Emerald

I tend to find that kinder people are usually more honest than unkind people. Unkind people have to engage in all manner of self-deceptions to explain away their unkind behaviors to themselves.

One thing that I think might be helpful along these lines that I notice in what you wrote, is that there is a lot of conscious calculation about how you want to come across and how you don't want to come across. And if I'm understanding correctly, there seems to be these two polarities that you're considering between as an image of the "nice guy" and the "toxic masculine guy." And there's an aversion to the nice guy but there's a sense that it's the nice guys who have girlfriends... and there's a sense of wanting to embody some of the pseudo-power of the toxic masculine guys despite recognizing it as neurotic on another level. That's the gist that I'm taking away from what you wrote. And I think that you should go for neither of these modes of existing... as neither are reflective of you. And you may have lost yourself in the complexity of these considerations. The challenge is to just get back to yourself and embrace whatever exists within you from either polarity and neither polarity without identifying with anything. I also sense that the resistance that arises towards the "nice guy" (or even the nice gal) is likely where some of the split from your authenticity might have originally arisen... especially if there's ever been a time in your life where you deliberately tried to carve your identity away from things like innocence or naivety or un-worldliness. So, you may associate the "nice guy" with things that you have tried to distance yourself from. I'm not 100% sure that's true. But it is something that could fit as a puzzle piece with the visceral resistance towards the "nice guy" and the desire to embody the "toxic masculine"... and the general confusion about where you are as a whole authentic being within this split. I would begin with dropping all agendas to be perceived or perceive yourself a particular way. And I'd begin by exploring the polarity you have the most resistance to (aka the "nice guy") in order to find the lost center in yourself. And feel into the aversions and discomforts if you were to perceive yourself or be perceived as one of those "nice" people.

@Ajay0 Thank you for sharing this. It's an interesting correlation that I wasn't aware of. Previously, I had assumed that the numbers of people in each of the castes were somewhat equivalent... save for the Brahman caste, as I assumed it was reserved for religious leaders. And I had also assumed the lowest caste was a somewhat smaller caste as well as, when I learned about the caste system in school, the vibe I got was one of a marginalized minority group. But given the fact that the lowest caste is the majority, it make sense that it's easier for collective bargaining... and less likely to lead to the discrimination that impacts people who have a minority status within the cultural context. And I can certainly see the correlation to the feudal system, which I have a framework for understanding in Medieval Western Europe but not in other places. My understanding of that in the context of European history is one where there's the noble class, merchant class, and peasant class. And it's clear that there are few nobles, a moderate number of merchants, and the majority is the peasants. Would you say this is similar size breakdown to the size breakdown of the castes in the caste system in India?

That's one of the issues with using the term "survival" in such an overgeneralized loosey goosey way... as it muddies the definition of the phrase "survival value" to the point that it doesn't really mean anything at all. And that's where you get the problem of over-subjectivizing to the point where you're assessing vacations as possessing more survival value than water. And if you made that claim anywhere else other than in this very intellectual context where there is social clout associated with complexity of thought, everyone would look at you like you're crazy. And they wouldn't really be wrong either, as it is crazy to believe that vacations serve the ends of survival more than water. It's just that when we over-intellectualize about a simple concept and get lost in the weeds of the complexity of those paradigms, we can lose grounding to what's actually real... and even the simplest truths can get lost in the mud of that complexity. So, if everything that humans do to enhance even the most peripheral of creature comforts gets classified as "survival", then we lose the ability to assess for LITERAL survival in the way that the word 'survival' is used colloquially literally everywhere else outside of the Actualized forum. So, let's say that we could classify survival in two ways: We could call the the common definition of survival as "Life and Death Survival"... and the uncommon definition that's frequently used in this specific forum context as "Self-Interest-Based Survival." Then, we can objectively assess for the common definition of survival, which is objective as it asks the question of "What sustains life better?". So, we could state the basic and simple truth that every kindergartener already knows the answer to that, "Water objectively has more survival value than vacations because water is a necessity for sustaining life and vacations are not." Then, you can also do the more subjective assessment for individuals in terms of "Self-Interest-Based Survival" relative to the question, "What serves your self-interest more at this juncture in time?" And perhaps one individual can say, "I'd love to go on vacation. I already have tons of water." But another individual is stuck out in the desert and they would say, "There's nothing in the world that I value more than water." Ultimately, I think it's an issue of over-intellectualizing the word survival to the point where meaning is eroded. Then, when the claim is made that "Masculinity has more survival value than Femininity" with the conscious or unconscious emotional and psychological agendas behind making such a claim, there is an understood bait and switch. And that bait and switch is that the meaning starts as "Masculinity has more 'Self-Interested Survival Value' than Femininity" but then gets switched to and interpreted as "Masculinity has more 'Life and Death Survival Value' than Femininity." And then it just becomes a propaganda tool to devalue women's role in society and our labor... both in historical and traditional contexts AND in contemporary post-industrial workplace scenarios AND in modern day households where women still do the majority of the household labor whether they work a job or stay at home.

