Ego vs. Spirituality

hiddenpuma75 said:First off:

You're missing the point entirely—here's what she actually means:

Let's be honest: life is tough for every man and woman out there. It’s just one of those inescapable realities of being alive.

It’s true—life isn't exactly an even playing field, and some people definitely deal with a heavier load than others. But at the end of the day, every man and woman faces their own unique set of trials, both those tied to gender and those that have nothing to do with it.

Complaining to women that they are too pale. 🙄 To claim that men in positions of power are inherently to blame for everything—or that life is simply easier for guys and harder for women—is a massive oversimplification. In most real-world scenarios, that kind of sweeping generalization just doesn't hold up.

Everything is so deeply interconnected, and there are just so many unknowns, that it feels almost reductive to paint men as the perpetual instigators of war while casting women merely as the creators of flowers and butterflies. 🙂 🎉 🙂 We're looking at this from the perspective of elementary school students and kids up to about 13 years old.

Your attempt to pin the blame for wars on those terrible men is just as ridiculous as it would be if I tried to argue that mothers are the ones responsible for wars because they raised those men. 🙄 Honestly, if they had truly embraced their roles as mothers and women, they wouldn't have raised such flawed men—the very same men their own daughters are now calling out for being so problematic. 🙄

By the way, conflict is just a natural, unavoidable part of being human. It’s really at the root of so many things.

It’s pretty obvious that some problems just can't be solved any other way than through pure, unadulterated struggle. Sometimes, you're fighting for your very life. That’s just the reality of things—it was true back in the days of America, it's true across the globe today, and it'll be true long after we're gone.

Of course, just because someone wins doesn't mean they're automatically "right." But hey, at least they proved they were the better fighter. To me, that’s still a step up from endless, empty chatter or just settling for the status quo.

So, to bring it back to the main topic—I'll wrap this up by saying you missed the point with every single one of your posts.
We have the Global Gender Gap Report
. What are we actually talking about here? A few examples:

1. Practically throughout history, women have mostly been treated as property belonging to men.
Which means a man could do whatever he wanted with a woman's body and soul (with religions giving him full permission, of course).
He could abuse her or beat her in marriage as much as he wanted, control all the assets, and decide what happened to the kids.

2. Women didn't have the right to vote until very recently—and many still don't. Women's suffrage

3. Until recently (and for many still today), women were denied access to schools by men. Why?
Timeline of women's education

4. Countless women were forced into prostitution by men. Prostitution

5. Countless women have been killed based on certain "male" traditions (like Sati in India), or brutally mutilated (like FGM in Africa), or murdered for the sake of "family honor."

Countless women have been killed by men just because they were labeled "witches"—it’s a grim history. Witch-hunt

Countless fetuses have been aborted in China—and honestly, it happens elsewhere too—simply because they were female. It’s left them with a massive deficit of over 100 million women. There are just too many men around.

Most women were essentially forced into financial dependency on men—back in 1985, for instance, you couldn't even open a bank account or land a job without a husband's permission (as Flyer pointed out). Their work at home was never valued, let alone paid. Even in modern society, we’re still dealing with the wage gap—women often get paid less for the exact same job, even when they're more qualified or simply perform better. And yeah, I know people love to bring up the "pregnancy risk" argument to justify it, but that's just a tired excuse for systemic inequality.

In most companies, women just don't get a seat at the table when it comes to those inner management circles—and that goes for major political roles too. It's basically a closed door.

In most major religions, women aren't even considered fit to be priests—it's just how things are.

Alright, your turn. 😍

casualtiger2 said:Maybe we should actually define what we're even talking about here.
It started like this:

Flyer basically summarized my view in a single sentence, and my reaction was aimed at kavala's chauvinistic remarks, which actually end up proving Flyer's point.
So, if you want, we can debate this thesis instead: throughout most of human history, one half of humanity has oppressed the other, more or less, based solely on gender.
What men have done to each other—how much, why, etc.—can be a topic for another conversation, but not this one, because it's logically flawed.
The subject is tied to our main theme, "Ego and Spirituality," but we can get to that later (by the way, I’d love to hear your counter-argument, especially from a spiritual angle, since you've spent all these years preaching the necessity of believing in God and the importance of religion).

