It’s Not Only the Body That Must Be Made Stronger

A contribution on mental health by George Virgil

While guys in our thing, be they Fascist, White Nationalist, National Socialist, or some other ideology place a great deal of emphasis on physical strength and aesthetics – one area that is sorely lacking our focus is mental fortitude and our collective efforts to build up not only the physiques of our brothers, but the strength of their minds as well.

I am writing this as a person who has long struggled with depression, and as a result, I have damaged and destroyed many connections over the years, burned several bridges, and constantly felt the need to move away from that wreckage and attempt to start anew. No, this won’t solve the problem – I know that – but in my mistaken darkened thoughts, I think it will save me from the stress of being in the same area as those who I feel who no longer want me around and who won’t miss me when I’m gone – again, it will not.

I promise I will attempt to make this article something more than just a black-pilling whining fest. Most readers probably never deal with depression (or don’t admit that they do) so this article is targeted at those guys to help them better understand what some of us go through when we are lost in the darkness inside of our own minds.

Think of it like encouraging a brother to work out…

As I mentioned before, we are hyper focused at times on the outside shell in our thing – who’s the most Chad, who has the best physique, who is swole or jacked, etc. And while physical fitness is important, and more importantly, aesthetics allows those of us who do face to face activism to achieve a more receptive audience for our message, no less important is our mental health.

I want to give an analogy: you have a close friend who is overweight; he’s struggled to lose those 100lbs he’s put on over the last decade from poor diet and lack of exercise. Of course, you encourage him to eat better and join a gym, “I’ll go lift with you!” you tell him, encouraging him that he won’t be alone and that you’ll help him see beyond the intimidation of the gym setting that some guys face. Or perhaps you offer to go bike riding with him, or jogging around the park. These simple steps go a long way towards helping your friend lose the weight he wants to lose and get in better physical shape.

As he begins to improve physically, he begins to feel better about himself, his clothes fit better, he starts getting compliments from those around him, and his overall mood and mental outlook improves. Perhaps not in all cases, but in most cases, this tends to be the outcome.

We need to approach mental health the same way. If you have a brother in our thing struggling with depression, is contemplating suicide and has made that known to you, or who has recently gone through a great deal of stress due to a major loss (job, wife, girlfriend, death in the family, legal trouble), we as brothers need to be there for one another.

Be there for your brother as much as you’d expect him to be there for you when you need help.

Some things you can do to help…

Often the best thing you can do for a brother when he’s depressed is just be there for him – offer to hang out and do something you’d both enjoy, which helps get his mind off of those dark thoughts. Some other possible actions include telling or showing them you appreciate them, that they’ve been a positive in your life in some way and that you’re thankful they are there. Even asking them to help you in some small way could prove a positive and help counter those dark thoughts because you make them feel like they are needed and you are giving them a purpose, even something as small as moving furniture or fixing something around your place. If they have a skill that you appreciate about them, ask them to put that skill to use, and you’ll help them out as well.

If you are so inclined, you could also act much as an AA or NA sponsor would; hold them accountable to working towards improving. Check in with them periodically to ask what they’ve done to counter their depression. If they are seeing a counselor, how is that going? Encourage them to keep at it in whatever method they are trying to better themselves. I know there is an inclination in our society not to talk about these topics, but that’s not healthy. Pretending a brother isn’t going through depression isn’t going to help him recover and improve any more than pretending a brother isn’t obese will help him lose weight.

The absolute worst thing you can do for someone who is depressed is isolate them. Yes, I understand that it’s a lot of work to deal with someone who is depressed. You see them as a constant negative, and you don’t want them to bring you down. Or worse, if they’ve made known they want to kill themselves, you figure you can’t help them and so you push them out of your life because you don’t want to deal with the outcome or feel guilty in some way for the actions they might take to end their lives.

But I promise you, even though dealing with them will be rough initially, especially if they are in a very deep depression or talking about killing themselves, keep at it and don’t let them feel alone. If you feel like they need to see a counselor or talk to a priest or pastor, offer to take them there personally, offer to be there and wait for them.

Their success will be OUR success, and we want them to succeed and overcome their internal demons.

The American mentality of hiding our feelings is not healthy…

I can tell you as someone who’s lost two friends in my life to suicide, the fact that they are making their issues known means they trust you, they want your help, and they are confiding in you because they don’t really want to go that route. My two friends who ended their own lives seemed happy all the time, seemed like life was going great for them, until one day one hung himself in his garage and the other shot himself in the head.

