Hitler Analysis

[Electrical flOw]

have just spend a long time reading about hitler... it's incredible how many emotions can be raised surrounding this one person.

from everything i'm reading, i'm all for ENFx.

in terms of whether he was a P or a J, i'm not sure. superficially, it seems that he was messy about some things, and anal about others. he seemed to make some decisions well enough but also didn't really trust his generals, which could throw things off either way. he also started taking amephetamines at some point, which would mean he would probably appear J regardless of what he was.

function-wise, i see a lot of what i think is Ni. hitler referred to himself a few times as sometimes being a prophet, and tapped into the symbols and mythologies of the time and culture. (though if i'm any indicator, a Ne dom can utilize that kind of thing frequently too.) he talked about his "big mission" and refused to marry because that wouldn't allow him to fulfill it as well. one of his first "realizations" regarding jewish people was when he was watching an orthodox man for the first time, and - well, here's the quote: "I carefully watched the man stealthily and cautiously but the longer I gazed at the strange countenance and examined it feature by feature, the more the question shaped itself in my brain: Is this a German?" it sounds very Ni-contemplative to me. but was he an ENFJ, or an ENFP with strong Ni? not sure.

on one hand, he had very obvious personal morals (Fi), but on the other, he was excellent at working a crowd and was easily able to tap into public enthusiasm. (Fe)



i was thinking about 6 too. especially when i read about him not trusting his closest guards, many of whom would sacrifice their lives for him at the drop of a hat. not that they were saints, but i think he was overly suspicious.

the thing that most makes me think not ENFP of everything i've read is this, from hitler's best friend when he was a teenager:



it kind of goes against everything ENFP is.



haha i know!! though i'm more prone to "omg what if i had done something different, [this good thing] wouldn't have happened", and then ponder endlessly about the implications of that... until something shiny crosses my field of vision, of course.

reading all this stuff about hitler though, he really was an extra-ordinary person. imagine if he had devoted himself to peace or global unification, instead of national socialism. or if they had just let him into fucking art school. i think he would have made an excellent motivational speaker, but no, had to go the world dictator route...

From experience I can assure you ENFP 7w8 is different than the rest ENFPs, ENFP 7w8 is more serious, assertive, rigid, perfectionist sometimes and not fun as the rest ENFPs. Developed one can be seen as ENFJ, INFJ, INFP and EXTJ, depend on the situation. I can see Hitler was extreme and unhealthy and he has gone so far

I don't want to keep discussing, I am not Hitler . Just wanna drop my point.

 

[Chloe]

i think he would have made an excellent motivational speaker...

but he was motivational speaker...

 

[Electrical flOw]

this is so ridiculous,lol...... Except if you think hitler did all that for FUN....

lol you misinterpret me, I meant he was known about his rebel tendency, especially in his early life which fit ENFP type 7. And he was enthusiastic in his speeches, which fit also.

 

[Chloe]

lol you misinterpret me, I meant he was known about his rebel tendency, especially in his early life which fit ENFP type 7. And he was enthusiastic in his speeches, which fit also.

but where does in 7s motivations (and unhealthy tendencies) fit to think that world is divided by "unworthy" and "worthy"?? 7s concentrate on positives. that seems like something that paranoid 6 would do.

 

[Electrical flOw]

He was unhealthy, and probably has his own motivations, beliefs and the people who encouraged him. Also I don't think there is any type is prone to be positive or negative. I think any type can believe in any idea that is fundamentally wrong.

 

[Electrical flOw]

I am not sure though, but I think that it is possible that he is an ENFP 7w8.

 

[Niaurus]

Hittler was INTJ.
He was quiet and trusted few (I).
He came up with a new kind of warefare (N),
He was logical and cold (T).
He was tidy and structured (J).

^ this.
And what's with all the ENFP BS? You might as well type him ESFP now...

 

[Poggle]

This question came up on my MBTI Step II qualifying course. The general consensus was that he must have been INFJ.

I, N and J were easy to put into place; the total disregard for his generals, the grand visions and the organised and orderly mindset visible in his policies and published works.

T/F posed a problem but in the end it was decided that the Holocaust proves F.

A T, even an evil one, would not have systematically massacred all of a particular faith, especially when these people represented a disproportionate number of buisness-folk, bankers and other trades assorted which would actually have been extremely useful to the German war effort, if they could have instead been brought on side. And even failign that, there is still no logical reason to go the expense of setting up an entire network of terror and concentration camps in order to kill in the most humiliating way possible all the people you don't like when you are trying to fight a war and presumably need the money for other things.

