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Rick Reilly, Michael Jordan, and My Spite for Fe

Zarathustra

Let Go Of Your Team
Joined
Oct 31, 2009
Messages
8,110
If there's one function I really don't like, it's Fe.

For fair disclosure: my mother is an ESFJ, and I actually have a really good relationship with her, and my girlfriend's mother is an ESFJ, and I have a pretty good relationship with her, but there's something about Fe that I just find deplorable.

The users can be so shallow (look at Frasier, a characteristic ENFJ); he cares so much about what others think.

As an Fi user, and as one of my Fi values, I value not giving a damn what others think -- in fact, I believe this is very close to the definition of authenticity -- and, yes, I do understand that this is all typological bias, so I'm not sure how bringing this point up is going to add any value to this thread (inevitably, it is going to happen, though).

I also want to mention that I love and appreciate many Fe-users that I know, including many on this forum, and that every function has its positives and its negatives. For me, though, Fe's negatives represent some of the most deplorable aspects of normal human psychology: neediness, collectivism, etc.

And yes, I understand that there are worse aspects to humanity than these, but [Godwin alert], let us remember, that Hitler was an Fe dom or aux... :cheese:

So, anyway, with last night's induction of several new members (Scottie Pippen and Karl Malone, most notably) into the NBA Hall of Fame, it reminded me about last year's HOF induction ceremony, in which one of my childhood heroes, Michael Jordan (wasn't he the hero of almost every young boy at that time?), was inducted into the Hall, and gave the amazing speech that I've posted below.

Now, here's my angle: in the post below, I've included an article from Rick Reilly, a writer for ESPN who, along with Bill Simmons, "the Sports Guy" (whom I love, and who is probably an Fe-tert), appears on the front page of ESPN.com everyday.

After reading Mr. Reilly's article about Michael Jordan's speech last year, I was enraged by how inaccurate his perception of the speech was, and I surmise that he is almost certainly an Fe dom, maybe an Fe aux. After reading several other articles he's written over the last year, I find them all similarly deplorable: so sappy, so needy, so lacking of that vigorous, independent, self-reliant spirit that I so clearly prefer.

So, what I ask of you, my reader (and, trust me, I'm surprised and appreciative that you've actually read this far) is that you first read the following article, soak it in for the picture it paints of the speech that Jordan gave one year ago, and let it sit with you for a moment, before you turn to the actual speech.

Then, watch the videos of the speech below, and let me know what you think.

How accurate do you think Mr. Reilly's depiction of the speech was? If accurate, how so? If inaccurate, how so, why, and, more to the point of this thread, how disgusting and pathetic does it make the Fe function look?

Thanks,
Z
 

Zarathustra

Let Go Of Your Team
Joined
Oct 31, 2009
Messages
8,110
Be like Mike? No thanks
By Rick Reilly
ESPN The Magazine
September 16, 2009

Michael Jordan's Hall of Fame talk was the Exxon Valdez of speeches. It was, by turns, rude, vindictive and flammable. And that was just when he was trying to be funny. It was tactless, egotistical and unbecoming. When it was done, nobody wanted to be like Mike.

And yet we couldn't stop watching. Because this was an inside look into the mindset of an icon who'd never let anybody inside before. From what I saw, I'd never want to go back. Here is a man who's won just about everything there is to win -- six NBA titles, five MVPs and two Olympics golds. And yet he sounded like a guy who's been screwed out of every trophy ever minted. He's the world's first sore winner.

In the entire 23-minute cringe-athon, there were only six thank yous, seven if you count his sarcastic rip at the very Hall that was inducting him. "Thank you, Hall of Fame, for raising ticket prices, I guess," he sneered. By comparison, David Robinson's classy and heartfelt seven-minute speech had 17. Joe Montana's even shorter speech in Canton had 23. Who wrote your speech Mike? Kanye West?

Not that Jordan's speech wasn't from the heart. It was. It's just that Jordan's heart on this night could give you frostbite. Nobody was spared, including his high school coach, his high school teammate, his college coach, two of his pro coaches, his college roommate, his pro owner, his pro general manager, the man who was presenting him that evening, even his kids!

"I wouldn't want to be you guys if I had to," he said as they squirmed in their seats.

He even mocked his own brothers, calling them maybe 5-foot-5 and 5-6. Actually, they're about 5-8 and 5-9. Michael was the one blessed with the height gene, not the tact one.

Jordan had decided that this was the perfect night to list all the ways everybody sitting in front of him had pissed him off over the past 30 years: Dean Smith, Doug Collins, Jerry Reinsdorf, Pat Riley, Isiah Thomas, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, George Gervin and Jeff Van Gundy. It was the only one-man roast in Hall of Fame history. Only very little of it was funny.

