776: Alone No More - How the WhiteFlag App is Rewriting the Rules on Peer Support

Brian Nichols  
depression, anxiety, harmful thoughts? Who can you talk to about the issues that you feel you can't talk to anyone about? Yeah, let's talk about that. Instead of focusing on winning arguments, we're teaching the basic fundamentals of sales and marketing and how we can use them to win in the world of politics, teaching you how to meet people where they're at on the issues they care about. Welcome to The Brian Nichols Show. Well, hey there, folks, Brian Nichols here from The Brian Nichols Show. And thank you for joining us on of course, for the fun filled episode. I am as always your humble host, can you live from our cardio here from Studios here in lovely Indiana, I want to figure out how to get the best heart health supplement in the world in your diet. Well stick around we're gonna go ahead and talk about that later. But first, we have a very important topic today and to help join us to discuss said very important topic. I have a returning good friend slash guests, plus a new guests here joining us from the white flag project. We have Johnny McCoy and joining us good friend spike Cohen. Gentlemen, welcome The Brian Nichols Show.

Spike Cohen  
Thanks for having us on, man. Awesome, Brian.

Jonny McCoy  
Glad to be here. Glad gentlemen, again, too.

Brian Nichols  
I know it's a great day when we get have spike Cohen on the program. But Johnny, Spike, you guys are here today to talk about, I think something that I honest that almost all of us, I think all of us guaranteed all of us have experienced at some point in our lives, where whether it's anxiety, depression, family issues, marital issues, relationship issues, the death of a loved one, traumatic events, there are things that happen to us. And at moments, it feels like you're on an island, you can't talk about the issues, especially if they're very personal issues, you don't want necessarily put your name to it. And all sudden you find yourself on that island with your thoughts by yourself and where that leads can go some very dark places. And yet, Johnny, you're joining us today with a truly I think, a revolutionary app that's going to help change the way that we address these mental health issues, specifically from opening up avenues for folks to talk about these issues with other people completely anonymously. But before we get there, Johnny spike a jump ball where we want to start, Spike you want to reintroduce yourself, Johnny Welcome to digs for the white flag project where we want to go here to start off.

Jonny McCoy  
Let's hear from spike first. I mean, that's why we're all here, right?

Brian Nichols  
Why not? What's going on?

Spike Cohen  
Hi, I'm spike Cohen, and I'm on a perpetual quest to look more and more like Brian every time I'm on this show. Next time I will have my wireframe but they didn't come in in time for this. I probably here and let me put up on on the backward app this way. Hey, folks, there we go. Brian Nichols here. Oh, yeah. Good to see everyone Brian Nichols.

Brian Nichols  
Come on Spike.

Spike Cohen  
My white magic money tree teacher. I don't have that I do have a Jewish space laser controller. But I've seen it's a kind of money tree. So um, yeah. So I'm, you know, people know who I am on Spike Cohen. I'm here to hang out with my friend Brian and Johnny. But it is very important to talk about this, this app. And and I think more than anything, I really would like to give Johnny a chance to talk about who he is, what he's doing and what we're here for with whitefly.

