This is true. But stocks have returned an average of 6.5 percent to 7 percent per year after inflation over the last 200 years. So, one can be rather sure, that a well-diversified stock portfolio over several decades will yield something like that.Even "buy and hold share" is such a bet. You bet the company does not go bankrupt and will have an addressable market that will still generate income and makes it worth something. There is no safe investment. Even if you put the money under your pillow it will wither away from inflation.
There is only different degrees of risk - and a fair risk/reward, because markets are efficient.
Stock market is a random game of imperfect information. Akin to poker. Mathematically poker is also zero-sum. But yet still people make a living with playing it. There is a saying: you don't play the cards, you play the table.
Stock market is the same. If you have an information edge over others (because you love things and research like crazy) you can capitalize on that. Or you get insider information directly.. i.e. look into the others cards at the poker table
Poker example is actually very good regarding the option market. It is true, that some particularly skilled player may constantly earn in poker, but when we look at the players in the poker table as a whole, it is a zero-sum game, actually the total sum for the players is negative as house takes its rake on every deal, akin to a broker, who takes its share of every option trade.
So yes, it is possible to get constant gains with the options trade, but in order to do that, one has to be better at predicting stock movements than market participants in general.