‹ Back

The nationalist sphere of politics is unusual among every other sphere, in the sense that although it correctly identifies the root causes of many of society’s problems, and says things that most people agree with, it is also maligned, ignored and lacking in serious credibility with the average person on the street. For two years I have asked myself why this is, and since I spearheaded the creation of the National Rebirth Party, I have been able to work out the answer. To understand what that answer is, and how to put the failure to an end, we have to ask another question:

 

What makes someone a nationalist?

 

There are many people who call themselves nationalists, and yet very few people can actually offer a definition of one. In most cases it is a label people give to themselves. It is increasingly obvious to me that in most cases, the label is actually incorrect. Most interpretations of ‘nationalism’ involve being opposed to immigration, being in favour of a strong military, and national independence. What all of these interpretations have in common, is that they are based on things that people think or things that people say. And once you realise this, you also realise that what every single one of these interpretations lack, is any measurement of what people DO.

 

It is the way that a person lives and the deeds that do that give someone the right to call themselves a nationalist – words mean absolutely nothing because talk is cheap. It isn’t a question of what a nationalist looks like, or sounds like, but a question of what a nationalist behaves like. So how does a genuine nationalist behave?

 

Putting their people before themselves. A nationalist would always seek to do what is right for their people, rather than what is right for themselves personally. They would be a good neighbour, a person that others would want to live alongside, not a person that others would loathe to be around. A nationalist would leave the people around them in a better state than when they met them.

 

Honest work. A true nationalist rejects laziness, lethargy or shirking responsibility. They work hard for themselves and for those around them. They do not steal, cheat, parasite, or take shortcuts in life by trying to everything with the least possible effort.

 

Integrity. A nationalist does not lie, nor do they suffer people to lie to them. They do not misrepresent themselves or act like frauds and crooks. They do not change their principles like the wind or pretend to be things that they aren’t.

 

The reason why so many nationalist people or groups are treated with such disrespect by wider society, is because even though they might say and think things that most people agree with, their actions speak louder than any words. Someone can present all the right ideas, but if they are an antisocial, reclusive, self-interested mess, then that is how they will be treated, and nobody in their right mind will deem their ideas to be worthy of being listened to. When you actually measure the standard of what makes a nationalist by actions rather than words or ideas, suddenly most of the self-professed ‘leading figures’ fail to meet that standard.

 

I routinely see people or organisations trying to define righteousness by the things they say or think, by someone’s devotion to a particular policy or talking point. Rarely, if ever, do leading figures actually care about how their people act or what their people do for society. On the other hand, the Party and I do, and we are more interested that our people show, rather than tell, that the National Agenda is a force for good.

 

I have said it before, and will have to say it again for as long as it takes: The ideals and standards that nationalists present to the public mean absolutely nothing if those ideals are not backed up with deeds, or those standards aren’t even met by the person presenting them. But there are many people in the political world who fail to comprehend this, despite being intelligent, well-read people, and it comes down to the following problem that I see far too often:

 

Reading the right history books, and learning all the wrong lessons from them

 

It is extremely common for people in either the third-position, anti-establishment or ‘right-wing’ political sphere to reference political movements of the past and use their activities as a basis for strategy or tactics. In particular the fascist, national socialist and to a lesser extent communist parties of the 1920s and 30s are used as examples of radical alternative politics successfully challenging and overthrowing a political system. The problem, as I have come to understand, is that most of the people, especially in positions of influence, that have read about these movements, do not actually understand what made these movements successful, and their beliefs about the activities and strategies that they employed is driven by a Hollywood interpretation rather than reality.

 

 One of the first errors is the common belief that those mass movements achieved popularity by employing violence and destruction. Yes, violence and destruction of things damaging to society took place, but the overwhelming majority of the work being done was constructive in nature. It didn’t get the attention (especially lasting attention over decades) that destruction did, but it accounted for 90% of the work. Welfare schemes organised directly in the name of the principles of those parties or movements took place routinely, in the form of soup kitchens, skill sharing (helping people become employed), even refuge for people dealing with domestic violence. These movements advocated for the concept of national communities, but they actually demonstrated those principles in action. They didn’t simply go around shouting empty slogans or putting material through letterboxes in order to convince people, they actually showed their principles in action (whatever those principles were).

 

Another error is the belief that those movements encouraged people to live in a ‘parallel society’. What they actually did, was encourage people to become leaders and exemplary citizens in the society that they were already in. People who were acting as heralds of those movements were expected to conform to the values of those movements. You didn’t see complete idlers endlessly talking about the value of hard work. You didn’t see sex offenders lecturing people about morality. People were not encouraged to isolate themselves from their own neighbours, or go and live in the woods like hermits. Instead, they were encouraged to make themselves leaders among their peers by being examples of honesty, selflessness and morality. Today, most ‘nationalist’ parties and organisations fixate on the idea of withdrawing from mainstream society in order to form their own. It is a twisted form of sectarianism which perfectly explains why many nationalists become like aliens in their own communities, even though most people actually agree with the things they say.

 

The final major error is the belief that propaganda and ‘optics’ is the answer to everything. Any inconsistency, any character flaw, any hypocrisy, any double-standard, it can all be fixed through optics, goes the logic – the faulty logic. The average person is not a fool, or so shameless that they are willing to ignore any concept of right and wrong just to make a political point. It is fantastic when things look ‘optical’, but if the good looks are not backed up by good deeds, the effect is actually negative, because it makes the movement look like one of snake-oil salesman and con artists. The reason why radical movements in the past succeeded was because although they might have looked good, the way they looked reflected their behaviour, as opposed to using looks to try and conceal behaviour. Far too many people in the nationalist sphere of today are unelectable by the standards of most people because they obsess more overlooking good than actually doing good things. You can go to any postcode, any demographic in the entire country, and the proportion of people who are willing to genuinely support something purely because it ‘looks good’ (even if it acts badly) will always be in the absolute minority. In the context of elections, that is a recipe for permanent opposition status.

 

What is the National Rebirth Party doing differently?

 

The Party has actually learned the right lessons from successes and failures of years gone by. It is not our task to tell people about the creation of a National Community, but to show people through great deeds what a National Community is and why everyone should be aiming to create it. We do not engage in shameless publicity stunts or say things that we cannot actually back up with actions. We give people authority because they demonstrate what nationalism is, not because they say what it is.

 

I increasingly suspect that the Party will be alone among the rest in this, because as time goes on, the obsession with image, influencing and social media likes grows ever deeper. At the same time, the political grave of those who follow that obsession gets equally deeper. Our values are there to be enacted, not to just be promoted. Our political campaigning is in the form of actions rather than words. And it must be this way because our people, by and large, are tired of hearing the same garbage phrases from the same salesmen over and over again. At this point, if it isn’t backed up with acts, it is hot air, and should be treated like hot air.

 

Some time ago, I said that hypocrisy and delusion are the twin evils in the mind. Through our principles we have banished delusion, and now the task is to banish hypocrisy. Show, rather than tell, of the greatness of our National Agenda.

 

By Alek Yerbury,

Party Leader