The problem with Personality forums

Personality forums seem to attract a particular kind of people interested in personality type, and I think it relates to the more general issues of personality type and how to interpret and understand it.

For example, I type as an ENTP. There are two kinds of evidence I have for saying this. The evidence is, to me, important in understanding how this stuff plays out with forums and such.

On the one hand, I have those MBTI-type tests, which offer a pseudo-objective evaluation of your ‘personality type.’ (More on that pseudo-objectivity later) I’ve taken the Keirsey version, the Myers-Briggs versions, and ones concocted by a variety of people in books. All of these type me as an ENTP.

On the other hand, I’ve read Jung and subsequent authors – particularly Lenore Thomson and Naomi Quenk. Based on constructing an understanding of the logical system they are explicating, and the properties of the attitudes describe by Jung, I subjectively examine myself and my experience of myself and conclude that Exraverted Intuition and Introverted Thinking, along with the inferior baggage, are empirically-valid approximations for describing my internal processes. This is an introspective approach – it’s a common methodology in theoretical linguistics, actually, which is probably where I learned it from. It has a history in other sciences, too, but not a popular one, of course. Goethe worked out a nice theory of colors based on the experience of color. Jung’s theory of personality is itself an introspective, subjective theory about the experience of various kinds of attitudes. My own opinion is that, in the context of human experience, introspective, subjective systematic thinking is the best metric, since it’s the only one that acknowledges the inherent subjectivity of perception. As Heisenberg pointed out – the observer always changes the experiment. It’s best to just accept that and calculate the observer into the equation.

The problem with the first method – the pseudo-objcetive one – is precisely this. It does not calculate the test-taker into the results. Hence, someone who experiences life through the lense of something like extraverted feeling may deeply desire to think of themselves as an introverted thinker (Typically, Fe types do). Hence, when presented with test questions (typically, these are very leading) which ask for ‘thinking’ versus ‘feeling’ judgements, they will side with thinking. The test results, then, are a description not of what they are, but rather what they wish they were.

How does this relate to personality forums? Well, personality forums typically attract people who have a strong desire to identify with a particular personality type. What’s more, they have a desire to hobnob with other ‘likeminded’ individuals. The combination of these two makes for a powerful slant in favor of people who skewed their test results, because people who skew their test results have a desire to identify with a personality type.

I typically find that ENTP forums are dominated by people who would better type as Te or Fe types. That is, they are obsessively projecting their inferior functions as their dominant ones. These forums are full of aggressive rules, categorizations, denunciations, social hierarchies, and in-fighting. Not exactly the Ne and Ti cup of tea, what with Fe being ultra-sensitive for them. Worse, the type descriptions usually floating around out there make Ti and Ne sound really good, and the SJ types sound really bad – this draws people to skew their test to get these results. Who wants to be an ESTJ, after all? Well, ESTJs would if they understood the type system better. (Note that my old troll site about ENTPs did not help any of these problems!)

So ENTP sites are usually full of pathetic people desperately trying to prove how ‘creative’ and ‘spontaneous’ they are. How ‘whacky.’ Meanwhile, disagreements are handled via banning, aggressive categorization, and king-of-the-mountain argumentativeness. It’s Jim Carrey meets Sam the Eagle on there. I was once kicked out of an ENTP forum for suggesting that Peter Pan may be an ENTP. Apparently, that was not Canon on the site. Scary.