Isn't "the unique one" or "the only" or "the ego", a product of society? It is produced by intercourse and womb and raised up and molded. No desires except the simplest, instinctual ones, arise within the individual, they are inputted from his world. His clothes, his language, his habits. There is also nothing the individual does per se, no more than a cell in his body does anything per se. All of his thoughts are woven from the material manufactured by countless other minds and forged by his imagination. He is constantly bombarded by messages and conditions, to have certain desires and drives and to find in these his sense of purpose. How are these subliminal or unconscious "spooks", less spooky than conscious ones? How is it that a union of individuals is a spook, but a conflicting bundle of desires and individual brain cells, is not?
>>25182295>How are these subliminal or unconscious "spooks", less spooky than conscious ones?"There is a difference whether one is determined by an other or by oneself, whether one is a living one or a reasonable one. Love lives on the principle that everyone does what he does for the sake of the other, freedom lives on the principle that he does it for his own sake""But how does love appear in the face of freedom?"Stirner, Preliminary Remarks on the Liebesstaat (pic)>How is it that a union of individuals is a spook, but a conflicting bundle of desires and individual brain cells, is not?I don't think you understand what a spook is, it is not just any idea. A spook is a concept which holds power over you because you've made it real and forgot you were the creator of that concept, that idea, and therefore its master, and therefore capable to abandon it whenever, because it holds no power. A spook is an idea that holds power of decision over you. By "you" you must understand the conscious ego, that must evaluate things for itself. >Isn't "the unique one" or "the only" or "the ego", a product of society? It is produced by intercourse and womb and raised up and molded. No desires except the simplest, instinctual ones, arise within the individual, they are inputted from his world. His clothes, his language, his habits. There is also nothing the individual does per se, no more than a cell in his body does anything per se. All of his thoughts are woven from the material manufactured by countless other minds and forged by his imagination. And when you describe things like this then, what advantage does 'Society' have over the individual more than Nature, or Reality or a God? And so what? Why? What does that have to do with anything that the child is born into the world from the world? Why would that prevent him from claiming acquiring things by himself, for himself? The point of the Ego and Its Own is not to detach from reality, it is to assert that Ego should stand as Master against Reality, and manipulate it to the extent that it can to its own benefit, which makes sense, because it is only true joy to be a master, and everyone feels it when they accomplish something creative (in other words when they subdue Nature to their will), and that every other proposition for a human should do rests on Fabrications which have brought nothing but enslavement and sapping of creative and vitality, which is the only thing you should be looking at to discern right and wrong: true joy, happiness. >He is constantly bombarded by messages and conditions, to have certain desires and drives and to find in these his sense of purpose. How are these subliminal or unconscious "spooks", less spooky than conscious ones? How is it that a union of individuals is a spook, but a conflicting bundle of desires and individual brain cells, is not?"Spook or not spook" is a consideration of mastery: "am I able to say 'no' here?" if 'yes', then you are in control
>>25182964(continuing)another pic from "Philosophical Reactionaries", with a rant that I likeThe hard part is always being clear about what it is to be a slave, or a master. What does it mean to be addicted, and lacking choice, or what does it mean to 'choose' something.To me it always comes clear with that question "Can you say 'no'?". It comes clear that someone addicted to drugs, or food, or TV, is simply unable to say no, and has one desire that eats up every other, It's an imbalance in a way. You could say "but if you desire that thing A(e.g. drugs) and you fulfill that desire isn't that a choice? Isn't that fine? Aren't you saying 'Yes' to it?", You are indeed right that you say yes at all times to a particular desire when you are addicted, but what makes it not a choice, is that you confront one single desire with every other you incapable to say no.Similarly, what is 'choice'? To me choice only happens with a power of evaluation and the *possibility of rejection*, it is saying Yes while having the potential to say No, otherwise it is no choice at all."Where does unselfishness begin? Right where an end ceases to be our end and our property [Eigen/um] , which we, as owners, can dispose of at pleasure; where it becomes a fixed end or a - fixed idea; where it begins to inspire, enthuse, fanaticize us; in short, where it passes into our stubbornness and becomes our - master. One is not unselfish so long as he retains the end in his power; one becomes so only at that 'Here I stand, I can do no other', the fundamental maxim of all the possessed; one becomes so in the case of a sacred end, through the corresponding sacred zeal.” -- Stirner, The Ego and Its OwnAnd my Stirner agrees with me :)>'Here I stand, I can do no other'is what he says about being a slave
>>25182984(continuing)I'll add one last point because I have seen it being brought up against me many times.Continuously saying Yes to living in society is not proof or admission of slavery, or an argument that you should live *for* it, if you say Yes to society continuously because you recognize it benefits *you* when compared to the alternative of being a hermit or committing suicide then it is still a choice so long as you keep the power within you to end yourself at any moment you'd see society being irremediably bad, the Ultimate No, suicide. Live free
>>25182964What is the difference between doing something for another rationalized as doing it for yourself (e.g. consumerism or fighting a foreign war under conditioning from war movies or books), versus doing something for yourself while rationalizing it as doing it for another? How is the latter more spooky than the former?My conscious ego and sense of identity and reasoning is a product manufactured by thousands of years and millions of people. It does not "evaluate things for itself" in any pure sense.The Ego is not external to reality and the division of the world into self versus reality, is an illusion, which cloaks the fact that the self is a product. The idea that selfishness is good of course predates Stirner as a capitalist concept, the idea that everyone being selfish is desirable economically is already present therefore also the incentive to condition this. By being selfish, it was argued, someone does better for the economy.
>>25182984Addicts are frequently in denial and insist they could easily quit any time they wanted. If they try to quit, they quickly find they cannot. Then rationalize it by saying they decided they did not want to quit after all.What is possibility? How much of it is just an illusion used for conditioning? Every man in America thinks he is a possible billionaire. Although obviously quitting opiates cold turkey is much more possible than that.Pleasure is not a spontaneous motion of the self. It is 99% a carrot which we cannot carefully examine because, according to Marxism, it transforms us from subject to object to do so, which unsettles us. We resent other interrogating our desires for the same reason a creationist is deeply uncomfortable with asking too many questions about prehistory. Out desires are our religion and capitalism stands by ready to give us complete freedom to practice it, for a price.>>25182993Of course it benefits you because whom you think are, is constructed and produced by society and perpetually updated by it
>>25182295Not sure why the buddha is on there since there is no "ego" in buddhism to speak of.
>>25183265Because Buddha is tired bro
>>25183279Never read the book but is languor a commonly explored idea with Stirner?