This is an idealization of women's nature, of course... as it views women as more human than human. But women do tend to have some of the qualities that the author mentioned. And men tend to push those very qualities away from themselves, usually out of a fear of it undermining their Masculine identity. And it leads to the projection of both positive and negative ideals onto women. It's likely where the author's envy and projection of ideals onto women is coming from. I have noticed that a sizable minority of men tend to have this envy and want to compete with women... and prove Masculinity as better than Femininity. And the only reason that I see for wanting to do that is to act as a salve for fears of inferiority. When I was in my teens, I used to envy maleness. And it really came down to the fact that I liked guys more than I loved myself at that point in time. I think that this could also be the case for many men who feel the insecurities that the author is speaking of.

It didn't mean literally starving. I meant very very hungry and haven't eaten in half a day. There is a saying, "Never go grocery shopping when you're hungry." And that is because you will make poor choices at the grocery store when you're making active food selections for the week from a state of ravenous hunger. Ideally, you eat something before you go grocery shopping, so as not to make impulsive choices out of desperation for food.

I'm not aware of the current circumstances with regard to Indian societal structure and the way that the caste system currently functions. Though, if it's anything like it is here, there's probably still a lot of inequities along those caste lines... even if there are some existing initiatives to help those in lower castes. Those issues won't go away very quickly. It's similar to how there might be some small amount of initiatives to help black Americans in the U.S., and we have also had a black president. But in practice, there's still a lot of inequities and discrimination. But the reason I brought it up is because it was a great lesson about underestimating the survival value of those who have less prestige in society.

While value in itself is subjective and in the eye of the beholder... value with a qualifier is objective, as it is seen from the perspective of the qualifier and not the beholder. So, deciding that survival is valuable in itself is purely subjective (even if nearly universal) as survival in itself is neither inherently valuable not non-valuable. From the eyes of the universe, survival as a phenomenon is empty of inherent value. But once you say the phrase "survival value", that takes away the subjectivity factors of value being in the eye of the beholder... and you are then objectively assessing something's value in relation to a particular end goal... in this case survival. And while "value" by itself is always subjective, "survival value" can be assessed objectively... especially if you use the word "survival" in more precise and accurate terms to mean, "that which sustains life." For example, if I am assessing the value of various objects towards the end goal of "brushing my teeth"... I can objectively say that toothbrushes objectively have more "tooth-brushing value" than ironing boards do. Similarly, if I am assessing the value of various commodities towards the end of "surviving"... I can objectively say that water objectively has more "survival value" than vacations.

Billionaires back corporate Democrats... but not leftists or leftwing causes. So, there is no such billionaire-funded far leftwing propaganda machine. There is no mainstream leftist media. And independent leftwing media is on a shoestring budget, getting just the default ads on YouTube. But the far rightwing propaganda machine is VERY well-funded. And even Democrat politicians and Democrat-leaning news networks tend to disparage far left and center left positions... and instead take more moderately rightwing economic stances with a smattering of uncontroversial "Let's accept everyone" liberal social positions. The main Democrat catch phrase has always been, "Let's reach across the aisle!" So, they aren't remotely leftwing. Billionaires fund the creation of a far rightwing propaganda machine that will move people further right, as it is better for their bottom line. Rightwing propaganda keeps working class people voting on culture war issues (like being anti-trans) instead of voting on their own economic interests. And that is necessary to keep working class people from waking up to the unfairness and going left and joining labor movements and engaging in strikes... which would undermine corporate interests. So, billionaires have a huge vested interest in funding far rightwing propaganda to keep working class people angry at trans people, immigrants, ethnic minorities, etc.... as opposed to focusing their ire on the powers that be and unfair treatment they get in the workplace.

I think everyone should have a social circle. And having romantic options that can develop organically is just one of the many perks of having one. So, I wouldn't even create a social circle explicitly thinking about game. Just think about it as looking for people (men and women) to have a spend time with and good time with. Honestly, before someone even considers doing pick-up, I recommend building a social circle of friends and acquaintances to connect with. Then, once you have those more basic needs met, you can go do some pick-up if you want. But doing pick-up without a social circle is a bit like going to a grocery store when you're starving. You're going to be too desperate for your needs for human connection and social support to be detached form outcomes.