Jonny McCoy  
I appreciate it spike, as always, you know, I met for those of you who don't know, my name is Johnny McCoy. And I'm the CEO and founder of white flag, which we'll talk about here in a second. But it's basically a revolutionary new platform for people to find and connect with other individuals who are going through the same issues, struggles, challenges as they are, whether it's somebody who's going through it right now. And you guys can just support each other through it, or as somebody who's five years removed from, you know, some sort of event that they went through or, or, you know, some depression that they couldn't get over. And now they're usually using their journey to heal and help other people on our platform anonymously. And of course, it's for free as well. But yeah, you know, it's funny, you say that everybody goes through it, and everybody's experienced and all this other good stuff, but I didn't I didn't believe in mental health whenever I you know, whenever I was growing up, I know my father didn't my father. You know, he was an old he worked on a cornfield and tobacco farm growing up, you know, his dad, my grandfather was a mail carrier, very simple folks out in the middle of Magby, South Carolina. And my dad was going to visit my great grandfather and, you know, this was before phones and electricity out there in the early 50s, late 40s. And he found my great grandfather in bed with a gun in his mouth and he had taken his life in his pain and my dad was 12 when it happened, so he stayed in that room for seven hours with The dead body waiting on school to start the next day and he walked to school and we came home from football practice. He told my grandma and she looked at it and said, Whatever you do, don't tell anybody. And so there was a heart attack, they had a closed casket, it was a heart attack. And right up into the point where, you know, my dad married my mom and, and never got any healing for what he went through my mom from Vincennes, Indiana, and she was molested. And so the two people who were mentally ill had got together and they had mentally ill children. I was born with generalized anxiety disorder and a bunch of other things. I was having panic attacks. By the time I was five years old, nobody called a panic. They just said I had a nervous stomach back then nervous is what I was always called. And then one day, I was walking home from missing baseball practice to hang out with a buddy of mine, I was 10. And I was I went away, when we came around the corner of the old dirt road, I'm pushing my bike and I'm watching my dad get placed in the back of a police car, he had hit my mom in the face with a bottle and and, you know, that was the really the beginning of the bomb going off in my mental health journey. And, and that was the first time I'd ever heard the word attorney, my dad said to have your mom call my attorney. And I'm thinking about this strong guys, you know, and that's what he needs his lawyer, maybe I should think about becoming one one day so that I don't have to call somebody to just be me. And, of course, my mom becomes an alcoholic and an addict. And she abuses me, he tells me, I'm a little boy, I was 12. But but for the time was 12 to 17. I was ugly and terrible. And nobody loves me and all this other stuff. She goes to rehab. And I go off to law school. And that's a longer story for another day. But you know, I thought that I could, you know, go to law school and protect myself and the people around me. And then I get into law school when I start hear about all this, you know, this big business stuff. So I become an insurance defense lawyer. And I thought that was like the coolest thing. And, you know, I lived in my ivory tower and didn't know what was going on in the real justice system until October 17 2009. I went to pick up some friends from from a bar who were in town for a wedding and I witnessed one of my buddies who was a prosecutor at the time, I was depressed and insurance defense. He was a prosecutor at the time, and he was he was being tackled by three police officers. So I approached and you can watch the video online. I approached with my hands up. And and I simply asked, Where are you? Where are you taking them to the county jail and Alvin Glen are the city jail where I can just go bottom out and they didn't like that they didn't like that I even spoke to him. They didn't like that. I was asking questions. And so they arrested me right then and there for asking questions. And when we got the back of the police caught him yelling at my friend, well, what the hell do you do, like spit on him, like beat him? And, you know, I wasn't until later that I realized that he was texting on his phone 80 feet away from the interest in the bar. They arrested him for trespassing, and I was arrested for hindering. Well, when we got to the jail, they asked, they asked us what we did for a living. And we said again, I told you, we're lawyers, and they didn't like that answer. And, you know, I was only this was 15 years ago. So I was you know, a younger guy. And I guess they didn't believe me. So to teach us a lesson for saying we were lawyers and you know, challenging them in any way. They didn't turn our paperwork in on time. And when that happens in the state of South Carolina, you can be held for 72 hours in jail with no bond hearing. And we got shifted to general population over the weekend, and I witnessed somebody commit suicide out, they took their life and ended their pain in front of me. I don't like using the terminology commit suicide, but that's the common nomenclature. And he helped himself. And I remember thinking that it's so bad in here and I look to my friend who was there with me, thank god or unfortunately, however you want to look at it. And I remember looking at my friend and going It's so bad and you're that guy just killed himself. And that was the beginning of the end for me. You know, I went into shock. A legislator called a judge who came down and got us out. And so began my slow, painful walk through severe mental illness. We got out I went to the courthouse three days later, and I was in shock. I had already been diagnosed with PTSD. I already went to a doctor, I had to go to the hospital and get the right medication. So I go into court on the first day that's on the ticket. And I remember I went in there and I was like, I've never been in criminal court before. I have no clue what I'm doing. I brought these lawyers with me who were friends and I see my lawyer walk up to the three police officers who were standing there getting ready to do whatever they're doing. And I could just tell they looked at him and they were like and then I saw the female officer go like this and I could have written suicide letter that night. They they basically deleted their dash cams and their body cam videos and they said instead of Asking questions was totally legal. When they found out we witnessed the suicide, they doctored the incident report sad, grabbed the officer and pulled her off of the guy. And so I'll never forget. We were leaving the court that day and they were smirking at me. And my lawyer said, I told him that, you know, this was the first we'd heard of anybody grabbing anything, nobody mentioned that. And they looked right at him in his face and said, prove it. So I went to get my hair cut at a place I've been to school there for eight years in the same city I went to I graduated and worked in the same city, Columbia, South Carolina. And this girl's cut most young ladies cut my hair and I'm quitting my job I'm moving home to be with all these toxic people. Because that's what you do when you're you know, when you're mentally ill is you go to what's comfortable. So she's cutting my hair and I told her I'm moving home, I quit my job making all this money and she starts tearing up and she goes, you know, there's a surveillance video, right? And I'll never forget, man, I I didn't even finish my haircut. I went my old office, I typed up a spoiled ation of evidence letter and I drove right back down. Because all these were the strip mall, the haircut place and the bar, they were all right there with each other. And I walked up to the owner of the bar was leaving, he was locking the door to go to the Phillies World Series. And I handed him the letter and I said, you know, you need to hand me the video. And long story short, they ended up giving me the video. And it was like Spielberg shot. I mean, it was perfect angle. It shows I never brought my hands down. Never. The guy was texting. And they walked up and tripped him and ripped his shirt. And like, I mean, it was it was bad video. And so I thought that the prosecutors and the police would do the right thing. And so did the media, they were all over them. The mayor ended up stepping down, the FBI got involved and all this other good stuff. But they did the opposite. They turned up the heat. I mean, I was followed, I was threatened. They said that they were going to up my charges from interfering with an arrest to assault and then quote, we're going to put it back in the same cell. And so I started practicing criminal law and learning how I could defend myself if this ever happens again. I mean, shit, I went to law school to try to be this person. And I, you know, I got tangled up with, you know, the big dollars and insurance defense. And so I became a criminal defense lawyer. And I started winning case after case after case after case because I was the only one in South Carolina to call the cops out. Everybody's like, we got to work with them on many, many cases, and they're not gonna give us deals and I'm like, I can't stop. I can't stop going out and as hard as I possibly can. And the jury couldn't stop overturning in finding them not guilty. And eventually, my reputation caught up to me and I got a I got a case for a civil rights case, my client was shot at 29 times hit nine times over $100 worth of marijuana. True story in his house.