"78% of suicides are men" — women didn't kill them.
"68% of the homeless are men" — women didn't take their houses away just because they're men.
"80% of homicide victims are men" — most weren't killed by women, and certainly not because they're men.
"98% of military casualties are men" — women aren't the ones sending them to war or killing them there.
"92% of workplace injuries happen to men" — women aren't the ones injuring them.

Is that "acceptable" enough for you?

Since you're such a fan of statistics, here are some actual serious topics (unfortunately, you can't fit these into some YouTube comedian's punchlines)—
The Global Gender Gap Report just dropped.
Let’s be real right out of the gate—we have to acknowledge that these numbers are looking at the recent past. The status of women in certain societies (the ones still lagging behind, anyway) has actually improved a ton over the last 40 or 50 years. Plus, we can't exactly ignore the previous few thousand years of history, either.
[A quick tangent—it’s often possible to stay silent from...]Highly educated, well-off women—mostly in modern societies.Honestly, all this talk about equality feels pretty redundant—just like how some Black Americans in similar positions might claim discrimination doesn't even exist. It completely ignores the vast majority of women and Black people who actually feel that inequality on their skin every single day. We’re talking about centuries of oppression against women and Indigenous peoples—and we shouldn't overlook the massive struggle led by brave people who actually fought to bring about any kind of progress at all.

I find it unacceptable because you're obstructing the facts just to protect your initial premise—that throughout history, and even now, men have mostly oppressed women.

I wasn't even disputing that, so your attempt to debunk my statistics doesn't really make any sense.

The data I provided is meant to show that this world isn't some paradise for men, nor is it, heaven forbid, a paradise for women; both genders mostly suffer from the flawed design of this life's "holodeck," rather than fighting a gender war.

a) Regarding the homelessness issue, let me show you where your nitpicking leads us. If we keep arguing like we're at a flea market—where I supposedly defend men by shifting blame onto women, just as you do—we'll end up in an endless regression. It turns into that classic, circular argument you see in bad relationships or on political forums.😁

Basically, we'd just be descending into mindless whataboutism and finger-pointing. 🎉

1) If women were truly all sunshine, butterflies, and pure kindness,🙂 they wouldn't allow there to be so many homeless men; they would have ensured they had access to Safe House 2 facilities.😉

2) The fact that 78% of suicides are men means life is harder for men than it is for women. OH, REALLY? WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT!

3) That 92% of workplace injuries involve men means men take on the tougher, riskier jobs, while women stay home painting their nails🙂 and avoiding anything dirty, heavy, or unglamorous.😁

hiddenpuma75 said:

I find it unacceptable because you're obstructing the facts just to protect your initial premise—that throughout history, and even now, men have mostly oppressed women.

I wasn't even disputing that, so your attempt to debunk my statistics doesn't really make any sense.

The data I provided is meant to show that this world isn't some paradise for men, nor is it, heaven forbid, a paradise for women; both genders mostly suffer from the flawed design of this life's "holodeck," rather than fighting a gender war.

a) Regarding the homelessness issue, let me show you where your nitpicking leads us. If we keep arguing like we're at a flea market—where I supposedly defend men by shifting blame onto women, just as you do—we'll end up in an endless regression. It turns into that classic, circular argument you see in bad relationships or on political forums.😁

Basically, we'd just be descending into mindless whataboutism and finger-pointing. 🎉

1) If women were truly all sunshine, butterflies, and pure kindness,🙂 they wouldn't allow there to be so many homeless men; they would have ensured they had access to Safe House 2 facilities.😉

2) The fact that 78% of suicides are men means life is harder for men than it is for women. OH, REALLY? WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT!

3) That 92% of workplace injuries involve men means men take on the tougher, riskier jobs, while women stay home painting their nails🙂 and avoiding anything dirty, heavy, or unglamorous.😁
I find it unacceptable because you're obstructing the facts just to protect your initial premise—that throughout history, and even now, men have mostly oppressed women.

I wasn't even disputing that, so your attempt to debunk my statistics doesn't really make any sense.

The data I provided is meant to show that this world isn't some paradise for men, nor is it, heaven forbid, a paradise for women; both genders mostly suffer from the flawed design of this life's "holodeck," rather than fighting a gender war.

a) Regarding the homelessness issue, let me show you where your nitpicking leads us. If we keep arguing like we're at a flea market—where I supposedly defend men by shifting blame onto women, just as you do—we'll end up in an endless regression. It turns into that classic, circular argument you see in bad relationships or on political forums.😁

Basically, we'd just be descending into mindless whataboutism and finger-pointing. 🎉

1) If women were truly all sunshine, butterflies, and pure kindness,🙂 they wouldn't allow there to be so many homeless men; they would have ensured they had access to Safe House 2 facilities.😉

2) The fact that 78% of suicides are men means life is harder for men than it is for women. OH, REALLY? WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT!