Jordan owes a roomful of apologies. But it'll never happen. I know firsthand. He once told me, "You know you don't get no apologies in this business."
He was like that Japanese World War II soldier they found hiding in a cave in Guam 27 years after the Japanese surrendered. The only difference is, Jordan won! What good is victory if you never realize the battle is over?

This is how Jordan really is, I just never thought he'd let the world see it. His old Bulls' assistant coach, Johnny Bach, told me early on, "This guy is a killer. He's a cold-blooded assassin. It's not enough for him to beat you. He wants you dead."

I covered his entire career and saw examples of it throughout. Saw him break Rodney McCray in after-practice, $100 shooting games, humiliate him until McCray lost his stroke. Watched him race his car up the shoulder of Chicago interstates just because he didn't have the patience to wait in traffic. Heard how he'd kept his friends confined to his hotel room at the Barcelona Olympics so he could play cards -- and keep playing until he won. For Jordan, it was never enough to win. He had to have scalps.

Now here he was, in Springfield without a filter or a PR guy to cut him off, while his staff must've been covering their eyes. And suddenly, it hit you: Michael Jordan is the guy who gets up at the rehearsal dinner, grabs the mike and ruins the night.

The thing Jordan doesn't understand is, it doesn't have to be this way. Terry Bradshaw won four Super Bowls and gave one of the greatest speeches in the history of the Hall of Fame. "Folks!" he hollered. "You don't get elected into the Hall of Fame by yourself! Thank you number 88, Lynn Swann! Thank you, Franco Harris! Thank you Rocky Bleier! What I wouldn't give right now to put my hands under
Mike Webster's butt just one more time! Thank you Mike!" He thanked linemen, tight ends, everybody but the ushers.

Had Jordan been in his shoes, he'd have said, "Hey, Steve Kerr! Remember when I kicked your ass in that fight?"

Jordan owes a roomful of apologies. But it'll never happen. I know firsthand.

Before his second comeback -- with the Washington Wizards -- I was the first out with the story by a month. Jordan and his agent, David Falk, denied it, said I was crazy, practically said I was smoking something. Then, after a month of lies, Jordan admitted it was all true. I saw him in the locker room before his first game back and said, "You wanna say something to me, maybe?"

And he said, "You know you don't get no apologies in this business."

So I wouldn't hold your breath.

They called it an "acceptance" speech, but the last thing Jordan seems to be able to do is accept it's over. In fact, Jordan hinted that he might make yet another comeback at 50.

I just hope Comeback No. 3 doesn't come with a speech.

Because then I'm really screwed.​
 

Zarathustra

Let Go Of Your Team
Joined
Oct 31, 2009
Messages
8,110
[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owbYN3XstVQ"]Part 1[/YOUTUBE].
[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDVFPn7BNX4&feature=related"]Part 2[/YOUTUBE].
[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8UtkcFZ_iA&feature=related"]Part 3[/YOUTUBE]
 

Night

Boring old fossil
Joined
Nov 2, 2007
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4,755
MBTI Type
INTJ
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5/8
If there's one function I really don't like, it's Fe.
The users can be so shallow (look at Frasier, a characteristic ENFJ); he cares so much about what others think.

I also want to mention that I love and appreciate many Fe-users that I know, including many on this forum, and that every function has its positives and its negatives.

Nice thread so far (Michael Jordan used to be my spiritual adviser), but I couldn't help but notice the inconsistency in your reasoning.

Fe fail.

No worries, though. You aren't failing at much if you're failing at Fe.


AMIRIGHT?
 

Zarathustra

Let Go Of Your Team
Joined
Oct 31, 2009
Messages
8,110
Nice thread so far (Michael Jordan used to be my spiritual adviser), but I couldn't help but notice the inconsistency in your reasoning.

Fe fail.

No worries, though. You aren't failing at much if you're failing at Fe.

AMIRIGHT?

:laugh:

You're an observant one, Night.

I was wondering whether anyone would catch that.

But to think I can't Ni my way outta that hole... c'mon now... :wink:
 

KDude

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Jan 26, 2010
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8,243
Fi cares, man :\

I don't how it is in an INTJ though. It's playing third fiddle. Possibly just centered on the realm of conviction.

Thing is, Fi can extend outwards.. which is tough for even Fi dom in all cases, but it can.

(Just a quick googling.. I don't feel like typing out passages from elsewhere atm)

Feeling, unbridled by the external forces of society and substance, is the dominant function. ISFPs spontaneously develop their own codes and credos, about which they are quite sober and intense. ISFPs are questors, driven to find the pure and ideal, as personally and individually defined. Feeling may temporarily turn outward, but cannot be long sustained beyond its cloistered home.
If the individual has values greater than herself, feeling may express itself in valiant acts of selflessness. Turned in upon self, however, it becomes an unscrupulous, capricious enigma, capable even of heinous acts of deception and treachery.