And the way that they found out that he was selling marijuana and only marijuana was they pulled over 100% mentally disabled veteran and African American female who had just gotten back from military service. They found a ash in her cupholder. And they said, Well, that's marijuana and we want to know where you got it or we're taking your military benefits, we're going to arrest you, they're going to take your benefits. So they put this young lady mentally ill in video equipment and send her to my client Julian bet and BDT to Anne's house, and give her $100 And he's literally like well, I usually just give it to you like what are you doing here like you can tell that this is not a normal occurrence and 10 days later, or approximately that 14 plainclothes police officers backward tat ba que vas jeans, no police insignia, they arrived at his house in an unmarked car. They put his neighbor on the ground and ar 15 point then they hit the door without knocking or announcing. And the first guy in fell. And when he fell, he's just unloaded on the ceiling all the way down to the floor and the second two came in and they blasted Julian 29 times hit him nine times including shots that were straight down. And guess what? Every single one of them turned off their body cams as they approach the house and every single and every single one of them turned it on when they were rendering eight. So they thought this guy was going to die for sure. I mean, they were high five and their videos online, their high five and all this other stuff. Well guess what? Julian got robbed a couple of months before and so he put a surveillance video on his front porch. Here we go again. That video is unbelievable. That Julian Benton 12 seconds from the time they get there to shoot him is unreal. I get a call from a friend. And he's like my buddy who makes his music and you know, just plays video games and smokes weed. He just woke up from a six week coma and they're trying to tell him that his mom can't see him so I rush over the hospital and they threaten me with arrest for trespass and all this I knew I'm like, Okay, why I didn't think this was a big case, I thought this was just a guy shot at the police. That's what they claim. When I found out that they were, you know, being crazy at the hospital and threatening with trespass, and I knew something was up. So by the time I get up to his room, I get a judge to fax over a, an order telling me I'm allowed up in his room, they're pulling out camera equipment, when he was waking up, they were telling you shot the police, you're a bad guy, you can't believe why you shouldn't believe and he's like, he's got a trach tube and can't even talk. And so that was the moment that I said, no matter what happens, these guys will spend more time in jail than you ever will. And I got his gun tested and hadn't been fired, it was fully loaded, and there was no missing bullets out of it, which he was legal to have in the house, they didn't arrest him for any gun issues. He never pulled it never fired it never any of that crazy stuff on him. And, and it was on. I mean, we spent five years in that case, litigating it and going through it and 2020, we settled for $11.25 million. Wow. And not a single police officer even got a day off. They didn't even have to go into the coffee machine and clean it out. They didn't have to get, you know, reprogrammed on what to do and knocking and announcing which they said they that literally in the deposition. We don't have to not we don't have to analysis isn't the rules. I mean, it was unbelievable what I witnessed in this and all the while I'm triggered over and over and over, right? And so during that process, and 2018, two years before we settled, I attempted suicide, I was on six milligrams of Xanax, I was being triggered by my criminal cases, I was being triggered triggered by Julian's case and all my civil rights stuff. And I was in so much pain, and I couldn't talk about it. Like you just said, like, who am I gonna talk to about this stuff, I'm trying cases and winning them. Because mental health doesn't make you less of a professional and less good at your job. And so, like, Who the fuck was going to believe who was going to believe me that I had these issues and who was really going to care. And by the way, in South Carolina, who you know, who can relate to about this stuff, you know, false a recipe, nobody's going to talk to me about it. And so when I got into my PTSD treatment facility in 2018, in Ocala, Florida, they put me in a in a house with three other people with PTSD. And that was where I learned, oh, my God, I'm getting better, because they're telling me about how they're handling PTSD. They're telling me about what PTSD and nightmares are light for them. And it was making me feel like I wasn't alone. And, you know, the cliche and all this other stuff. And slowly but surely, I started to feel better. It was great. I had a therapist and I was on medication. But the peer support was what really, really showed me that you know, you can you can fully recover from this and live a normal life it you know, if you find the right way in the right people that can hear what you're afraid to talk about. And so I came home, I started peer support groups and my hometown, because there were none COVID hit. And we had shut the peer support groups down. And so I was like, well read the take this online, let's just make an app. And so we made an app where you can instantly and anonymously connect with somebody else who's going to same through the same issue struggles and challenges as you are, you can either fill out your profile put for me PTSD, generalized anxiety disorder, depression, overcoming Xanax, coping with marijuana, you put all that boom, shoot it out there and your mental health twin will respond. Somebody who's gone through the same things as you understand your unique position that you're in, and it has I use it just as much as anybody else. We got 110,000 people on there right now it's free. We've had a million messages exchanged in just the last couple. I mean, it's only been 18 months, this thing is viral. And that's, you know, we got spike involved. We got other big hitters involved. And, you know, for me, obviously, you know, I, I relate to you, Brian, and spike in the liberty movement, but really sodas white flag, I mean, we we don't require you to train. There's nobody coaching you on how to talk to somebody, we're the only app out there that does it this way. And, and it's because I understand that, number one understand liability and there's nothing against the law about just letting people help each other heal each other. Yeah, yeah. You know, it's been the government and corporate that's gotten involved and said, No, no, you need to pay to train you need to, you know, we can't just let people