As American men, we often look down on one another if we express one iota of our feelings. We are often told to “man up” or to simply bottle up our feelings. This ends up pushing our guys towards drugs and alcohol to cope, to cover up those feelings. I’ve likely had a few other friends who, having died from overdose, were probably depressed and suicidal and that was just an easier way out for them.

No, I am not suggesting that we need to put up with someone talking about their feelings 24/7. Let a brother vent about what’s going on. He’s probably not asking you to help fix him, so don’t go into it thinking that’s the case; plus mental issues are by nature something that needs to be solved internally anyway. DO try to encourage him in the ways I laid out above though – but also realize that much like a chubby bro doesn’t turn into Arnold overnight, he isn’t going to suddenly become a fully functional mentally strong individual in one sitting.

Be patient with him, but encourage him as he positively makes improvements overcoming his internal struggles.

We’re all in this together, we need to realize that and stop tearing one another down…

One cause of a great deal of stress for our guys is the interpersonal conflicts and infighting. I’m someone who joined this movement because I want to see our people survive, thrive, and become stronger. I am not in this for my personal gain, in fact, joining the groups I have has been incredibly difficult for me at times and made my life more difficult as a result. And what makes it difficult are these petty little spats between people that accomplish nothing other than destroying our nascent movement before we can really get things rolling.

Every brother we push away because of some squabble over tactics, some slight we can’t get over, or some other thing holding us back from fully trusting him or at least working together towards our common goal is a huge loss to our movement. More than this, these things cause one another a great deal of unnecessary stress and leads to burn out at best, or deep depression and potential suicide at worse.

“Well, if a dude is depressed or suicidal, they shouldn’t be in our thing anyway. We only need strong men in our movement!” you might think.

I’m sorry, but I’ve met a great number of guys in various groups in our movement – and while a vast majority of them are solid guys, they aren’t all walking anatomy charts as is, why should we expect them to be mentally perfect as well?

There is a major difference between a brother who is being overly dramatic, or is just someone who likes to stir up drama, and a brother who is legitimately struggling with mental health issues. Not all of us process stress or are able to cope with it in the same way. For one brother, losing a job because he was doxed might not be a big deal and he’ll shrug it off and go out looking for another one right away – and to another, it could mean spiraling into deep depression and trying to suck start a shotgun.

Even for those of you reading this who believe you’ve never been depressed (and maybe you never have), I am simply asking you to understand that key point. We all have different minds and our minds process information in different ways. Some of us are creative, some more analytical, some of us enjoy more active pursuits, and others like to do things on their own. As a result, we all bring different skills and experiences to the table, but also our own past baggage and struggles.

So to recap…

• Try to help your brothers out with mental strength as much as you would attempt to help them out with improving their physical strength
• Invite him out to do shared activities, do not let him feel isolated, make him feel appreciated, give him something to do using his skills
• Don’t feel like you are expected to help fix your brother, that’s a struggle he needs to overcome, but being there for him will help remove some stress to allow him to work on things effectively
• Encourage him to work on his mental issues, check in with him to make sure he’s progressing
• Don’t blow off their concerns or make them feel like they just need to hide their emotions or pretend they don’t exist – those feelings don’t go away until they’re dealt with
• Help your brother by reducing the external stress they deal with – stop the bickering and infighting and encourage more comradery and collaboration

We’re all in this together, our struggle is a shared one, and we need all the help we can get to overcome our enemies. There’s the old saying that we’re only as strong as our weakest link – so much as we try to build our guys up physically, we can’t neglect the mental side of things as well.

I know it would be easier to simply cut those guys out, tell them to come back when they are better – but understand that a lot of guys (such as myself) came to this movement because we felt we had nowhere else we fit in or belonged. We still have a purpose, we can still contribute to the movement with our blood, sweat, and tears –don’t shortchange a brother because he may not be 100% mentally healthy, especially if he can help the movement out in so many ways.

If you have beef with a brother and you can’t get back to a working relationship, understand that perhaps they have their own issues they’re dealing with and you may be making things harder on them or vice versa. In that case, take a step back, take a break if needed, and allow things to cool off between you both. Hopefully in time, they will cool down and maybe you can pick things up once more on a better footing.

Look out for one another, be there for each other, and together we shall overcome our enemies!