3) That 92% of workplace injuries involve men means men take on the tougher, riskier jobs, while women stay home painting their nails🙂 and avoiding anything dirty, heavy, or unglamorous.😁
So, what exactly is it you're trying to talk about here?

Just to be clear, this post isn't a direct rebuttal to Dragan’s latest update from earlier tonight.

It’s honestly too easy to just get stuck in a political shouting match and reflexively argue against everything Dragan says just for the sake of arguing. I’m officially opting out of that cycle.

HERE IS MY TAKEAWAY:

The way I see the world is that women in any civilized society face the same ups and downs as men. Life involves suffering, regardless of gender—suffering doesn't care if you're a man or a woman.

The constant whining from certain feminists about "evil white men" has been effectively dismantled by people like Jordan Peterson and even Raspudić here in the States.

Of course, in primitive societies, life is undeniably harder for women, but that's a total truism.
It's difficult because, at that primal level, life is simply dictated by whoever holds the most power.😉

This is actually pretty significant stuff—after all, every single one of us carries a mix of both masculine and feminine hormones, along with certain "masculine" and "feminine" traits.
Given how men have historically dominated women in various ways, it’s left a mark on everyone—both men and women—on a subconscious level, even today.
By trying to belittle or control women, men essentially ended up diminishing themselves too, while women were stripped of the chance to truly reach their potential.
That’s why, if we want to actually feel like whole human beings, we need to acknowledge and understand both the masculine and feminine aspects within ourselves. We need to develop them, embrace them, and let that understanding guide how we act in the "real world."

There’s zero reason why people should be treated unequally based on gender, despite how things have functioned up until now.
Sure, having a bit more testosterone or a stronger physical build isn't a valid excuse for men to rule over women, but that’s basically how it all started—the "I'm stronger, so I decide" mentality. That logic eventually got baked into tradition and then cemented by social structures, government laws, and some pretty mindless religious dogmas as the supposed "natural order of things."

At its core, it’s just a very specific way to feed the ego—the "I'm a man, so no matter how weak, stupid, or cruel I am, I'm still superior to a woman" mindset. It's just one of many ways the ego protects itself.

It’s really only since the state—specifically a secular government—took over the role of being the "stronger" authority that things have started to improve for everyone. Now, whether you're a man or a woman, there's finally a path toward becoming mature individuals, especially if you actually care about any kind of spiritual growth.

PS
Don't get me wrong, women have their own version of "ego support" through the "I'm a woman and..." trope, but historically, that version has always been a lot less damaging than the male equivalent.

hiddenpuma75 said:Just to be clear, this post isn't a direct rebuttal to Dragan’s latest update from earlier tonight.

It’s honestly too easy to just get stuck in a political shouting match and reflexively argue against everything Dragan says just for the sake of arguing. I’m officially opting out of that cycle.

HERE IS MY TAKEAWAY:

The way I see the world is that women in any civilized society face the same ups and downs as men. Life involves suffering, regardless of gender—suffering doesn't care if you're a man or a woman.

The constant whining from certain feminists about "evil white men" has been effectively dismantled by people like Jordan Peterson and even Raspudić here in the States.

Of course, in primitive societies, life is undeniably harder for women, but that's a total truism.
It's difficult because, at that primal level, life is simply dictated by whoever holds the most power.😉

Are you suggesting that oppression doesn't exist in developed countries? Then how do you explain the homelessness crisis, workplace injuries, and all that? Let’s set aside gender for a second—those with more money, power, or influence naturally squeeze those with less. Suffering doesn't just fall from the sky; people create it constantly while trying to grab more than their fair share. Women in certain parts of the world managed to fight for their rights, not by attacking men personally, but by challenging the structures that allowed injustice to persist. And let’s be real: they didn't do it by being delicate little flowers. No one survives or improves their situation in this world by acting like a fragile butterfly.