Spike Cohen  
insurance coding and all of that, yeah, people be

Jonny McCoy  
there for each other. And what we've proven is that is the opposite. Like in a like AA, like support groups online and Facebook and other stuff. It's totally not only not harmful, but the Clinical studies show that peer support. When done right in an unsafe environment, which we have on white flag is long as it's authentic, as long as you're not being told what to say, which is what all the other platforms out there do. They are afraid to let people who are struggling connect with each other because the stigma says, oh, no, we can't let crazy people talk to each other. Well, that Yeah, you can't I mean, that's how me and my wife My wife has PTSD, what are you gonna come here and train her out of talk to me at night? You know, and, and so the magic of white flag at you know, has really not been a secret to me. It's just let people connect and get the hell out of the way. Let them find each other and get out of the way. And for some reason, all, you know, venture capital and big, big corporate America, they kind of go where we're, you know, we're just going to let two people just talk to each other.

Spike Cohen  
On the internet, yeah,

Jonny McCoy  
I'm going and I'm going on Facebook, a 72 year old pedophile can get out of prison and message a 15 year old, and nobody monitoring that. But because Facebook doesn't say we're talking about mental health, everybody thinks, Okay, then the only difference between us and these other social networks is we openly say, come here and deal with your mental health stuff. And that the wording, mental health just freaks people out. And that's why we're out in the front. That's why we're the you know, growing at the rate that we're growing, and we have no partnerships with the Cleveland Clinic partnerships with Miss USA. And I was a judge for Miss USA and Louisiana because they wanted the people who are participating to talk about mental health issues, because Chesley Crist, who was Miss USA in 2021, jumped off the 29th floor of New York City High Rise six months after she gave up her crown. And so you know, it's everywhere. It doesn't matter if you're a beauty pageant winner, it doesn't matter if you're a civil rights lawyers on TV, it doesn't matter if you're spied Cohen, and loved by all, it can come for anyone and everyone at anytime. And white flag will always be there. If you say right now, I don't need it. That's fine. Download the app now. And then if you do need it, or you do need somebody to talk to you have somebody, or your daughter, or your wife, or those people who you're like, I just don't know why she won't talk to me, is because they don't think you understand the madness that they see as a movie in their head. They can't even describe it to you. So do them a favor, do yourself a favor and point them to a place where they can find people who can understand what they're trying to say, but they can't. And that's on the white flag app right now.

Brian Nichols  
Wow. Okay, so really quick spike. I don't know if you're hearing this, of course, you're hearing this you're involved with white flag the similarities between what Johnny just outlined here with white flag and frankly, what you're doing and what we integrator liberty movement are doing with what you are the power helping decentralize these approaches to dealing with issues and really empowering not just the individual but empowering communities. And Johnny, he mentioned this in spike, I'd love for you to maybe dig a bit more on this, of how when you when you get outside of the mentality of I'm by myself, and actually embrace the idea that there are others out there, like you dare I say in a type of community that you can communicate with and talk about your issues, but also to now put that that you know, in an enemy in the way so you feel that you're able to protect your identity. And frankly, the issues that you're dealing with. I mean, this is I think in essence one of the best decentralized, democratized approaches to dealing with mental health that I've really ever seen.

Spike Cohen  
Yep, yep. There are three main reasons that I'm involved in this number one, it's because Johnny's a dear friend, anything he's doing, I'm behind them. 100% The second reason is exactly what you just outlined. His reason Johnny's reason and the people that started this their reason for doing white flag is essentially a the exact same reason I started you are the power. People feel powerless. And they feel hopeless because they feel powerless. They feel like there's this monolithic system that there's nothing they can do about and so they just figure out how to try to live with it within that that flawed understanding what white flag does is it says no, you don't need the multibillion dollar medical mental health industrial complex, if you don't need it, or aren't ready for it. We're not saying don't get a therapist or don't take medications if you're prescribed them or anything like that, that can be helpful, but you don't only need that and if that's not serving you especially it's not the only way to do this and that goes to the third reason why I'm a part of this and it's because I think of how much this could have helped me when I was at my worst you know, my my mental health struggle is downright pedestrian after comparing it to Ajani just detailed but you know, I thankfully, I was never at a point where I attempted to take my life but I was at a point plenty of times where I would go to bed with the comforting thought of well maybe I just won't wake up and if I don't wake up, then I don't have to worry about any of this and it was the comfort I would get from that that would allow me to go to bed so I've certainly been in a bad place before now for me what what woke me up even after I you know, got free from drug addiction, or at least I thought I got free from addictive thoughts. I got free from the use part of it, but I'm still very much thinking as an addict. Even after I got free from that even after you know having getting successful business And on paper everything looking right, I got a great wife, very similar to Johnny and Johnny's got sia and I, you know, I'm passionate that everything seems okay. But I was falling apart now for me it took being diagnosed with MS and being forced to look at take a radical transformative approach to every aspect of my health, including my mental health, that that was what set the journey for me. But what if many years prior to that? When I was saying to myself, well, no one else understands what I'm going through, no one else knows what it's like for people not to realize just how messed up you are, and think, Well, everything looks okay, on the outside. So you must be fine. What if instead, there had been something like white flag or white flag itself, for me to be able to reach out to other people and find out that no, not only am I not alone, but there are actual words for what it is that, you know, descriptors of this, and, and these are different ways that you can address this. And here's what I'm doing to to help with this. And even just someone saying, I'm here for you, you're not alone. I've been there, you can get through this, that alone. And to know that there were already 110,000 and counting users who a million times have experienced that. You know, the metrics are great for you know, investors, and the metrics are great for, you know, charting the the rise of white flag. But if you break that down, that's a million times that people were able to say, okay, I can make it today. Yes, I can make it to next week, I can make it to next month, next year, whatever I can get through this. And that's an incredibly powerful thing, especially when we No, I think it was and I may be misquoting this, but the for the average person that's suffering through a mental health crisis that can result in suicide. It is roughly about three and a half minutes that they experienced the most acute part of that where the danger of them harming themselves is at its highest. And if you can get them through that first three and a half minutes, the risk of them actually moving forward on those ideations goes down precipitously. And if you can make it go past even 1015 20 minutes, you've pretty much you're out of the woods, at least for that moment. That's a million times many of those million times, where a time that someone was in that three and a half minute window, and was able to get out of it, and was able to see another day, and they're still still here with us now. So it is just it is absolutely incredible what happens when you tell someone, not only can this get better, but you have way much more power at your fingertips than you knew. And there are people who are going through this too. And together, we're going to be able to get out of this. And that's what white flag represents.

