... Can be boiled down to one principle.

Some people think that people are puzzle pieces, each a special unique snowflake with a different shape, and that each person needs to find someone they "fit" with. They advise people to look for someone "compatible", and if a relationship fails, well, the two of you just weren't "compatible" enough. Try the exact same thing again with a different person.

This is the Blue Pill.

Other people know that people are pretty much motivated by the same set of instincts, and their desires can be understood as similar. They know mating is about attraction, and that there are simple ways to work on being attractive, and that it's easy to tell who's attractive and who isn't.

This is the Red Pill.

And that's is why blue pill dating advice consists of "keep trying the same thing over and over again, hoping for different results", "just be yourself", "wait until you find the right person", "people are complicated, and all different. Just keep trying", and "changing yourself or your behaviour is dishonest, manipulative, and rapey". Because their notion that people are puzzle pieces means that they must find a fit the way puzzle pieces do... test each different piece the same way, until you get the right result. And anything you do to present yourself differently is just disguising what puzzle piece shape you are, and preventing others from finding a fit.

So why do they believe this lie? Because it is pretty.

Because it comforts them with the whisper that no one is better than anyone else. That we are all just different in our own unique, special way, and if we just be ourselves, that unique specialness will shine through and get us what we need. It whispers that the universe is fair. That no one's feelings ever need to be hurt, because no one is ever just plain not good enough the way they are.

One is inclined to wonder if these people have tried looking at the universe lately.

The beginning of the red pill is the realization that the universe is not fair, that we cannot make it fair, and we all must simply struggle as hard as we can to get by in an unfair universe. That some people are better than others (in the case of mating, this mean "more attractive"), and that we all simply have to work on improving what we have, and who we are.

The lie that no one is better than anyone else may stem from the commendable desire to hurt no one's feelings. But it ends up hurting more than feelings. It destroys lives. Not simply because it gives people fantasy expectations that the universe will crush, but because it prevents them from doing the work they need to do to become better.