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The ESFP "stupid" myth.

redacted

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 28, 2007
Messages
4,223
Bart simpson is supposed to be an improvisor. Of course, he's actually perfectly smart.

Cartman is a dumbass.

In my opinion, cartman illustrates people NOT resembling TV characters. Cartman is an unrealistic representation of a domTe.

lol how is cartman a dumbass?

have you seen 'Scott Tennorman Must Die' or 'Christian Rock Hard' or 'Ginger Kids' or...well, i could give you a list of probably 20 episodes.

he's a complete ENTJ genius.

his lack of Fe holds him back, though.
 

arcticangel02

To the top of the world
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Oct 5, 2007
Messages
892
MBTI Type
eNFP
nah. I actually think that's actually a role that ESFPs are extremely unlikely to play.

And what type would you attribute the 'ditzy female' stereotype to, then? (I know they're not all like that, that's why I said stereotype.) Or, rather, which types would you consider most likely to play that up?
 

Nocapszy

no clinkz 'til brooklyn
Joined
Jun 29, 2007
Messages
4,517
MBTI Type
ENTP
When I think of ESFP I think of Abraham Lincoln.

Now, what is the rest of your post about. Hollywood characters resemble people in real life? I mean, sure, I bet the villian in dirty harry resembles a real criminal, and House resembles a real doctor, and the characters in the Boondock saints resemble real people (can you detect the sarcasm yet?).
You realize by arguing my point, be this a boolean matter, you're saying that most of what's written in hollywood IS based on type do you not?

Coincidentally, one criteria for me hating a movie/show is if it presents one personality type in a particularily biased/distorted way, or through the common cultural standpoint.
So they can't be common, and they can't be fantasy. Well sounds like you're unhappy any vantage point.

I hope you're not implying that people's bias represents reality.
Does yours?

I'm not implying but saying directly, (again you missed my point and over-assumed) that the personalities are derived from actual people. You'd have to be an fool to think that House was written as some kind of drama/biography. However, there ARE personalities like his around. Not many, but they exist. Just like the attitudes expressed by those in the boondock's saints, The office and any number of other T.V. shows. I'm sure even the OC encompasses a few personality surrogates, as unrealistic as that bull is.

Must you go flying off the handle at every one of my remarks? I choose words quite carefully. I suggest you read them the same way.
 
Joined
Apr 24, 2007
Messages
1,511
MBTI Type
ENTP
In the IQ level sense, ESFPs aren't necessarily more likely to be mentally handicapped. But in the sense of constructing ridiculous webs of lies and misadventures they're buffoons... or geniuses, depending on how you look at it. That's why sitcom writers love them.

Incidentally, they often seem to be able to return things to normal, one way or another, in less than 30 minutes. So they're almost as good at getting out of scrapes as they are at getting into them, you have to give them that. Though about once a year or so it takes a little bit more than half an hour. Season finales.
 

Gabe

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Nov 17, 2007
Messages
590
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ENTP
You realize by arguing my point, be this a boolean matter, you're saying that most of what's written in hollywood IS based on type do you not?

So they can't be common, and they can't be fantasy. Well sounds like you're unhappy any vantage point.


Does yours?

I'm not implying but saying directly, (again you missed my point and over-assumed) that the personalities are derived from actual people. You'd have to be an fool to think that House was written as some kind of drama/biography. However, there ARE personalities like his around. Not many, but they exist. Just like the attitudes expressed by those in the boondock's saints, The office and any number of other T.V. shows. I'm sure even the OC encompasses a few personality surrogates, as unrealistic as that bull is.

Must you go flying off the handle at every one of my remarks? I choose words quite carefully. I suggest you read them the same way.



I was just pointing out that those women in 17th century Salem were not actually witches.

What I meant by common cultural standpoint was- I think the common cultural and/or hollywood standpoint is an indulgent fantasy. Furthermore, I think this is fairly obvious.
In one excercise that Nardi was doing, he mentioned that an ENTP had written a story about himself as a heroic prince who saves his kingdom through his intuition and thinking. Then he writes the story about an INFJ and he makes him incompetent and unable to defend the kingdom.
Here's a much more extreme example: someone wrote a scathing review of one of Michael Crichton's books. In his new book, Crichton wrote in someone who is exactly like that reviewer and also made them a child molester in his latest book.
The personalities in BAD movies only exist as the self-indulgent fantasies of thier creators. They result from being too heroic (in an archetypal sense-it's not a good thing to be over-heroic. Being over-heroic means not even noticing if we're turning something to shit). They also result from projecting our shadows on to the people around us.
That's why I find it so easy to dismiss a TV personality type
 

Nocapszy

no clinkz 'til brooklyn
Joined
Jun 29, 2007
Messages
4,517
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ENTP
Ugh... I didn't say the characters would be carbon copies of those around them. Actually, I took specific care to mention that they WOULD NOT be.

They're manufactured products. You have to go into it knowing that things WILL be exaggerated.

Again you fail to differentiate between personality and actions. I grant that action is a manifestation of personality, but at the same rate, the situation can just as easily affect the writer.

Additionally, giving examples of a few exaggerated personalities being in a story doesn't prove, or even bolster your point. All that says is that we should be skeptical.

Anyway, the example you propose with Crighton doesn't hinder the typing. If someone wrote a bad review, and michael wrote about them exactly as they were, their typology would reflect that. Instead he portrays the chap as a criminal. To go backward with my point about how behavior is a direct manifestation of personality, the person's typology will be reflected by the actions he takes. Again, I didn't say that they're replicas, or scale models. Obviously the artists will portray them a certain way. The psychology that's drawn from that will change, as the subjective interpretation by the author is spilled onto the page, or recorded on film.