Brian Nichols  
Amen. movement here, here and that Johnny, the words on my mouth, because this speaks to not just why this is so popular right now. And while you're seeing this go viral. But Johnny, I think something you mentioned earlier, it's frankly, why you got such pushback, right? Because you're now taking away the power, you're taking away the control. And frankly, you're taking away the monopoly on dealing with mental health issues through this traditional Big Pharma or big medicine approach. And, and what we've seen and if goodness, if the past three years have not taught us anything, is that our public health officials aren't necessarily focused on public health. So how do we actually address public health? How do we address mental health and it's through the styles and the approaches that Johnny you and your team at white flag are taking that spike, you and the team are taking it you are the power, this is how we actually make changes is by more or less, I would say just you know, flipping the bird to the system, but creating the solutions that are actually addressing the problems we identify bringing them forward. And instead of asking for permission, we might know, are we going to ask for forgiveness? I don't think so. Because we're actually solving problems here. Right. And that's saying You're welcome. Exactly. Channel your inner Michael malice.

Jonny McCoy  
Ya know, it's so true, you know, but if I wasn't a liability lawyer, right, everybody's like, what are you? Why are you the founder of this company? It's not just because I went through it, and understood what was needed out there. And I had to have the means to start, you know, development is very, very expensive. But it's because I understand liability. And I understand. I understand peer support in a level, you know, having gone through it creative peer support groups, and a level that you can't learn in a book. And yeah, it does sound like oh my god, he's just gonna let people who are like, hurting or whatever, talk to each other. What what do you think a and NA is and all this other stuff. But the reality of the situation is, I mean, we're, I'll be honest with y'all is 2023. And we are the only platform that doesn't require you to train and go over script before you talk to somebody. Now imagine that a veteran gets on a peer support app. And they're like, he's like, listen, I just want to talk to people. I just want to help out because that's what we have to you have the ability to either get support or give support on our support and get on there and just start immediately talking to somebody He, and learning more about you and them. And you know, it's like teaching you learn it more while you're teaching it, you know what I'm saying? And so, you know, just imagine, just imagine if a veteran who comes back from Iraq gets on an app like some of our competitors, and they're like, well, before you're able to help people, here's sort of our curriculum, here's how training station, here's at it, here's what to say if they say this. Now, imagine if you're talking to multiple supporters, and they're all saying the same thing. You know, in authentic that is authenticity, and being real. And being letting people be real, is the only way out of this situation, because people aren't going to talk openly. If they're feel like they're being monitored, if they feel like that key words are gonna, you know, be sent out someplace, and then somebody's going to kick the door and take them away for three

Spike Cohen  
days, mandatory reporters and all that. Yep, therapist is

Jonny McCoy  
a mandatory reporter for me, I was in therapy, and all of my therapy notes were being shown openly in court, because of my case, and my PTSD was being challenged. So yeah, it's an instant and anonymous way for you to say the stuff that you've never thought that you could possibly say, or for you to be there for somebody else, and sort of just be a listener and say, Listen, you know, no judgment, my daughter's going through it, no judgment, I got nothing else to do. I'm retired, no judgment. I'm just here to listen, I believe in the fight. And I mean, we have just as many people who sign up just to help, and listen and support as we do people who are getting on there to actually get, you know, the healing medication that's that's comes out of individuals during peer support connection.

Spike Cohen  
Well, and I've actually perhaps like, Well, no, I was just gonna say, so some of the people who you know, that have downloaded the app based on, you know, my posts that I put out there about it have reported back to me that not only have they used it to be helped and to help people, but that they got help from helping people in two main ways. The first thing was, they would find that what they were saying to other people, they go, You know what, maybe if I took that advice myself, that might be helpful, too. The other thing that happens is, a lot of them go in saying then that one of the biggest things that so many people, especially millennials, and Gen Z people are experiencing is a feeling of just no fulfillment whatsoever. A feeling of absolute, purposeless purposelessness. Why am I here? Well, at least for this moment, you're here working someone through walking someone through one of the worst moments of their life. And you're part of the reason that they're going to survive, it. Talks about purpose, unbelievable.

