DOES EGO EQUATE TO EVIL?

My Dear  Trill,

(Author’s note: Trill is a fictional female acquaintance who, with her questions, makes it possible for me to write in a style that is for me both different and comfortable.)

     How amusing. The guest of honor at the annual meeting of the Lithuanian Club, a Peter Kashilinus, who turned out to be a mere office clerk, though a senior one, at the local slaughter house, while the real Peter Kashilinus, Phd, renowned physicist and Nobel Prize nominee, was somewhere in Montana, fishing for trout. I imagine  your program  chairman had some things to explain.
    So you ran across my poem which asked the question: “Does ego equate to evil?” It could have been a rhetorical question, but it happened that it was aimed at a one-time friend, who, an admitted egotist, said the question left her reeling. I did not intend to offend her. I intended only  to lure her into an interesting discussion but she did not take the bait.
    Still, it’s an open question when you restrict the word ego to ally with terms like conceit, narcissism, overly self assured, or a hunger for recognition, accolades, or for power, no matter what the circumstance.
    It’s my contention that everyone  possesses a finer sense of self and a less-than-finer sense of self. The eternal problem is which is allowed to, or made to, triumph over the other.
`    It follows, in my view, that evil can easily result in egoists who exhibit the second trait. This is manifest in the numerous despots who take over entire populations through the strength of their ego.....Adolph Hitler, Mao Zedong, Peron, Mussoline, Gaddafi, Genghis Kahn, Alexander the Great .....the list goes on and on, throughout history, and has prominent membership to this day. A living example is Donald Trump, candidate for the U.S presidency, whose ego is so strong that he feels no need to prepare speeches, but babbles away instead. In this case, though, evil is not evident; simply a strong  egocentricity. Still, who can argue that all candidates for public office are not strongly egocentric?
    My question: “Does ego equate with evil” is  not categorically true, of course, but I  could argue endlessly that it is at the root of much of the evil we encounter or observe, or that has occurred. It would be hard to imagine doing anything about it, however. The answer lies in uniform adherence by humans to the finer self, and that isn’t going to happen.