Covington, LA.
To be clear, Pete has never been in control of the financial/business side of PRE, and he has not had an active role beyond contributing a few facebook posts since February of this year. Wil and I are both committed to the success of PRE and will continue putting every bit of energy into it's continued success.
Pete has lied to all of us, and to a large part of the firearms industry. Wil and I are incredibly angry and are actively pursuing every legal avenue available to ensure he does not do this again. We're posting this publicly, and tagging each of you so that we can ensure you're fully aware of what's transpired in the last few weeks and to ensure Pete is never able to step foot in the firearms industry again.
Now I have no ill will against Shaggy, I have stood face to face with him, and listened to what he had to say. But I never once believed anything he said. In fact I called him out in 2010 and said as much. Still people were happy to jump on the bandwagon because the story sounded great and he wasn't Frank.
There is a reason people will entertain stuff that really makes no sense, they want you to like them. They believe this is a popularity contest rather than a meaningful exchange of information. If you are willing to embrace something that doesn't pass the sniff test, you aren't looking for valid information, you're looking for someone to agree with you, or you're looking to make friends u'd we all know how well I do that. The difference is, I don't care if you like me, I don't care if you need me to agree with you, none of that changes anything. The only reason that matters is if you are looking to collect FB Friends. If goes against my personal experience I will say so, and while people will complain about my "tone" it's nothing more than straight forward.
Tone over the internet is nearly impossible to determine, yet I get comments about my "tone" all the time. It's usually because I poked a hole in their theory as to why. Sure I am quick to blame the shooter over some microscopic variation but that is what my experience has taught me. Yes David Tubb might be able to discern the difference, "Bob" with is new 5R cannot. That is my Tone... I do classes every month, mostly brand new shooters, that illuminates a lot of things.
Well I have made my point about as well as I can with a head full of DayQuil, so take if from there... but understand SH has been doing this a long time and it's not because of me winning popularity contests, but because we don't suffer fools and we value solid information over the talk. You can question my tone, it's a lot harder to question the level of my experience when it comes to a precision rifle.