It depends on how you define survival value. If you define survival value as objectively, "Things that contribute the most to human survival"... then women contribute just as much to survival value as men do, if not more because of women doing the lion's share of cyclical sustainer tasks. But if you define survival value subjectively as, "Things that contribute to human survival that people are consciously aware of due to the scarcity/rarity/novelty of what is being provided." then I can see that men's work is more visible and people will tend to take it for granted less and consciously value it more in a subjective sense. If we go with the latter subjective definition that you've proposed for the term "survival value", then novel experiences (like going on vacation) have a lot more survival value than having access to a consistent supply of drinking water because the latter is a taken for granted background element for people in first-world nations... while the former is a rarity and highly valued (and a premium can be charged for it). But I would argue that access to clean drinking water objectively has more survival value even if it's common and banal... and taken for granted. Certainly, value exists within the eye of the beholder generally. But if were are looking specially at "survival value" as "that which objectively contributes the most to the life and death survival of human beings." I would argue that access to drinking water provides objectively more survival value than other resources that are scarcer and more novel.

There are VERY FEW big money interests that fund leftwing causes. And there is no such equivalent leftwing propaganda network, as lefties don't get big money dollars. Now, George Soros himself has donated to some progressive causes over the years. Like he helped countries democratize after the fall of the Soviet Union, funded college tuition for black South Africans during apartheid, donated a LOT of funding of a few specific universities, donated money to a cause to help pull impoverished African people out of poverty, donated to defense committees to help controversial defendants procure legal defense, and donated money to racial justice groups and criminal justice reforms. So, he is using his wealth to support philanthropic progressive causes. But none of these things have to do with funding a strategic propaganda network to brainwash people into being leftists. That's just what the right wing thinks he is. But then, when Elon Musk was helping Trump, he proudly proclaimed himself to be the "George Soros of the right". It's just yet another instance of "Every accusation is a confession." The reality is that leftists don't have anywhere near the funding and resources allotted to the far right from the billionaire class, major industries, and even foreign governments. And that's because leftist causes go against corporate interests. That's why many people who were once left-wing pundits make a big deal about, "Why I left the Left." They want the riches that come along with joining the right wing media-sphere. The reality is that there are big money interests flowing into right wing independent media and right wing think tanks. Being in leftwing independent media pays nothing. Soros most definitely isn't funding bread-tube in the way that billionaires are funding the Daily Wire lot. Right wing independent media pundits are making millions and millions of dollars... to the point where Steven Crowder accused Ben Shapiro (The Daily Wire) of "slavery" when he offered him a contract for a "measly" $50 million dollars. And Tim Pool, Dave Rubin, and Benny Johnson were getting big money from Russia to say their talking points on their shows. The reality is that the right wing propaganda machine is well-oiled and constructed by big money interests to influence the masses to be more sympathetic to right wing perspectives.... and the left doesn't have anything close to equivalent to that level of power.

Well said. The issue is that Blue and Orange people (including the ones on this forum who believe themselves to be Tier 2 thinkers and critiquing Green from above), will tend to see Green as outlandish and will want to see only a caricatured strawman of Green. So, taking a common reasonable Green positions like, "People shouldn't be treated unjustly and should be respected despite their differences" gets reframed as "These crazy leftists want total equality of outcome, to castrate all men, and to turn your dog trans!" And along the lines of what you were saying, I recently ran across an article about a large-scale survey of many women (Feminists and non-Feminists) where 19% of the participants identified as Feminists and 81% did not identify themselves as Feminists. And they were asked a series of questions about their feelings and attitudes about men. And men were also surveyed in this study and asked the same questions about their feelings and attitudes about men in this study. And both Feminist women and non-Feminist women tended to hold similarly positive views of men... though both Feminists and non-Feminists were mistaken that the Feminist group would hold more negative views about men than the non-Feminists. But Feminists' views on men tended to match more with men's perceptions of men than non-Feminist women's perceptions of men. Feminists were also more likely to see men and women as similar to themselves and to chalk up most gender differences to environmental factors, while non-Feminists had more of a tendency to see men as starkly different from themselves and see gender differences as a reflection of innate nature. So, Feminists would tend to view things like Toxic Masculinity as an environmental/societal issue rather than an innate propensity towards toxicity that men have... which likely has a lot to do with why Feminists have generally positive views of men despite their critiques of culture. And that matches my experiences as a woman who subscribes to Feminism. I always felt very positively about many individual men that I interact with, depending on their individual character. So, I don't relate large-scale societal injustices that disenfranchise women to individual men. That is, unless those men are loud and proud supporters of said disenfranchisement, like Andrew Tate types and those who agree with his perspectives on women.