So therefore one had to conclude he actually hated Jews, Gypsies, Gays, Russians and others assorted. They had no place in his 1000 year Reich, so they had to be destroyed utterly. But in a world leader hatred like that must surely be the sign of a F, albeit an absolute disgrace to all other F's that there are now and have ever been.

Poggle

 

[Eric B]

I still think that's a very shadowy use of F that rose up and derailed some of the logic of T. Mainstream MBTI theory dioes not go that far into the "shadow", except for some to refer to just the inferior function. So they identify a particular series of acts as a product of F, and then assume it is from a preferrred function, and thus determining his type.
But precisely the stuff they use (his moral and ethnic hatreds) is very shadowy. He was said to be part Jewish himself! Clearly, some repressed, "not me" sense from the unconscious that is typical of the shadow.

 

[Tradewind]

Hitler was known to leave his left over food on a plate on his floor before he went to bed. He said he left the crumbs for the mice because he knew what it was like to starve.

Sounds like an F to me.

 

[Sniffles]

He was said to be part Jewish himself! Clearly, some repressed, "not me" sense from the unconscious that is typical of the shadow.

They can't really confirm that he was indeed part Jewish.

 

[Eric B]

Hitler was known to leave his left over food on a plate on his floor before he went to bed. He said he left the crumbs for the mice because he knew what it was like to starve.

Sounds like an F to me.

A T in tertiary or inferior mode could do that.

 

[Niaurus]

I guess someone had a reason to put him here.

 

[Aleksei]

I'm not sure how much of this has been said already, but whatever. here we go:

I searched here and there on the net and was quite surprised that many people seem to think of Hitler as an MBTI idealist - INFJ, ENFJ and even INFP (!) are some of the various suggestions I encountered. (Among other things I read through an old thread on INTJforum and some people even said he was a sensor.) From how I understand MBTI and the eight functions this is nothing but ridiculous, but then, it seems like people understand the functions differently, or they don't understand them at all but are happy with just the letters.

Nope -- I just understand Hitler enough to know that OMGz hes eeeevul does not disqualify Fe.

Introverted Intuition
Anyone who doesn't agree with this? Well actually, this far people does seem to be agreed, more or less. Hitler was driven by an inner vision, Deutschland �ber Alles, Lebensraum, World Domination, all that crap. When he was younger, hanging out with his NSDAP buddies, he could be silent for long periods of time, and then suddenly burst into speech, and when he talked he could do so for hours.

This is correct of course, but it's worthy of note that his inner vision was not so personal (the way an INTJ's would be) -- it was based on what would benefit the German people, and their general beliefs.

Extraverted Thinking
Secondary function, according to me then, is Te - organization, efficiency, decisiveness, toughness. Te is impersonal and sees what needs to be done (whatever that is) and how to get there, no matter if other people will protest or, ultimately, get hurt by it. It doesn't, like Fe, stop and say: "Is everyone okay with this?" People are secondary to the project at hand.

This is where you started royally fucking up. Hitler was notoriously bad at objective organization, and was a famously horrible strategist. He was, however, very concerned with social harmony and well-being among the German people and among his officers, even if not universally. That is, he had the standard Fe behavioral pattern of being guided by the values and desires of those he felt emotionally connected to, as opposed to those he didn't.

Introverted Feeling
This third function, sadly misdirected, undoubtedly helped to fuel the little moustasche-man's feeling of humiliation and thirst for revenge: "The jews didn't let me in to their art's school, so I hate them", "The war was unfair and so was the Treaty of Versailles, just wait till next time", and so on. And yes, the Versailles-thing was very unfair, but in a more balanced person, and with a more developed Fi, the hurt feelings would have had a chance to transform into acceptance and forgiveness, instead of being a source of sheer hatred.

I doubt this is accurate. For one thing the Final Solution was just an extreme measure based on an official party platform position of the NSDAP -- the one on which they campaigned and got elected. The German people in general were very antisemitic. For another, Hitler didn't even engineer the Final Solution himself. Himmler (likely INTJ) did.

"Oh my, I am so sensitive to conflict, I better start a World War...?"

He was sensitive to conflict within his own people. Lebensraum (which was older than you might think) was a way to appease them.