If the number of homeless men really bothers you, feel free to go out and organize some aid. Just like you could comfort someone to prevent them from committing suicide, or stop using products made through forced labor... tomorrow you could start an association (all-male, if that makes you feel better) and actually work on solving these issues. But I get the impression these statistics are only waved around when it's convenient to protect one's own skin... or rather, to pivot back to the main topic... our own bruised egos caused by some random woman who barely pays us any mind. Not necessarily you, but guys who wave these grim statistics around like a flag, essentially shouting, "Oh, it's hard for me too because I have a penis"... which quickly translates to "women are just targets who spend all day painting their nails."

I really don't have the patience for that anymore. Credit to Dragan for trying to provide reasoned arguments about where this perceived female "superiority" comes from... but it's all for nothing if a junkie like Peterson keeps barking his talking points, and I won't even bring up Raspudić since you already know how I feel about him. If you think following caricatures of the male gender (or humanity in general) is the way to go... then we really have nothing left to talk about.

Alright, let’s talk about the whole ego versus spirituality thing.
Look, the feminist movement—as just another slice of subculture—isn't really the point here, much like how punk rock, political extremists, or even die-hard sports fanbases aren't the core issue...
A lot of people try to draw lines between these things, but honestly? I don't see the connection at all.
Why? Because ego and spirituality are basically baked into the very definition of being human.
You can't have a human being without an ego, any more than you can have one without some level of spirituality.
They're totally intertwined.
If you have an ego, you've got to be spiritual, and if you're spiritual, you're inevitably carrying an ego around with you.
It’s all about finding that sweet spot, that balance between the two.
I mean, how do you even wrap your head around spirituality without an ego?
It’s impossible—unless we’re talking about robots or some sci-fi cyborg nonsense.
Maybe modern culture is obsessed with turning the average Joe into some kind of "superman," but let's be real, every era has tried to play that game.
It's been happening throughout history.
There is no human being without spirituality, just like there’s no human without an ego.
It’s basic logic—if a equals b and b equals c, then a equals c.

So, let’s talk about ego versus spirituality.
Look, the feminist movement—as just another subculture—isn't really the point here, much like how punk rock, the hardcore political factions of the 40s, or even die-hard sports fanbases like those in Chicago or NYC aren't the topic...
A lot of people try to draw these lines between things, but I don't see the correlation at all.
Why? Because ego and spirituality are basically hardwired into what makes us human.
You can't have a person without an ego, just like you can't have a person without some level of spirituality.
They're completely intertwined.
If you have an ego, you’ve got to be spiritual, and if you're spiritual, you're definitely carrying an ego around with you.
It’s all about finding that sweet spot where they balance out.
I mean, how are you even supposed to imagine spirituality existing without an ego?
It’s impossible—unless we’re talking about robots or some sci-fi cyborg crap.
Maybe modern culture is trying its best to turn the average Joe into some kind of Superman, but honestly, people have been trying to engineer that "perfect" human for ages,
throughout all of history.
There is no human being without spirituality, just like there is no human being without an ego.
It's basic logic—the law of association: if a=b and b=c, then a=c.

Keith Harris51 said:Alright, let’s talk about the whole ego versus spirituality thing.
Look, the feminist movement—as just another slice of subculture—isn't really the point here, much like how punk rock, political extremists, or even die-hard sports fanbases aren't the core issue...
A lot of people try to draw lines between these things, but honestly? I don't see the connection at all.
Why? Because ego and spirituality are basically baked into the very definition of being human.
You can't have a human being without an ego, any more than you can have one without some level of spirituality.
They're totally intertwined.
If you have an ego, you've got to be spiritual, and if you're spiritual, you're inevitably carrying an ego around with you.
It’s all about finding that sweet spot, that balance between the two.
I mean, how do you even wrap your head around spirituality without an ego?
It’s impossible—unless we’re talking about robots or some sci-fi cyborg nonsense.
Maybe modern culture is obsessed with turning the average Joe into some kind of "superman," but let's be real, every era has tried to play that game.
It's been happening throughout history.
There is no human being without spirituality, just like there’s no human without an ego.
It’s basic logic—if a equals b and b equals c, then a equals c.

That initial "Self" impression is just a limitation. It’s this illusion of self-awareness that actually stunts your growth, keeping your spirituality stuck in diapers, trapped in a tiny little crib.

Yeah, yeah, yeah... "No, I don't want to go out, I just want my juice box and my teddy bear."
Pathetic.