Jonny McCoy  
You can be here talk about fulfillment, you can be a hero 24 hours a day. And if you go down, I'm going to say, let's go look at our reviews. We don't put reviews out there, there's 290 reviews on there's almost 301 of my favorites was done last year, before we really turned up, you know, all of the features and everything. And it says and you'll see it in the app store. You have no idea what this app has done for me.dot.is The reason I'm still here, you can be the reason somebody's still there. That's not me. I didn't support that guy and help them out. That's you. That's you tonight, you can get on there and just you know, have a conversation with individuals and learn about yourself and feel fulfilled as fighting said and, and the truth is hurting people, people who are hurting hurt other people. Yes, people who are healing, heal other people. So no matter where you are on your journey, if you're feeling good, and you're okay, you've experienced something, you can truly offer somebody something so special that we can't I mean, Spike and I can't even really describe what happens. Yeah, you know, when people are connected, it's a it's a physiological and chemical reaction in the brain in the body that I mean, describe love, describe love. You know, how can you describe love? Oh, it's this feeling you get when you see somebody blah, blah, blah. But what is it sounds like bullshit. describe the feeling you get when you pull somebody. I mean, it's it's otherworldly. It's why we're here. It's what it's the purpose of human humankind is to be there for each other, and use what we've gone through and what other people are going through to build each other up and figure this thing out and figure out a way out, because I mean, it is, you know, my generalized anxiety disorder was because I'm right. I know how painful it is out here. I know how scary it is. I know that you can be arrested, and your whole life turned over like that for not doing anything but the right thing. I was literally questioning the police as to why they were abusing my friend. I should have been given like a pat on the back. Said it was ruined my life. And people were always in mind where I'm from, how dare you challenge the police? Yep. And that just made it even worse. But now that I'm on white flag you it's the first time that I ever talked to somebody else who got falsely arrested and had something happened to them in jail. I've talked to several in my career who've been false here. And I'm like, Well, what was jail? I got out in the first ball. I thought somebody else who was raped while he was being falsely arrested. And you think that guy could talk to anybody but me about that? Yeah, yep. Now,

Brian Nichols  
I don't think it's a secret For the audience here that's listening, I used to be a big guy, I was 385 pounds. And I felt more often than not that I was trapped inside that body. And there was nobody at school that I could talk to, there's no family that can talk to you how, you know, 120 pound person gonna be able to relate to me. That's how I felt, right. But to your point, Johnny, and Spike, if I had had resources where I could have put myself behind the veil, right, and then reach out to somebody who not only knew what I was experiencing, but they themselves likely experienced it firsthand. I mean, that would have given me so much more. So much more help. And you know, it's funny. So I'm thinking back, like, how did I actually like come to a feeling of like, I'm taking a step forward mentally. And it was actually I used to sing in like the court choirs and courses a lot for school, and I played tuba. And I came across this one guy who also played tuba and also was a singer. And we were next to each other in the in the chorus. And he was like a six foot, three 340 pound guy, I was a six foot, six foot five, 380 pound guy, so like we naturally. And that's literally what happened. Right? Five years, I loosened up losing around 180 pounds of fat. And then I'm posting my story on social media only to get him messaging me and my Facebook notification saying, You've inspired me to start doing some stuff differently. Fast forward a year and a half for him. He's down 100 pounds. And now he's got a wife. And he's, I think they're expecting their first kid. And like, for me, looking back at that now, I get it. Right, I see that. It wasn't it wasn't his doctor, telling him, you know, Hey, your High Blood Pressure. I mean, yeah, my doctors are telling you that it's good shit out of me. But did it actually make me change? No. But when I started talking to someone who was going through what I was going through, it's like, Oh, I'm not crazy. Oh, this is something that impacts other people. And guess what? We can talk about it and get better from it like that, that for me? I think and this is going to be probably for anybody else is looking at the white flag out? That is the answer is to be able to know not only that you can talk about these issues, but if you've experienced these issues, you can help other people and you don't have to go through you know, I was gonna joke like, yeah, you hear other libertarian podcasts that are sponsored by better help. No, no more BetterHelp go to white flag white flag is truly the the true democratized decentralized approach to dealing with these issues. We're getting rid of the gatekeepers, we're getting rid of the three by five allowable opinion card there that Tom Woods always talks about. We're focusing on what actually works. And as covered this as we go towards the tail end of the episode, guys, jump ball for final thoughts as we kind of like go through because I don't know what that's actually I lied, Spike, I'm gonna start with you. Because you guys are doing amazing stuff in the campaign right now helping raise some funds for white flag. And you You're obviously not just invested in terms what the solution actually comes from white flag. But I think you're invested other ways as well talk to a spike about not just how other folks can get involved with white flag but financially on that end as well.

