/lit/ - Literature

The one thing I've been wondering about Stirner and those who argue in a similar vein is this:

Let's say tradition/laws/etc are merely 'spooks' or 'social constructs' - what then? Why must we refuse to take seriously, something that has no objective grounding in reality? Why must we, going further, disown it at all costs? Why should we insist that these things have no authority over us? I'm NOT saying that we shouldn't do this - I want good retorts for those who claim we should take spooks/social constructs seriously, as is often the case.

It is interesting to note the similarities with nihilism as it appeared in Russia:

>In the 1860s a movement known as Nihilism developed in Russia. A term originally coined by Ivan Turgenev in his 1862 novel Fathers and Sons, Nihilists favoured the destruction of human institutions and laws, based on the assumption that such institutions and laws are artificial and corrupt. At its core, Russian nihilism was characterized by the belief that the world lacks comprehensible meaning, objective truth, or value. For some time many Russian liberals had been dissatisfied by what they regarded as the empty discussions of the intelligentsia. The Nihilists questioned all old values and shocked the Russian establishment.

Was Stirner just a nihilist at heart?