Why Are Character Types Controversial?

People seem to want to go to war over what character is what type. One doesn’t have to lurk within an MBTI community for long before they see some sort of argument break out… and sometimes the arguments get heated. Sometimes it seems like there are very few people who can have a civil discussion, and even when they can, an agreement is rarely achieved. Why? There are few main ones (beyond general ignorance of the theory) that I can think of that I’m going to cover briefly in this article.

1. Personality Bleed

The first reason people argue tooth and nail over some of these characters is simply because the character itself is not truly accurate to the intended personality type.

For those who have been long time followers of this blog, this article is along the same strain as Personality Bleed: Typing Fictional Characters. Personality bleed, a term that my cohort Ryan came up with, is essentially when a personality separate from the character in question bleeds into that character’s personality, producing a hybrid, of sorts. What do I mean? Well, think about a book or a manga. Every personality within a fictional work is a creation of another personality: the author’s. Every story needs diversity within its characters or else it would be boring. Ergo, an INFP writing a book could easily be creating one character of each personality type. That means that every character filtering through that INFP’s mind may potentially come out with an Fi-Ne-Si-Te imprint, of sorts. This can lead to inconsistent actions, skewed motivations, misinterpreted reasoning, and etc. Obviously, the better the author, the more realistic their characters will be.

Movies add another element with the inclusion of physical actors. Actors can easily bleed their own personality into the personality of the character they are playing. So, depending on the work of fiction, you could see an ISFJ character filtered through the mind of the original author and then filtered through the actor’s interpretation of said character. Do you see what’s happening?

2. Type-to-Type Perspectives

The second reason is similar to the first, but different enough to be worth the separation. We all have a certain perspective on the different types, based on our own cognitive function stack and our personal experiences with the other types. An author creating an ISTJ character is going to create what an ISTJ personality looks like from his/her own perspective. Ever seen one of those overly, ridiculously, and stereotypically rigid and intense STJ characters? I bet you anything an STJ didn’t create that character.

This principle remains the same for those of us who are onlookers, or consuming said fictional media. We have our own take on the personality types. We’ll want to attribute certain characteristics to certain types based on our own life experiences. We’ll also be more prone to noticing certain attributes, based on our function stack, and possibly missing others. What we can relate to may dictate our interpretation. If you run across an ISFP character that’s contradicting your personal experiences of ISFPs, you probably won’t be quick to peg that character as an ISFP, and it’ll take a much deeper, impersonal analysis on the character’s cognitive functions to recognize that character’s true type.

3. Claiming a Character As Your Own

This is probably the most frustrating reason for character type controversy. I’ve seen people openly admit that they relate to a character, ergo that character must be their type. That is a deeply flawed argument. Can you use your personal relation to a character as a potential hint or indicator? Sure. But, it’s not evidence, and it’s certainly not impartial by any means. Sometimes it looks as if someone is claiming a character to be a certain type simply because they WANT that character to be that type. They’ve placed that character on a pedestal, and on some level, they want to believe that they are like that character. Sometimes it feels like you’ve offended that person for suggesting otherwise, like you’re ripping their heart out or stealing their favorite toy by claiming that the character in question is something else. If you have a hyped up perspective of yourself, you could easily look at the character of a slightly different yet relatable enough personality and be like “Yeah, that’s me. I’m like that.”

4. Desirable Personality Types

Stereotypes have framed certain characters to be more desirable than others. Sometimes people subconsciously (or consciously) get it in their heads that only certain types can be, for instance, cool. Ergo, if a character is cool, he/she must be -inserttypehere-. Of course, this is where I take a second to mention the high Si users. ISFJs and ISTJs appear to be the least desirable of the types, and ergo, people instinctively seem to want to mistype any popular ISFJ character as an INFJ (or INFP) or any popular ISTJ character as an INTJ. You need to watch out for this, and make sure you’re not falling prey to that mindset.

5. Refusing To Be Wrong

And lastly, the age old problem: pride. No one wants to be wrong. Once you assert an opinion, it can be hard to back down. I get it. The most logical people can become extremely bull-headed and irrational when they feel their pride is at stake. I most certainly can’t claim innocence in this regard. Although, some things just aren’t worth the trouble, and as a whole, I don’t feel like character types are. They’re figments of someone else’s imagination that just happened to be published in some form of media for our entertainment. They have absolutely no bearing in the real world. Does it really matter if they’re one type over another?

Honestly, if given the option, I typically prefer to avoid stating an outright opinion whenever I get involved in character type discussions just so I can avoid that dilemma, and keep things civil. I know that might sound odd coming from me as a blog author… But, in reality, I can probably count on one hand how many times I’ve intentionally asserted an opinion on some character for the purpose of debating. Unfortunately, having a blog stating all of my opinions runs counter to my nature in this regard… which is why I prefer to keep my personal accounts anonymous. I’d much rather toss out thoughts and perspectives instead of having to advocate for a certain position. Rational discussion, with the simple goal to deepen understanding, is gold.