Spike Cohen  
Yeah, absolutely. So white flag is not just an incredible resource, and really a movement towards better mental health. It's also a for profit company, this startup app has a has a gameplan for actually becoming something that won't just profit us mentally and in our mental health, but can do so also financially as well. And so, so I am, I am not, I'm not only a supporter and a believer, but I'm also an investor as well. And we actually have a very interesting campaign right now, where we have a it's called start engine. And it's a it's a crowdfunding campaign website. And we already have quite a few investors on there already just in the in the months since we started it. But they have different things that different thresholds that if you reach them, start engine will send out an email blast to all of its users, anyone on their list, anyone who has ever invested in anything on start engine, which right now is right around a million to a million and a half people, we already got one of those blasts that just went out because we got 100 individual investors, but there's another one that we can reach and it doesn't cost anyone anything, it costs you nothing more than about a minute of your time, all you have to do is go to start engine.com/white flag app and follow Click to follow that campaign. And if we can get 2500 people to follow the campaign, another email blast will go out to those million and a half people to get to let them know about white flag and how they can get how they can get involved and get invested. And that can help us to reach even more people. If you do want to invest, go to that same start engine.com/white flag app and get invested today. And I do want to speak on that very briefly because the number one and most important thing is the is you know what this can do for mental health. But let's talk numbers here. I'm the Jew in the panel. So I'll talk money. Let's talk money for a second. White flag currently has a 25 it's operating based on a $25 million valuation, meaning that it has been independently evaluated to be worth $25 million. That's with 100,000 users and zero monetization, zero ads, they have given it a $25 million valuation based on receiving zero revenue. So let's just even before you get into the revenue aspect of it, think of just the sheer number of people in the US alone, forget other English speaking countries forget the entire rest of the developed world or anywhere that has an internet connection. Just think of the sheer number of people who have mental health that are battling mental health issues. Right now, just in the United States, it's a lot more than 100,000. So just taking a straight line approach, what's that

Jonny McCoy  
53 million

Spike Cohen  
ease, and that's, again, those who admit to it. And the reason that white flag is so effective is because people don't want to admit to it right off the bat. So, but let's even go 53 million, let's even go 1 million, 1 million turns a $25 million valuation into a $250 million valuation, which means if you invested the 250 minimum, that becomes 20 510 million becomes a $2.5 billion valuation, which means a $250 investment becomes a $25,000 investment. And once you start looking at actual revenue, potential with advertising and things like that, it's not hard to see how this can be an incredible thing. This could be the the, the ex or Facebook or Google of mental health, it's already positioning itself as that. But if you say, hey, you know what, that sounds great, but I don't have 250 to drop like that. But I do want to help this, you can still help if you go to start engine.com/white flag app and just click follow, it'll have you you can sign up with your Google account to to you know, be able to follow it. This will take you all have like 4050 seconds, something like that. And if you click follow, if we get 2500 follows another email blast will go out that will help us to get even more investors. And so that can be a way that you can help without having to spend a penny. But if you got 250 bucks, you want to you want to take the same bet I have and many others have taken that this is going to be worth a lot more than that 250 bucks is worth, then you can do that as well. But it's both at Star engine.com/white flag app. Fight common.

Brian Nichols  
Thank you for that Johnny. This is and he's America's Jew and he's also our BFF. So like, thank you for that Johnny. What we'd like to do here on the episode is we do a little segment called Final thoughts. I would love for you if you could just paint a nice picture, find it oh, here for today's episode, obviously the call to action for folks, please go support white flag app, go download white flag app, sign up for white flag app, if you're having issues. If you've had issues. I think it's a no brainer at this point. That's kind of my call to action. And frankly, I think you guys have done an amazing job articulating the importance of this. And I'll say that's my final thoughts for today. John, if you would do us a favor, bring us on out here. Where do you think folks need to leave today's episode.