100%

No, the left are just convenient scapegoats to blame the rise of Fascism on. The reason why Fascism was able to come to a head (after decades of being pushed under the floorboards) is the result of a solid decade of well-strategized and expertly crafted billionaire-funded propaganda campaigns to awaken people's authoritarian instincts... and to normalize and sell far right conservatism as a lifestyle brand to young people. AND also TONS of far right people organizing on every level of society and government to warm people up to Fascism and implement their agendas. Of course, this is helped along especially by the successes of Donald Trump... as he is particularly good at getting disengaged political normies to join the cause. And even the talking point in this meme was probably workshopped in a far right think tank 10 years ago to disseminate to the masses to brand jam the left further... as to train people towards the instinct to hate the left and see the right as more reasonable by contrast. So... don't give the credit of expert-level political organization to leftists. Leftists just have ethical values... but are piss-poor at organizing and don't have two nickels to rub together. But the right wing is unified and well-funded by big money interests. So, this past decade has been a masterclass at political organizing to mobilize people towards the Fascist cause and the further empowerment of the powerful at the expense of the vulnerable.

That only really works to keep a woman from wanting commitment if she really is just wanting a sexual encounter. But if a woman is just wanting sex, then that's usually going to be a one-off encounter for a time when she feels lonely and the man lucked out because he was there to fill that need for the night. But if the woman wants to continue sleeping with a guy and spending time with him, then she most certainly wants a relationship even if she's in denial about it and says, "I'm fine with friends with benefits" but unconsciously believes that she will eventually win the guy over (which never works). So regardless of the frame that a guy takes, a woman who sleeps with him and keeps sleeping with him is definitely wanting more and wanting a deeper connection. And the guy could be the biggest player and maintain that frame perfectly, which will signify to the women who really want one-off sexual encounters that he's the guy for the job. But if he has women on a regulation rotation, undoubtedly they all desperately want to be his girlfriend. They are just in denial about what they really want and are choosing WHO they want over WHAT they want. And they (deep down) hope that, with the magical power of their love, he will one day open his heart and pick them... and it causes them to accept breadcrumbs from a man who doesn't really value them. So, it really doesn't matter how much of a player frame a guy takes if the woman has agreed to more than one or two sexual encounters with him. If it's gone that far, she has definitely developed an attachment.

It's worth a shot. But I don't know if it would work very well as it isn't actually the positive values that sells a conservative candidate to voters. It's the emotions of fear, anger, and disgust that a candidate acts as a conduit for that attracts in voters. Most conservative voters just aren't really psychologically attracted to positive values in and of themselves... even if you tie your platform to family values or Jesus' teachings. It's more about what family values and Jesus' teachings gives them authoritative license to hate and to try to eradicate. What really motivates most voters towards Trump in particular is the fact that Trump knows how to push their psychological buttons around their desires to externalize their negative feelings. And his emotional button-pushing allows them to feel like they're valued loyal foot soldiers to an absolute authority who are doing the right thing. And they get to feel they are vindicated victims and to name a universally reviled scapegoat. Otherwise, the support for conservative politicians is tepid at best. Like, no one is obsessed with voting for a Romney-type or Huckabee-type. They mostly vote against what they hate in the culture... not for a politician or the positive things that politician will do for them, or how much that politician aligns with their positive values. It's more like "The more a politician will rid the world of what I am disgusted by, the more enthusiastic I will be about voting for that politician." Positive values and Golden Rule teachings are not a compelling emotional driver for those who feel chronically unsafe and ruled by fear of the other. It's more of "This politician will purify the infections of society by removing or eradicating the people and elements of culture that make me feel unsafe and cause the culture to degenerate." That's the motivating message... and Jesus and family values can be slapped as a label on top of it to help people hide their hatred from themselves.

Yes, that's accurate. A lot of traditionally Feminine work has tons of survival value because it involves the absence of major survival problems... without the evidence of the tragedies that would have otherwise occurred had that work not been done. So, they're a hard sell value-wise, as they are taken for granted. It's hard not to under-estimate the survival value of the janitor... until the janitor stops doing his job. It's sort of like how people view vaccines as having less survival value than cures.... despite that vaccines are responsible for saving so many lives. With cures, there is a sense that the cure can come in as the hero that saves the day... and be appreciated for its survival value. But vaccines save so many more lives than cures do. But because they are preventative medicine for sustaining a healthy population, they get taken for granted at best... and demonized at worst. Traditional men's work is like a cure. Traditional women's work is like a vaccine. And it's much harder for people to value a vaccine. So, cures cost a lot more.

It's 100% necessary to be emotionally detached in order to let go and be playful. If a man is emotional attached he will overthink things and get too serious about every little thing because he is trying to get to a specific outcome. But if a man is emotionally detached from outcome and is keen to the let the chips fall where they may, he can just be himself and goof around and laugh at himself.

No, I don't acknowledge that because it isn't true and never has been true in any era of human history. It's just that the survival contributions of women involve a lot of invisible work that gets overlooked as the traditionally Feminine work is one of cyclical sustenance rather than of progressive achievement. For example, everyone appreciates the man in the tribe who brings home the wooly mammoth as he is recognized to have achieved something of great survival value... and is thusly celebrated for his acheivement. But the invisible labor of women in the tribe who do all the childcare, cooking, cleaning, creating and mending clothing, and other maintenance tasks gets overlooked and taken for granted... because if they've done the job well, the work is invisible. But if they don't do it and do it well, everyone in the tribe's survival is compromised. So, human history is one of women being the invisible glue that holds everything together and getting very little thanks for it. And even the notion that women provide less survival value is a continuation of that lack of gratitude and acknowledgement for the sacrifices of women now and all the woman in all eras before that your life is scaffolded upon. There is a quote that goes something like, "A man might work from sun to sun, but a woman's work is never done." And that is how it is now and it is how it has always been in human history. But it's also true with people who do sustainer tasks in general that they don't get recognized for their invisible work. Consider how little appreciation that people have to the garbage man. It used to even be the case that parents would say, "You better go to college or you'll end up being the garbage man." But the garbage man provides SOOO much invisible survival value and deserves everyone's upmost gratitude... and way better pay. But cyclical sustainer tasks are archetypally Feminine principled... so they are devalued and come with no prestige. We only value the Masculine-principled progressive achievement based tasks that are more visible to use because there is more contrast around them. In these tasks, if you've done well... your achievement is visibly evident. It's the opposite of sustainer tasks where, if you'd done well... it doesn't look like you've done anything at all. The fact of the matter is that the most of the survival value comes from the people who are the least valued in society... and who do the most thankless invisible work. Consider India with its caste system... where the bottom class is called the "untouchables" or Dalits. And people of the higher classes, don't even want a Dalit's shadow to touch them. And because of their low status, their assigned lot in life is to collect human waste and deal with the sewage. The Dalits were seen as being of "low survival value". And there was a strike among the Dalits where they refused to collect human waste... and everyone of every class started to get very ill because of the sewage problem. So, it was a bit of justice for the acknowledgment of the "survival value" of those who are thought less valuable in the hegemonic ways people tend to see society.

No, that was just one of the identity/worldview factors that prevented me (as a teenager and early-20-something) from acknowledging the existence of collective power imbalances and injustices. I never wanted to acknowledge the power imbalances against women because they were very emotionally heavy and disturbing to face with. Even earlier, at age 10, I convinced myself that I was different from all other girls to escape the acknowledgment of those imbalances. And I had a lot of overtly misogynistic viewpoints that I felt applied to every other girl/women... but that I was the lone exception. And later (in my teens), I used anti-Feminist notions of "Everything is already equal. Why do we need Feminism?" to ignore and escape those imbalances and my feelings about them. And those identity blocks to acknowledging these patterns were something that I spent a few years of my early 20s working through... which caused me to have to look at my own internalized misogyny and hyper-valuation of Masculinity over Femininity. It was helpful that I had (at age 20) experienced what Femininity actually is during my medicine journeys because it gave me an expansive and empowering understand of what the Feminine really is... which is very authentic to my core nature and very different from the narrow way society conceptualizes of it. Prior to that, I didn't have any kind of understanding that Femininity and womanhood could be empowering. The only empowerment that I saw possible was in the transcendence of social constructs around gender and the sense that there is no difference between men and women... as societal notions of Femininity have always felt so inauthentic, constricting, and disempowering to me since childhood. But in the direct experience of the deep Feminine at the age of 20, I realized that Femininity is more than a social construct... and in myself and in society, the deep Feminine has been pushed under the floorboards. So, the crux of my inner work has been about re-integrating my own Feminine side and helping others to do the same. And that process was helped along by my ability to recognize these large-scale macrocosmic patterns of unfair imbalance and injustice. (Though these are more surface-level expressions of very deep-seated emotional, spiritual, and psychological splits within the collective psyche of the human species) So, integrating the recognition of systemic injustice in my early 20s opened up my ability to see the world more clearly... and recognize how I am impacted by and impact these systems. And it also caused me to have to reckon with the fact that privilege has played a hand in my successes... and that my cherished identities around "pulling myself up by my bootstraps with no help from anyone but myself" wasn't true as society had been playing a tremendously supportive role. And that's because there were enough supportive societal patterns working in my favor to allow me to succeed... in contrast to my intermittent economic hardships. But my reason for writing these posts isn't to lament about my own disenfranchisement under these systems. That's just a necessary part of the story to understand why it was so difficult for me to acknowledge these macrocosmic realities in the first place... and what blocked me from being compassionate and serving the egalitarian values that I've always had. I have always wanted everyone to be treated justly and fairly. But my identities and fears were causing me to go blind and be ignorant to injustice and unfairness... and caused me to be an unconscious contributor to the problem because of my myopia. I wrote the initial reply because I was trying to communicate with the OP who seemed to have this defensive viewpoint against the acknowledgement of widespread injustices because he has some similar patterns centered around identification with struggle to the patterns I used to have in my teens and early 20s. And acknowledging these collective unfairnesses is something the OP perceives as undermining and devaluing his own challenges and struggles. Often times, people can push back on certain realities if they don't know how to acknowledge those realities without undermining their identity or sense of meaning. And in this case, it seems the OP feels like his feelings and struggles are being dismissed because he is white... and he is understanding the concept of white privilege as something that invalidates his economic struggles. He also seems to see it like I used to see it when I first encountered the term white privilege where I would say, "How can I have white privilege if I'm technically homeless with no support system?" or later on "How can I have white privilege if I can't afford to pay my electric bill and have to take cold showers and live in the dark with only oatmeal to eat with water from the sink?" And when you're going through the economic ringer the last thing that you want to hear is that you have some kind of in-built privilege because it feels like people are saying, "You aren't struggling enough. You should be struggling more." Now, I'm not sure if the OP is going through the economic ringer in these ways. But getting by is very difficult for most people. And if identifying with the economic struggle is his go-to coping strategy, then he might be upset at what he conceptualizes as "the left" because their recognition of these patterns feels threatening to his ability to use that coping strategy. The OP was saying that he had always valued things like equality. But because he has interpreted the political left's acknowledgment of the existence of collective power imbalances as an invalidation of his own hardships, he is identifying as far right... seemingly as a "Ha! Take that Leftists!" Perhaps shadow boxing with an imaginary image in his mind... where he says, "But I'm a white guy and I've struggled economically." and then a caricatured group of unattractive, ethnically diverse, androgynous, moralistic, strange people with bad hair-dos and frumpy clothes that are all finger wagging him and saying "Your hardships as a white man mean NOTHING! And if you don't agree, you're a Fascist!") That's what it feels like he's arguing with in his mind. And unfortunately, this resistance towards the left's acknowledgment of systemic injustices, will undermine his originally stated egalitarian values and potentially cause him to fall into the trap of being a collaborator... seemingly just to spite the imaginary leftists in his mind.

I think this is an excellent post. It very much mirrors some themes that have come up in my medicine journeys. So much of what is happening politically is just the surface-level symptoms of deeply ingrained collective Shadows, needs, and psychological patterns. So, I have thought about what the roots causes of rising Fascism and authoritarianism (more generally) are... Authoritarian parenting - which primes people to idolize authoritarian figures who demonstrate absolute certainty Disconnection with humanity, the planet, and reality at large Projection of shame onto a scapegoated other The powerlessness over economic struggles (and the transference of blame onto a scapegoated other) The unconscious need for limitation The desire to abdicate responsibility and project responsibility/blame onto the scapegoated other... and project responsibility onto the parental authoritarian Let me break down my explanation a bit more... Reason #1 - Authoritarian parenting: This was studied after WW2, when a group of researchers wondered what the main factor was that made people susceptible to being sucked into the Nazi ideology. And they found that the number one factor that caused people to become Fascists was being raised by authoritarian parents. And what happens is that the child projects their authoritarian parents onto the demagogue... and reverts back to a childlike state with the demagogue where they can put all their trust into that demagogue to operate like a 100% perfect parent who always knows best. And they follow the demagogue like a cult-leader. Then, they project their negative feelings of anger and resentment towards the authoritarian parents towards those in weaker social standing. It's similar to how an abused child might not feel safe taking their anger out towards their parents that abuse them... but will instead transfer those feelings onto a younger sibling and start trying to dominate and terrorize the younger sibling. This is what happens to the scapegoated groups in a Fascist dictatorship... like women, ethnic minorities, religious minorities, the LGBT community, etc. They are the ones that the disowned negative feelings about the authoritarian parents (and authoritarian dictator) get projected onto. And it's a more individual trauma with regard to authoritarian parents that demagogues have learned to collectively "hack" in order to get traumatized people to project their authoritarian parents onto themselves... and to get people to direct their negative feelings about those authoritarian parents onto a scapegoated group. Reason #2 - Disconnection: When we have identities are worldviews that are centered around the idea of competition and differentiation from others to prove ourselves special or worthy, this tends to lead into hegemonic thinking more generally. And this creates a dynamic where we feel disconnection from the rest of humanity, nature, and reality at large. And it leaves us in a state of starvation for connection where we feel like an island unto ourselves and totally disconnected from the whole of reality. And this produces feelings of shame... and a desire to differentiate ourselves further to prove ourselves valid and valuable. And in this compensatory differentiation, we end up creating lots of arbitrary separations within ourself and outside of ourselves... and it strengthens the perception of self and other. This lead us to project a hierarchy of value onto existence itself where we start believing that "people who have x qualities are more valid that people who have y qualities." And if these hierarchies of value involve collective identities... that is often weaponized by the demagogue who wants to say, "You are part of the chosen people" and "You are special because you exist." And there's a huge need to be able to feel valid simply because we exist. But there's often a demographic quality that gets placed as the qualifier to differentiate the worthy and unworthy... like race, ethnic group, religion, gender, etc. But all of these comes from seeing one's self as separate from everything else... and trying to prove one special enough within the hierarchy compared to others to justify one's own existence and overcome shame and disconnection through "proving one's self worthier than others." Reason #3 - Projection of shame onto a scapegoat: Similar to the transference of the feelings of resentment towards the authoritarian parent onto a scapegoated group, there's the projection of one's own personal shame onto a scapegoated group. This gives the person/group the ability to wash one's own self clean of sins by projecting them onto the scapegoated other. If you're on the left (one of the scapegoated groups of the authoritarian right), you will see a dynamic that's referred to as "every accusation is a confession." It's projecting one's own perceived sins onto the scapegoated other... and then removing or killing the scapegoated other to further "purify" one's own self of sin and the shame that comes with it. Reason #4 - Economic powerlessness (and blaming and retaliating against a scapegoat to feel more empowered): When we feel powerless to a macrocosmic dynamic (like economic problems), it can feel empowering and relieving to have someone that's less powerful that you are to blame. If you blame the macrocosmic dynamic of economic problems themselves, you can't retaliate with violence against those problems to feel power over them. If you blame the politicians and powerful people for these problems, these are also out of reach. So, you can't easily retaliate with violence against those powerful people to feel more empowered. And if you do succeed, you will be in a world of hurt because they have more power than you. If you blame those who are already vulnerable AND you live in an authoritarian Fascist society that enables violence against those vulnerable groups... you're able to feel empowered by victimizing the less powerful other. And that retaliation feels like a solution to the powerlessness... especially if the scapegoated other is being blamed for economic anxieties. This is also