Extraverted Feeling


OK, now, this might not be _the_ definition, but it says pretty much the same as others I've seen. What more is there to say?? Hitler was so NOT Extraverted Feeling! He was so NOT caring, nice, friendly, considerate and he was definitely not sensitive to conflict! Everyone knows Te is the forceful function; brutal, aggressive, insensitive people are often unbalanced Te-users, I think. There is a risk for unbalanced Fe-users, and especially NFJs, to become manipulative, that is true, and maybe why many think this ought to be the F�hrer's type. But Hitler wasn't *manipulative* like an NFJ, he wasn't a "people-person"; he was rhetorical, his speeches were passionate, fierce and aggressive, and lots of people were moved by it.
YouTube - Adolf Hitler - Speech (1932)

No, no, Hitler was definitely a sensitive people person. People who met him personally remarked that he had an innate ability to deeply connect with them. You're mischaracterizing an attitude you see as inhuman (genocide is actually a very common feature of human history), as lacking Fe.

 

[Aleksei]

Anyway, I thought of him as being more Fi than Fe.

Then he'd be INTJ (or ISFP). Where's his Ne?

 

[ZPowers]

I think Hitler was an F, too, but the reaction to Hitler's type always gets me. Sometimes I get the feeling that feelers have a tough time accepting that out of every 100 bad guys from history a handful just happened to feelers, as though no feeler could ever do anything bad. Sometimes I think every type forgets that one example of their type, good or bad, is not indicative of them as people.

 

[skylights]

I think Hitler was an F, too, but the reaction to Hitler's type always gets me. Sometimes I get the feeling that feelers have a tough time accepting that out of every 100 bad guys from history a handful just happened to feelers, as though no feeler could ever do anything bad. Sometimes I think every type forgets that one example of their type, good or bad, is not indicative of them as people.

agree. Feeling does not entail nice any more than Thinking entails intelligent.

 

[Sniffles]

Hitler was notoriously bad at objective organization, and was a famously horrible strategist.

Like George Lucas bent on world domination, Hitler simply gets too much credit for the decisions made by people around him. Germany's successful invasion of France, for example, had nothing to do with Hitler's planning. His contribution was the part where he let 300,000 Allies escape at the Battle of Dunkirk, and where he singlehandedly blew The Battle of Britain with every advantage going for him, canceling the invasion of Britain in what would be the first real turning point of the war.

The hell kinda grade-school BS is this? Hitler played a key role in the French campaign, and it's widely accepted by scholars in this moment he was right and his generals were wrong(except for von Manstein and Guderian). Also Hitler's order to stand firm against Soviet counter-attacks at Moscow is also widely credited for saving the Wehrmacht from a total disaster. Concerning Dunkirk, there's still debate about that, including whether the Wehrmacht really had no choice but to halt due to the extensions of their supply lines(Blitzkrieg was based on speed and racing ahead of your own logistics was a common problem during those operations). Hitler certainly wasn't the greatest military commander, but he wasn't a buffoon that many try to make him out to be. Much of that impression came from German generals after the war who wanted to make handy excuses for why they lost the war, without having to examine the critical flaws in the German military system and their own thinking.

 

[Eric B]

This is correct of course, but it's worthy of note that his inner vision was not so personal (the way an INTJ's would be) -- it was based on what would benefit the German people, and their general beliefs.

He was very concerned with social harmony and well-being among the German people and among his officers, even if not universally. That is, he had the standard Fe behavioral pattern of being guided by the values and desires of those he felt emotionally connected to, as opposed to those he didn't.

He was sensitive to conflict within his own people. Lebensraum (which was older than you might think) was a way to appease them.

No, no, Hitler was definitely a sensitive people person. People who met him personally remarked that he had an innate ability to deeply connect with them. You're mischaracterizing an attitude you see as inhuman (genocide is actually a very common feature of human history), as lacking Fe.

But was all of that genuine, or was it more deceptive. In the Galen temperament system, Hitler is universally held up as the most extreme [unhealthy] example of a Choleric. Since they are extroverts, they have a great appearance of being a people-person, and can easily approach others to connect. But the aim is usually more personal goals in some way (people can even be seen as objects), and they can undertake any behavior necessary (including that of other types) to achive their goals. Cognitively, this might fit shadowy Fe.
And he did seem to ultimately treat people as objects, even if he did go through the motions of looking out for the concerns of his country.

 

[Sniffles]

They can't really confirm that he was indeed part Jewish.

Well this sheds some light on the matter:
Hitler 'had Jewish and African roots', DNA tests show - Telegraph