Jonny McCoy  
So the reason that we opened the campaign up on start engine is because I found out that the only people who can invest in a company like ours are called accredited angels, that means people with a million bucks or more and I wasn't having that, you know, I was on the Pell Grant in college, meaning I was below the poverty line, I never knew that there were startups and investments out there. And so we raised two and a half million bucks from just my network of friends, not family, friends, doctors, you know, physicians, therapists, you know, business leaders and financial experts in Myrtle Beach. And then I was like, well, we gotta let the people who are creating this magic, the ones who are using the app, regular common folks who are struggling or right now helping people, we got to open this up. And the only way that you can do that, according to the SEC is to open up on a crowdfunding. So that's the reason that we open up on start engine was because I mean, we need the people who are creating the magic to feel a part of this. And take the whole journey spike speaks openly about how much the company is going to be worth and where it's headed right now. And I'm a little bit more shy about that. Because to be honest with you, we're doing such great stuff. Like I it's almost as if, like, you're not supposed to talk about the other side of it. But you know, the reality of the situation is, you know, that's how you reach the rest of the world. And if you look at our reviews, people are reaching out from China and from Japan, and from Australia and South America, we just opened up in Canada, I mean, the demand is, is worldwide and and the reason that we open up on startengine is the same reason that we created the app. We don't need other individuals telling us how to help each other. We don't need to be taught we don't need to be certified. We don't need to have to go and pay somebody to you know, give us a certification and say you can now you're officially now to help people where did that start? Where did that come from? How did we get so far away from just walking to our neighbor's house and saying, you know, I saw that you need some support. I'm here for you. Now it's gotten went, Well, maybe you should google how to support them before you go over there. And that's not the reality of humanity. What's what's needed to pull us out of this darkness, this, this human wide depression is within each other. And the only way that you can create that gold that that's within you is to experience something and goes through it, you can't learn it in a book, you can't learn it by, you know, hearing something from a third person, it's just something that you recognize in somebody else. And all we do is bottle, that magical white flag. That's it. I mean, we can't even really describe what happens when two people connect and talk about things that they've never ever imagined that they could actually express, like a mother going through postpartum who wants to kill her baby, because she's going through a depressive, psychiatric natural chemical response after giving birth, to imagine how alone she feels when she could just talk to another mom and say, I had that thought, too. I had that thought, too. And it will give her momentary peace to overcome that, that time period that she's in where she's suffering so much. And if you guys want to support the liberty, the reason that I love spike in this movement, and you know, being on podcasts like this is because this is your app, you guys who are listening, you guys who follow Brian Nichols, in spite Cohen, that this company was built for you and your belief system, that it's within us. And we don't need anybody else to tell us how to take care of each other. So if you believe that go to start engine, put your money into the into the company, I tried to get it lower than 250 as the minimum investment that's as low as they would allow us to go. And, you know, take the financial journey with us, follow us on social media, you know, we want to work for our social media, because we're real, just like our connections, we're authentic, we talk about real shit that is actually going on in people's lives. And it will always be that way. Always be that way. And so if you want to be a part of something that's natural, if you want to be a part of something that's new, if you want to be a part of something that is taking something that is that is centuries old, which is to be there for each other, and then bottle it up in a safe environment, it's free and anonymous and online than white flag is the best place for you to go. So thank you guys for supporting us. I'm so grateful for spike CO and it's not just him on we have other high profile people like safety from the Denver Broncos, Nate Boyer is probably know that Nate Boyer is the most high profile veteran in America. He did several tours Greenbrae, NFL actor, philanthropist, he's our chief of Veteran Affairs, I mean, this movement is only continuing to build and grow and grow and grow. And it's because we are taking a old approach and doing something completely new with it. And so, yeah, I mean, join us on start engine campaigns only going to be available for another 30 days for you to get in and you know, make a monetary contribution and take the financial ride with us. I was looking at an app, a photo earlier today that I saw on an ad. And it said if you invested 1000, when these were startups, you would have made 3 million Airbnb 148,000 Uber, 232,000. Tesla, and that's just investing $1,000. Early in, like spike said, I mean, you know, it's just about as many people as we can get on the app. And if they're using it, that's all that matters in the in the financial game. And so, we've seen unbelievable, we've seen numbers that rival Twitter in its first two years, and that I'm being dead serious about that. And we've been adding downloads and users for free, because mental health advocates and mental health influencers are making tick tock videos and saying I need this I need it. We're not telling them what to say and how to say it. I mean, this thing is only just begun. And I'm honored to be leading it and I'm honored to have been the person who was selected by whoever's out there, you know, contributing to fate. And, you know, I vow to never use your information, your data, your privacy rights against you in a nefarious way, as you'll see in our terms and conditions. I'm a civil rights lawyer. In my bones, I will always fight for you. I'll always be there for the little guy and you can trust me if you want to come and join us with white flag.

Brian Nichols  
Johnny McCoy spike Cohen. Gentlemen, thank you for joining us. I'm in too under 50 bucks I'm in I'm gonna go ahead after we're done. today. I'm signing up spike. I saw that the finger was up.

Spike Cohen  
I just I just want to add the obligatory disclaimer, nothing that has been on this episode should be taken as financial advice. Neither I Brian or Johnny are licensed financial experts. I am merely a Jew on the internet. I can see how that can be confusing, but we are not. We are not financial advisors. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future profits. And there are other parts I'm forgetting right now. But the bottom line is we're not financial advisors. We can't predict the future. We just strongly believe in this company. We hope you do too.

Brian Nichols  
Here here. Spike Cohen, Johnny McCoy, gentlemen, thank you for joining us and folks if you got some value I know you did. You got some value. In today's episode number one, obviously go ahead and give today's episode of share this episode is going to hit and resonate with so many people, I'm getting chills just even saying it out loud. I know that there are people out there who are suffering in silence. And we need to have a real conversation about mental health here in our country and frankly, in our world. And I think this is a great first step, at least for us to to have that conversation albeit behind the veil. But this is the way that we start having real, real results to help real problems that real people are facing. So gentlemen, thank you for joining us and folks, beyond getting today's episode to share you know where you can go ahead and support the show. Or you can go ahead at Brian Nichols show.com We have our morning sales huddle every week, yours truly in your inbox. And by the way, if you want to go ahead and find all 775 other episodes of the show, all over at Brian Nichols show.com also video and audio versions video YouTube rumble x.com as well as sovereign S O V. r en that's been swans entity which by the way, if you're joining us today on sovereign congratulations, you're seeing today's episode before anybody else that's your sovereign exclusive. And then as an audio podcast, Apple podcast, Spotify, YouTube music wherever it is your podcast, Just do yourself a favor. Hit download all unplayed episodes start from episode one spikes on the show like 40 times. Go ahead and listen to all the great conversations underway. I guarantee they will leave you educated, enlightened and informed. That's all we have for you. That being said Brian Nichols signing off. You're on The Brian Nichols Show for Johnny McCoy and Spike Cohen. We'll see you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai