Eric Kim explicitly calls out “belts are for cowards” in his own writing. For example, in his blog post “Don’t hate me because you’re a coward, don’t hate me because you’re afraid?”, he writes:
“The only reason people use belts is that they are afraid of damaging their spine or whatever…
I weight lift barefoot, no stupid belts, because belts are just for cowards.”
He reiterates this stance in his lift breakdown, noting:
“No belt, no problem. Why strap in like RoboCop? Your core is the belt. Build armor under your skin, not on top of it.”
These passages make clear that “belts are for cowards” is a core tenet of his “caveman” lifting philosophy.