true for other types of macrocosmic distress that are not specifically economic... like pandemics, wars, political upheavals, cultural changes, etc. Reason #5 - Unmet needs for limitation and contraction: In one of my medicine journeys, it showed me that the function of dictatorship is to create limitation in a top-down authoritarian way when the populace has a need for limitation... but can't consciously admit to that need and choose their own limits from a sovereign place. Similar to a child that doesn't know their own limits, they need a parental figure to come in and do it for them. And right now, there's so much rapid expansion and SO MUCH information that's readily available to use with the current state of the internet. And it's overwhelming and causes a lot of distress. The same thing happened when the printing press was invented. We were flooded with more information than EVER before. And this led to the arise of authoritarian movements... as people always consciously or unconsciously clamor for authoritarians to set limits when we aren't consciously feeling able to narrow our own aperture of exposure to catalysts of expansion (like educational materials, new perspectives, abundance of money, abundance of freedom, etc.) So, one of the best things we can do in order to let go of the collective demand for authoritarianism is to help people set boundaries and limits based on their own sovereign preferences. The main thing standing in the way of that is that contemporary humans have many paradigms that prize expansion over contraction. So, many people are unconscious to the fact that they feel over-expanded... as they see expansion as an unquestioned good and contraction as a unquestioned bad. Reason #6 - Abdication of personal responsibility: Being an underling of an authoritarian regime confers a major benefit... and that is to relinquish responsibility for one's own actions... and to give that responsibility over to a PERFECT source of authority that is greater than one's self. People also tend to do this with their God image... as it is a basic human need to be able to "give things up to the higher power". But with authoritarian governments (and cults), there is a tendency to make the authoritarian leader as the higher power itself. So, there is a tendency to give one's own sense of sovereignty and personal responsibility over to the authoritarian "Big Brother" figure... and see the Big Brother as perfect and Godlike. And this assures people that it's okay to give up their power and the responsibility that comes with it... as it feels safer to "just follow orders" given the absolute Godlike perfection projected onto the authoritarian leader. That's why, during the Nuremberg trials, lots of people who went to trial tried to give the defense as "We were just following orders." They believed they would be inoculated from the responsibility for their own actions because they were "just following orders" set by the leader. So, they expect the leader to take all the blame and responsibility if something goes wrong. And they project that the leader is perfect... so nothing will go wrong as long as they follow orders. Likewise, there's also the abdication of responsibility onto the scapegoated other where the scapegoated other is to blame for all of the problems of the dominant group. So, it enables victim's mentality, self-pity, and a total release of personal responsibility because "they are to blame for all the problems". --- Solutions: With regard to solutions for this, the number one preventative solution is for society at large to discourage authoritarian parenting... as this is one of the main roots causes. That's a more long-range preventative project. But in terms of more current solutions, the more we encourage eye-to-eye human connection... and an embrace of ordinary common humanity, the better. And a big part of this is to help people depolarize from hierarchical identities of being above or below other people.... both collectively and individually. And a big part of this is helping people recognize that humans are ordinary parts of nature just like all other creatures on the planet. We are not extraordinary animals that rule from outside of the circle of life... we are ordinary animals that exist as one of many peripheral aspects of the circle of life. This breaking down of the myth of human specialness, national/racial specialness, and even meritocratic specialness is what humbles us and brings us back into a state of interconnection with humanity, nature, and reality at large. And we feel at home and like we don't have to compete with others to prove ourselves individually or collectively special enough to exist. --- What would I do if I was Trump? What Trump's goal is, is to be validated by others as a special and significant person who's more important than others. So, he wants validation AND he wants power... which further cements his identity of significance and specialness compared to all other people. My goal (as Trump) would be to continue grand-standing as an absolute authority and never show any sign of faltering or making mistakes. That will ensure that people with traumas from being raised by authoritarian parents will continue to project absolute authority onto me. Showing uncertainty of any kind is a no no! Also, I'd continue scapegoating groups of people... as that will divide the populace and make them easier to control. And it will create more allegiance to me among the group of people traumatized by authoritarian parenting... who will then self-police the working class population from within by dominating their neighbors and trying to be the tallest kid in kindergarten. What I would do that Trump isn't already doing (and likely isn't capable of doing), is to be more strategic about power grabs. Trump just seeks power like a heat seeking missile seeks heat. But he will go for the quickest route to power from where he is. But this causes him to make a lot of mistakes... and undermine his power sometimes because he only thinks 1 or 2 steps ahead, instead of thinking 10 steps ahead.