How can you argue that? No one's saying it's realistic. They're just saying that the artists are quite often (decidedly) non-creative, and realistic with their characters, so the underlying message -- the theme of the work seems more 'real'.

I guess you wouldn't know though, since you dismiss the shows, and presumably don't watch them anymore (unless you're a masochist).
 

Nocapszy

no clinkz 'til brooklyn
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ENTP
Oh and as a sidenote;

I've seen reality shows where the subject was an ESFP. They've almost always been fucking idiots... but then... that's probably a non-representative portion. It's not a random sample.

After all, it is the intellectually inept crowd who's more attracted to being on those shows. Perhaps a self fulfilling prophecy, but likely enough, a sample that is representative. I just won't stake a claim for it as official research.
 

lazyhappy

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Nov 5, 2007
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107
Lol the ESFPs I've met in person are quite... "dumb" in the things that intellectuales are good in... Though i do not know all ESFPs so i shouldn't conclude that but... who cares.

However, they are smart in thier own way. I met this one who seems like a professional hair dresser. She's amazing and she does it by herself and she is very young. She could make alot of money doing hair in movies and stuff. I actually view the ESFPs as quite amazing. They're not cocky at all and accept thier flaws- the ones i met. And they arnn't the most religious people (i like that quite a bit actually). And they are the ones who are actually having the most fun out of thier life. They will be the ones who laugh last for they seem to have the best life and the most fun.

I believe they are portrayed as stupid because they happen to not be the best in sciences and math. And those that are, are stereotypically smart
 

Vivid

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Feb 18, 2008
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47
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ISTJ
The stereotype is that ESFPs are stupid.

Peter Griffin seems like a Thinking type to me.
 

LunarMoon

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Oct 19, 2007
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ENTJ
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Same thing with Homer Simpson. Stupidity comes in all types; it's just that ESFPs are vastly over represented in its depiction.
 

Mort Belfry

Rats off to ya!
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Jan 12, 2008
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1,238
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INTP
Is Randy Marsh an ESFP?

It's interesting isn't it? I post on a thread that has laid dormant for over two weeks and a flood of conversation soon absorbs it.

However the yes/no question I asked that brought the thread into this spotlight remains unanswered.

What a fascinating world we live in. :dry:
 

LunarMoon

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However the yes/no question I asked that brought the thread into this spotlight remains unanswered.

What a fascinating world we live in. :dry:

Yep. That it is.
*continues on his merry way without answering the question*
 

The Ü™

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May 26, 2007
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Same thing with Homer Simpson. Stupidity comes in all types; it's just that ESFPs are vastly over represented in its depiction.

I really think Homer Simpson is generally an underdeveloped ISTJ. He definitely fits Si from Jung's perspective.

I mean compare him to Bart Simpson (generally written as an ESTP, maybe an occasional ENTP). Bart is much more of an open-minded thrill seeker that you would expect from an Se dominant, while Homer is much more passive, closed-minded and highly judgmental, more interested in peaceful living than active experience.

I guess people get the perception of an Se dominant because Homer is loud-mouthed, but his actual behavior is more often Si, I think.
 

Gabe

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Homer isn't a type. He's a TV character. And I say that because I don't think he will ever fit one of the types, especially after the writers make him pretty over-the-top in the later episodes.
Bart, on the other hand, is in fact very much an extraverted sensing type
 

Seanan

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I've noticed a trend in television sitcoms for "stupid" characters to be ESFPs.
Notably, Homer Simpson, Peter Griffin, Joey Tribbiani and Kelly Bundy.

Obviously this a stereotype unfounded in reality, but what is it about ESFPs that makes Hollywood writers make them stupid characters, or alternatively make stupid characters into ESFPs?

Umm... I don't think there's a way to answer this without sounding rude but, prefacing with its not intentional, I would have to say that its quite humorous, in a comedy, and frustrating when not in one of those, seeing a character that is totally subjective.
 

LunarMoon

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I really think Homer Simpson is generally an underdeveloped ISTJ. He definitely fits Si from Jung's perspective.

I mean compare him to Bart Simpson (generally written as an ESTP, maybe an occasional ENTP). Bart is much more of an open-minded thrill seeker that you would expect from an Se dominant, while Homer is much more passive, closed-minded and highly judgmental, more interested in peaceful living than active experience.

I guess people get the perception of an Se dominant because Homer is loud-mouthed, but his actual behavior is more often Si, I think.

I was responding to Vivid's post about Peter Griffin being a T. Personally, I think that ISTJ is a pretty good assessment of Homer Simpson. At the very least he seems ISTx. His behavior can be weird from episode to episode since it's mainly written for comedy but some of the stupidly impulsive stuff he pulls (chasing after the musical prize car while driving Bart to school) tends to shun away from the security seeking and responsible behavior of your typical Guardian type.
 

boombanca

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Apr 30, 2009
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ESFP
The ESFPs I know irl, one of whom is frigging brilliant, seem to have a less than intelligent persona and sometimes make pretty wild decisions because they aren't thinking about the future very much.

true true
 

kendoiwan

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Christina_Applegate_Biography_2.jpg
 

boombanca

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Apr 30, 2009
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ESFP
Some ESFPs are stupid, some are highly intelligent. Their average IQ is probably slightly below average, but they would probably come out better in a multiple intelligence theory perspective, probably being above average in musical, bodily-kinesthetic and interpersonal intelligence. My best friend is an ESFP (at first thought to be ENFP, but cognitive processes test revealed she is clearly ESFP) with an IQ of about 150 and a musical genius, so for sure highly intelligent ones exist.

i agree with you here. reading all of these ridiculous assumptions of esfps being "stupid" really bothers me. and it bothers my brother who is an intj too because he knows my inner genius.
 
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