Fe vs Fi

Fe strives to intensify emotions, and Fi, on the contrary, strives to reduce the intensity of pathos and passion. Even when it comes to extroverted white ethicists, they - through humor or even verbal mockery - tend to downplay the significance of people or events. They diminish the weight of tragedy, soothe pain, but also temper joyous excitement and belittle others’ virtues. They turn the bright into the dull, the extraordinary into the ordinary, the general into the particular, and the important into something not so significant at all. And almost always, they focus on the local rather than the global - on the emotions of an individual or a small group rather than on the feelings of an entire nation or humanity as a whole. And if they pay attention to something as unusual, it will invariably be something soothing rather than stirring - birds in the forest, peaceful conversations, quiet singing by the fire, cicadas chirping in the grass on a summer night.

In our view, this is the main, usually striking, difference between Fe and Fi - both in the behavior and speech of specific individuals and in literature.

A white ethical writer would never write a story like that of Danko, who tore out his heart to light the way for his tribe. They wouldn’t create a legend of Icarus, who soared above humanity, or the tale of Till Eulenspiegel, whose father’s ashes knocked against his heart from inside a pouch. Because such themes simply don’t interest them. But they might well write something as renowned as The Man in a Case. And if they are a composer, their music is unlikely to have the rising intensity of Appassionata, The Sacred War, or Ravel’s Bolero.
Anna Karenina – predominantly Fe.
Eugene Onegin – predominantly Fi.
Balmont – Fe.
Fet – Fi.
Mikhail Weller – Fe.
Sergei Dovlatov – Fi.

For those who need a more detailed analysis, we offer a small essay borrowed from a socioforum post by Danidin, whose reasoning we quite agree with:

«Overall, Fe differs from Fi not in extroversion (unless we are specifically considering the program versions of these functions) but in ‘cheerfulness’ and dynamics. Namely:
Fe evaluates from its subjective point of view (like/dislike, good/bad) the changes taking place around them, Fi - the stable properties of individual, private objects and subjects;
Fe feels its empathic unity with the people around, Fi forms its attitude toward them as separate from itself;
Fe is inclined to push its position and change others to fit itself, Fi adapts and adjusts to others, changing itself to best fit others;
Fe expressively influences the moods of others - uplifting some and worsening others - , Fi manipulates communication distances: staying close to some, distancing itself from others, and approaching yet others;
Fe does not think about relationships; it naturally forms them through self-expression, drawing attention to itself, Fi places the subject within an already established local system of relationships and then either keeps them there or transitions to another system;
Fe is excessive, broadcasting itself in all directions (which makes it more irrational), Fi is economical and selective, tuned to one-on-one communication, influencing a specific interlocutor;
Fe is global, characterized by an inspiring grandiosity of ideas and fantasies, Fi focuses on the private and small, on the fate of a specific person;
Fe finds it easier to identify with another person (including the protagonist of its own book, often narrating in the first person), Fi finds it easier to understand how someone differs, modeling their character and behavior taking into account their specific features (while observing them “from the outside”).
Extroverted (base) Fe is sincere, straightforward, and in fact, completely serious (!) in its expressive self-expression. In contrast, extroverted (creative) Fi plays around, teases, and jokes, often appearing more cheerful (!).
Introverted (creative) Fe outwardly appears soft and pliable, adjusting to partners, but in reality it always stubbornly chooses the environment and partners that make life easier and more enjoyable for it, never doing anything it dislikes. On the other hand, introverted (base) Fi appears principled and rigid on the outside, but in reality, it is highly suggestible, willing to yield to public opinion, carry out unpleasant tasks, and interact with people it dislikes simply because it made a promise to someone earlier.»

«Black Ethics cannot be “the emotions and relationships of other people”, if only because all socionic functions are YOUR functions, not someone else’s.

BLACK ETHICS is the desire to convey one’s current internal emotional state to others. A person with strong Fe speaks to the crowd, “ignites” others, calls them to action, excessively demonstrating their own emotions (so that even the most distant and indifferent will understand). A person with weak Fe is secretive and quiet, experiences everything internally, privately, and shares nothing of their emotions with others. The life strategy of strong Fe is pack-mindedness (being a trendsetter in the human pack and its herald), while weak Fe prefers staying in their own hut, minding their own business.

WHITE ETHICS is the desire to adapt to the stable personal qualities of other people. A person with strong Fi easily reads other people’s personalities through the nuances of their behavior and speech (intonation, facial expressions, gestures, characteristic words, details of clothing and interior, etc.) and uses this knowledge to adapt to the right people, gain trust, and maintain desired informal relationships. For someone with weak Fi, the inner world of others is uninteresting and inaccessible; they behave the same with everyone (ILE – with everyone, and SLE – with everyone of the same formal rank), is often too straightforward, tactless, and rude, doesn’t get attached to anyone, and easily breaks off relationships. The life strategy of strong Fi is manipulation of others through assigning moral and ethical labels (follow etiquette = good, break it = bad). People with weak Fi make good crisis-time leaders – when it is necessary not to build relationships, but to cut them to pieces in order to solve objective problems. The rest of the time, society stigmatizes weak Fi as antisocial.

Emotions belong only to Fe; Fi has nothing to do with emotions at all, it, like Ti, is an analytical function. But while Ti sees the general in the particular, then Fi, on the contrary, is interested in the general only in order to draw conclusions about the particular. For example, when listening to someone’s speech, a person with strong Ti first notes WHAT is being said (i.e., the part of the speech not related to the speaker’s personality, but reflecting some objective information they wish to convey), while a person with strong Fi first hears HOW it’s said (i.e., the part of the speech that characterizes the speaker’s personality).

The average ILI has very weak, repressed Fe, while Fi, though also weak, is an activation function. That is, they want to be “called good”, so they’re sometimes not opposed to learning good manners (that’s all Fi), but their true emotions are hidden from others, and sometimes even from themselves (Fe, being the vulnerable function, is forbidden).»