Introverted Feeling
INFPs live primarily in a rich inner world of introverted Feeling. Being inward-turning, the natural attraction is away from world and toward essence and ideal. This introversion of dominant Feeling, receiving its data from extraverted intuition, must be the source of the quixotic nature of these usually gentle beings. Feeling is caught in the approach- avoidance bind between concern both for people and for All Creatures Great and Small, and a psycho-magnetic repulsion from the same. The "object," be it homo sapiens or a mere representation of an organism, is valued only to the degree that the object contains some measure of the inner Essence or greater Good. Doing a good deed, for example, may provide intrinsic satisfaction which is only secondary to the greater good of striking a blow against Man's Inhumanity to Mankind.
 
G

garbage

Guest
It seems like one should watch the videos first, then read the article, in order to watch the videos with no preconceived notions or biases.

In any case, counting the number of "thank yous" isn't a good a metric of how valuable a speech is--he's got a lot more implicit "thank yous" and goes into depth about many of the people who he 'owes.' It also seems like Jordan cracks a lot of jokes, and his speech isn't all about other people. Why should this author think that Jordan should pretend to be something he isn't and give an acceptance speech that's more "typical"--or "stereotypical?

It's like counting the number of times Obama says "I" and trying to treat that as a metric of how self-absorbed he is :rolleyes:

It also seems like the author completely missed the first part of the acceptance speech and has some sort of a personal vendetta against Jordan. "Jordan owes me an apology. By extrapolation, he also owes everyone in the room an apology!"

But then, I know nothing about basketball, Jordan, or Hall of Fame acceptance speeches.
 
G

Glycerine

Guest
Out of all the functions when Fe is good, its great but when it's bad, it's horrendous (at least it's noticeable by everyone).
 

Zarathustra

Let Go Of Your Team
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Messages
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It seems like one should watch the videos first, then read the article, in order to watch the videos with no preconceived notions or biases.

I mulled over different ways of presenting it, and concluded by thinking that it would be interesting to get a picture of what this speech was supposedly like according to Mr. Reilly's piece, and then see what it was actually like via the speech itself.

Out of the all the functions when Fe is good, its great but when it's bad, it's horrendous.

Interesting point...

:thinking:
 

sculpting

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I like Fe users and would like t o use Fe more effectively so I can love the Fe users even more in my life. Yeah, i dont know anything about basketball..but the below was of interest :D

Fi cares, man :\

I don't how it is in an INTJ though. It's playing third fiddle. Possibly just centered on the realm of conviction.

Thing is, Fi can extend outwards.. which is tough for even Fi dom in all cases, but it can.

(Just a quick googling.. I don't feel like typing out passages from elsewhere atm)

Feeling, unbridled by the external forces of society and substance, is the dominant function. ISFPs spontaneously develop their own codes and credos, about which they are quite sober and intense. ISFPs are questors, driven to find the pure and ideal, as personally and individually defined. Feeling may temporarily turn outward, but cannot be long sustained beyond its cloistered home.
If the individual has values greater than herself, feeling may express itself in valiant acts of selflessness. Turned in upon self, however, it becomes an unscrupulous, capricious enigma, capable even of heinous acts of deception and treachery.

So in INTJs...they are NiTe..FiSe.

I have noticed the older ones take a distinct, very individual weird turn. They get kinda emo. :D They seem to begin to appreciate love and harmony and see the big picture a lot more. They become highly compassionate..even if they dont say much, they feel it .but the younger ones without such well developed Fi arent like this...so yeah I dunno...

What does it mean for Fi to turn inwards upon itself exactly? What does misbehaving Fi look like? (In me, it is emo vomiting or expression of moral judgments in inappropriate situations or that dont really fit the situation properly) Really trying to understand negative Fi...
 

rav3n

.
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Messages
11,655
Ever notice that people can find offense in or have a criticism about the statement "the sky is blue" if they dislike the person who said it?

Ever notice that someone you don't like is rarely funny?

You can generally apply the above two statements to all 16 mbti types, Fe or not.
 

Zarathustra

Let Go Of Your Team
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Messages
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I like Fe users and would like t o use Fe more effectively so I can love the Fe users even more in my life. Yeah, i dont know anything about basketball..but the below was of interest :D

:offtopic:

So in INTJs...they are NiTe..FiSe.

I have noticed the older ones take a distinct, very individual weird turn. They get kinda emo. :D They seem to begin to appreciate love and harmony and see the big picture a lot more. They become highly compassionate..even if they dont say much, they feel it .but the younger ones without such well developed Fi arent like this...so yeah I dunno...

I would be wary of making the assumption that all mature Fi resembles compassion...