Keith Harris51 said:Alright, let’s talk about the whole ego versus spirituality thing.
Look, the feminist movement—as just another slice of subculture—isn't really the point here, much like how punk rock, political extremists, or even die-hard sports fanbases aren't the core issue...
A lot of people try to draw lines between these things, but honestly? I don't see the connection at all.
Why? Because ego and spirituality are basically baked into the very definition of being human.
You can't have a human being without an ego, any more than you can have one without some level of spirituality.
They're totally intertwined.
If you have an ego, you've got to be spiritual, and if you're spiritual, you're inevitably carrying an ego around with you.
It’s all about finding that sweet spot, that balance between the two.
I mean, how do you even wrap your head around spirituality without an ego?
It’s impossible—unless we’re talking about robots or some sci-fi cyborg nonsense.
Maybe modern culture is obsessed with turning the average Joe into some kind of "superman," but let's be real, every era has tried to play that game.
It's been happening throughout history.
There is no human being without spirituality, just like there’s no human without an ego.
It’s basic logic—if a equals b and b equals c, then a equals c.

That initial "Self" image is just a total limitation—it's this illusion of self-awareness that stalls your growth and keeps your spiritual side stuck in diapers, trapped in a tiny little crib.

Yeah, yeah, yeah... "No, I don't want to go out! I just want my juice box and my toys!"
Goo goo ga ga.

casualtiger2 said:This is actually pretty significant stuff—after all, every single one of us carries a mix of both masculine and feminine hormones, along with certain "masculine" and "feminine" traits.
Given how men have historically dominated women in various ways, it’s left a mark on everyone—both men and women—on a subconscious level, even today.
By trying to belittle or control women, men essentially ended up diminishing themselves too, while women were stripped of the chance to truly reach their potential.
That’s why, if we want to actually feel like whole human beings, we need to acknowledge and understand both the masculine and feminine aspects within ourselves. We need to develop them, embrace them, and let that understanding guide how we act in the "real world."

There’s zero reason why people should be treated unequally based on gender, despite how things have functioned up until now.
Sure, having a bit more testosterone or a stronger physical build isn't a valid excuse for men to rule over women, but that’s basically how it all started—the "I'm stronger, so I decide" mentality. That logic eventually got baked into tradition and then cemented by social structures, government laws, and some pretty mindless religious dogmas as the supposed "natural order of things."

At its core, it’s just a very specific way to feed the ego—the "I'm a man, so no matter how weak, stupid, or cruel I am, I'm still superior to a woman" mindset. It's just one of many ways the ego protects itself.

It’s really only since the state—specifically a secular government—took over the role of being the "stronger" authority that things have started to improve for everyone. Now, whether you're a man or a woman, there's finally a path toward becoming mature individuals, especially if you actually care about any kind of spiritual growth.

PS
Don't get me wrong, women have their own version of "ego support" through the "I'm a woman and..." trope, but historically, that version has always been a lot less damaging than the male equivalent.

your stance is an ideology—or rather, a byproduct of one.

Every human being possesses both masculine and feminine qualities in full; it's just that men are socially conditioned to suppress their feminine traits as "unnecessary," pushing them into the unconscious (the anima) and projecting them onto an external object—namely, a woman. The reverse happens too.

That is a dogma, and we are trained—conditioned—to see it that way. From the perspective of vital life, men and women are equally valuable and interdependent for the continuation of the species, each serving a specific biological function...

A man exists to be potent, and a woman to bear children (to be beautiful and fertile). Because of their biological differences, their psychological morphologies are also different and require different treatments. In reality, equalizing is a poor way to treat both men and women. The direct consequence is a loss of clarity regarding both sex and gender, as well as the distinctions within them. It is this equalization that has led to a chaotic understanding of gender, driven by the attempt to make everyone equal. Everything else we perceive becomes equally chaotic.

Based on this equalization, every gender ends up handicapped—men lose a significant part of their "masculinity" and women lose a significant part of their "femininity." If you compromise with equalization, you end up with castrated men and barren women.

From a spiritual standpoint, every man and every woman is a star.

For anyone wanting to reflect on this, I recommend Jung's *The Red Book*.

Joseph Bailey41 said:I’m sorry, but I honestly have no idea what you're getting at. 🤷

Could you maybe explain that in plain English?

It just wouldn't work—you’d lose so much of the nuance in translation that there wouldn't be anything left.