Macho guys can also have hair. But they have to have a hyper-Masculine voice and personality, cocky swagger, and big bulky muscles. But either way, that's just one type of guy.

To be clear, I wasn't trying to take a jab. When I think of guys who are macho, I think of Joe Rogan and Hulk Hogan types. And I don't have any particular admiration towards that type of guy over other types of guys. So, when I say, "There aren't many macho guys on the forum"... it isn't reflective of a negative value judgment. I literally mean that they just aren't Joe Rogan types... which to me is a values-neutral statement. The majority of the guys I get into debates with are just average nerdy guys with particular ideas and ideologies about men and women.... not macho guys.

My point in relation to your previous post was that the Feminine itself is under-valued because society is polarized towards the Masculine-principle. So, society views Masculinity as superior to Femininity. And that's the root cause of many of the problems in society... the biggest one being our relationship with the Earth itself. We tend to operate off of a mind over matter paradigm, which doesn't have to do with gender but is very patriarchal in its valuation of the Masculine principle over the Feminine principle. And it causes us to value ideas and constructs over the planet itself. That's why the idea that "We need more women in STEM" misses the entire point as it just reaffirms the idea that Masculinity is better than Femininity... as STEM is a Masculine principled career. It's just that many people who are more egalitarian-minded, believe that Masculinity and Femininity are pure social constructs... when there is an archetypal and energetic reality to that polarities that remain even if neutrality is projected over them. And if STEM were suddenly to become a female dominated field and were perceived as Feminine in a societal sense, it would lose its prestige and pay... despite it being archetypally Masculine with its focus towards technology and hard sciences. When there are careers that shift from male-dominated to female-dominated, those careers loses prestige and gets less pay. Like nursing used to be male-dominated and have more societal prestige and better pay. But now it's a female-dominated field and associated with Femininity. So, it has less prestige and pay. Money is the way that society indicates that it values something. That is why anything Feminine or female-related will always be paid less and get less appreciation, until we are able to depolarize our valuation of both principles. As a side note, I wonder how things will shift with AI replacing a lot of the Masculine-principled labor. I wonder if society will continue to push further and further into Masculine imbalance with AI (given that AI is hyper-Masculine principled)... or if AI will take the Masculine-principled burdens off our plates and behoove us to finally integrate the Feminine in lieu of those obligations. It looks right now like it will be the former because these Masculine pursuits are mostly being used in pursuit of more polarization into Masculinity. But I can see how it could be used in a more integrative way. When the Masculine is more aligned, the Masculine is the polarity that builds the stage and context, while the Feminine is the play that takes place on that stage once the Masculine builds it. (like Teal Swan's idea of Masculine containment) So, I could see a potential future scenario where humanity can re-integrate the Feminine when so much of the logistical Masculine principled "stage-building" work we have to do can be automated out. And when you've been operating your whole life (and humanity for its entire history) off of obligation-mindset, it can be so difficult to answer the question, "What do I really want?" But it would be a chaotic transition to that, as humanity has historically defined itself by its labor and obligations. And it could always go to hell in a hand basket in the transition over the coming generations, especially if it serves more and more of the same polarization. Humanity hasn't fully built the container for the Feminine yet (but is getting close to the point of diminishing returns for tech innovations). So, it's an interesting prospect to ponder on to think about what a world would be like if the obligations and needs are squared away... and there is a room for discovering one's sovereignty (if we can actually use this technology in a way that serves integration instead of reinforcing polarization).