That's akin to saying that one must value compassion above other values in order to be mature, which is not necessarily the case.

Note: that is also not to say that those who value other values over compassion are not compassionate.

What does it mean for Fi to turn inwards upon itself exactly? What does misbehaving Fi look like? (In me, it is emo vomiting or expression of moral judgments in inappropriate situations or that dont really fit the situation properly) Really trying to understand negative Fi...

I think negative Fi is seen in thinking that one's own subjective Fi judgments are actually objective and universal judgments.
 

Zarathustra

Let Go Of Your Team
Joined
Oct 31, 2009
Messages
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Ever notice that people can find offense in or have a criticism about the statement "the sky is blue" if they dislike the person who said it?

Ever notice that someone you don't like is rarely funny?

You can generally apply the above two statements to all 16 mbti types, Fe or not.

Point taken.

I just think there's a clear division between these two people (Rick Reilly as Fe-user, Michael Jordan as Fi-user), and that Mr. Reilly is making a clear display of Fe vs. Fi in his article.
 

sculpting

New member
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4,148
Note: that is also not to say that those who value other values over compassion are not compassionate.

I think negative Fi is seen in thinking that one's own subjective Fi judgments are actually objective and universal judgments.

Are you, like, Te-ing up layers of Fi values? hehehe, I have a headache, but for some reason that is quite funny. Yup, as I said highly individual, given Fi of course.

Well, I see IXTJs get real damned whiny when stuff doesnt go their way, which seems like the bad side of Fi...I mean I still love em of course, but yeah, whiny...Bless their hearts.

I get this funny feeling that bad Fi in you guys might look more like bad Fi in an ISFP.....but I dont know what that is really. Just like bad Fi in an ESTJ might look a bit like a tyrannical ENFP....sending them off on crusades for injustice...well meant but a little off kilter...I did see this once. But my heart was very sad for the ESTJ as it was a cause very, very close to her heart.

I need ibuprofin...something about basketball....
 

Zarathustra

Let Go Of Your Team
Joined
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Messages
8,110
I get this funny feeling that bad Fi in you guys might look more like bad Fi in an ISFP.....but I dont know what that is really. Just like bad Fi in an ESTJ might look a bit like a tyrannical ENFP....sending them off on crusades for injustice...well meant but a little off kilter...I did see this once. But my heart was very sad for the ESTJ as it was a cause very, very close to her
heart.

My spidey-sense is telling me this could be a trick...

:thelook:

Aren't you just pointing to the INTJ-ISFP shared Ni/Fi loop, and the ESTJ-ENFP shared Si/Fi loop?
 

sculpting

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My spidey-sense is telling me this could be a trick...

:thelook:

Aren't you just pointing to the INTJ-ISFP shared Ni/Fi loop, and the ESTJ-ENFP shared Si/Fi loop?

Silly INTJ have you not noticed enfps just blather off whatever is in our brains at that very second?

(However that line of text translates to "My NeTe says I see a connection, but has had no testing whatsoever so take this with a grain of salt, but it is too fun to keep to myself")

I would say it is Ni-Fi-Se and Si-Fi-Ne. I understand how my perceiving functions work and can extrapolate to ESTJs sorta...you guys, I still dont understand at all...either ISFPs or INTJs. But KDude sounds like a wise old INTJ who has moved past book knowledge and onto love of the Se things in a very holistic sense...thus I suspect there is a link...
 

KDude

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What does it mean for Fi to turn inwards upon itself exactly? What does misbehaving Fi look like? (In me, it is emo vomiting or expression of moral judgments in inappropriate situations or that dont really fit the situation properly) Really trying to understand negative Fi...

I think it'd be pretty rare, but it could be worse than merely emo. "Turned inwards", to me, would mean unapologetic conviction mixed with someone who only has shortsighted values/interests. It would also probably only manifest like that in someone who had the worst kind of experiences that shaped their Fi over time. I think the term "values" is so abstract that we should not necessarily say they would be vomiting out moral judgements. They might be vomiting out something, but it'd be their own personal morality.. which is basically no morality at all.

This is the most hilarious typing I've ever seen. It pissed me off when I first read it, but I started thinking later that there might be something to it: Nero Caesar was an ISFP. Who would have thought the role model for all impulsive antichrists was an ISFP :huh:
 

Stevo

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Well I don't like you Te-ers either, getting your "Objectivity" and "Empiricism" all up in my subjective internal logic. So there. :tongue10:
 

KDude

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I need to say that that link above is still hard to swallow. Plus, they only have two ISFPs there. Doesn't look like much thought was put into it. I smell a rat. A biased NT one, I might add. :tongue:

I think a "treacherous" ISFP would mostly be some dude who couldn't keep it in his pants or something.
 
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