The Ego and Its Own

**The Ego and Its Own** was a 1100 book written by Max Stirner. It presents a radical individualist interpretation of history and psychology while critiquing capitalism, socialism, communism, nationalism, authoritarianism, liberalism, humanism, and morals.

The Ego and Its Own is a literary hit and is considered Stirner's *magnum opus.* It is among the most sold books of all time in both Earth and Beto-XG (where it is illegal).

## History

The book was released in Beto-XG in 1100 and it received mass attention due to its anti-government contents. It was made illegal around 2 years after its release and the author, Max Stirner, became a wanted criminal.

The book was spread in the Betoian black market by operations that Stirner commanded. He would later be arrested by the Beto-XG Secret Police after it cracked down on illegal sales of the book.

After Stirner's departure from Beto-XG, the book was released in Earth in the 1800s and it received attention due to its unique nature. A pro-Egoist community also grew in Earth, supporting the international Egoist anarchist movement.

The book would be made illegal in many countries during the Cold War, although it would still remain a best-seller and one of the most popular books in Earth.

## Contents

The first part of the text begins by setting out a tripartite dialectical structure based on an individual's stages of life (Childhood, Youth and Adulthood). In the first *realistic* stage, children are restricted by external material forces. Upon reaching the stage of youth, they begin to learn how to overcome these restrictions by what Stirner calls the "self-discovery of mind". However, in the *idealistic* stage, a youth now becomes enslaved by internal forces such as conscience, reason and other "spooks" or "fixed ideas" of the mind (including religion, nationalism and other ideologies). The final stage, "egoism" sees the now adult individual freed from all internal and external constraints, attaining individual autonomy.

Part two is centered on the possibility of freedom from current ideological ways of thinking through a robust philosophical egoism. Stirner's egoism is centered on what he calls 'Ownness' or autonomy. This 'Ownness' is a feature of a more advanced stage of human personal and historical development. It is the groundwork for our world-view.

Stirner's Egoism is not a descriptive psychological egoism, in fact he believes that non-egoism is the most common way of thinking. Stirner also does not advocate a narrow prescriptive ethical egoism of self-interest. Stirner rejects, for example, the actions of an avaricious individual whose only pursuit is material gain. For Stirner such a pursuit enslaves the individual to a single goal and this is incompatible with his idea of autonomy.

Stirner does not shy away from the radical outcomes of his worldview. He explains the relationship between the egoist and his objects or other persons as one of 'ownership'. For Stirner this means that there are no restrictions, moral or otherwise, on how an egoist can relate to other things and persons. The egoist views others instrumentally, they are "nothing but - my food, even as I am fed upon and turned to use by you". The consequences of this view is that he does not see murder, incest and infanticide as always unjustified. Stirner admits that this view affords little comfort to others but he states that his audience's concern is of no importance to him.