Max Stirner, pen name of Johann Kaspar Schmidt, was a teacher in Berlin and frequented the circle of the Young Hegelians. In The Ego and Its Own, he attacked God, the state, morality and even humanity as ideas that enslave the individual. He died poor and almost forgotten, but was rediscovered by anarchists and existentialists.
Core ideas
God, state, morality and humanity are ghosts that dominate the individual
Each person should take themselves as their own cause, serving no outside ideals
Instead of the state, he proposes a free union of egoists who join out of interest
The tradition: Egoist
Stirner's egoism is the thesis that the unique individual is the only real value, free from duties imposed by abstract ideas. He is the creator of this radical position, close to individualist anarchism.
