So, are you joining mensa?

[So, are you joining mensa?]

So, are you joining mensa?

Yes

 23 (19%)

No

 66 (54.5%)

Already a member, dumbass!

 17 (14%)

I got a 162!

 15 (12.4%)

Total Members Voted: 100

[KillMeNow]

Dupree is in MENSA.

[hereshopin]

Dupree is in MENSA.

hahahah indeed

[Sooner]

I had my Mensa membership on my resume for a few years. I really think it helped me get some great professional jobs. It definitely gets employers' attention. I don't think it is regarded as negatively as many here think...it's more a thing of curiosity. Once you get to the interview, then they decide whether you're a self-important ass.

I let my membership lapse a couple of years ago. Once I attend a prestigious law school, I don't think I will need to mention Mensa again to get that attention. It kind of goes without saying that you're really smart if you attend a Michigan, UChicago, etc. But the Mensa membership did serve me well.

BTW, I went to a few Mensa meetings in Fort Worth and Oklahoma City...and I've seen the membership websites of many other regional groups. It's my impression that most of the active members are 50+, conservative, and surprisingly undistinguished (no advanced education, blue collar). I felt like some kind of hot-shot kid driving up in my new car and walking in with my shiny shoes. It was hard to find common topics about which to converse.   

[baytostay]

I think that joining/telling people you are in MENSA is the quickest way to help them realize that you think you have limited social skills and are trying to over compensate for some deep-seated intellectual inferiority complex.

[paigeroo]

I had my Mensa membership on my resume for a few years. I really think it helped me get some great professional jobs. It definitely gets employers' attention. I don't think it is regarded as negatively as many here think...it's more a thing of curiosity. Once you get to the interview, then they decide whether you're a self-important ass.

I let my membership lapse a couple of years ago. Once I attend a prestigious law school, I don't think I will need to mention Mensa again to get that attention. It kind of goes without saying that you're really smart if you attend a Michigan, UChicago, etc. But the Mensa membership did serve me well.

BTW, I went to a few Mensa meetings in Fort Worth and Oklahoma City...and I've seen the membership websites of many other regional groups. It's my impression that most of the active members are 50+, conservative, and surprisingly undistinguished (no advanced education, blue collar). I felt like some kind of hot-shot kid driving up in my new car and walking in with my shiny shoes. It was hard to find common topics about which to converse.   

Well see peeps, that's all I'm saying.  I don't want it so I can feel self-important.  But it looks great on paper!

[baytostay]

I don't think that it does look great on paper--or if it does--only to employers who don't generally have educated/intelligent employees. I can't imagine how quickly your resume would get passed around the office as a joke if you submitted it with MENSA on it to a managment consulting firm or similar type employer.

[paigeroo]

I don't think that it does look great on paper--or if it does--only to employers who don't generally have educated/intelligent employees. I can't imagine how quickly your resume would get passed around the office as a joke if you submitted it with MENSA on it to a managment consulting firm or similar type employer.

Are you serious here?  Why wouldn't there be a benefit.  I seriously don't understand why all the hostility.  I mean do you have any solid basis for your criticism or is it all personal opinion?

[cesco]

I don't think that it does look great on paper--or if it does--only to employers who don't generally have educated/intelligent employees. I can't imagine how quickly your resume would get passed around the office as a joke if you submitted it with MENSA on it to a managment consulting firm or similar type employer.

Are you serious here?  Why wouldn't there be a benefit.  I seriously don't understand why all the hostility.  I mean do you have any solid basis for your criticism or is it all personal opinion?

At my job (or should I say previous job since last Friday was my last day...) we did an icebreaker at a meeting that essentially involved going around the room and saying something about ourselves that no one else would know.  One of the guys used his Mensa membership  - and he instantly became the total laughing stock of the office.  I work for a huge company (Fortune 50) and this was just a group of about 60 of us - but we all made fun of him for the two day meeting.  I think he was pretty embarassed, but took it in stride.

Moral of the story - many people think Mensa is a pretty big joke. 

[BrerAnansi]

Some famous members of Mensa...as you can see they're a mixed bag...now compared with famous members of Phi Beta Kappa...you can see a difference in quality and quantity...bottom line..Mensa has layman prestige...but in academic and corporate situations you won't do yourself any favors by highlighting your membership...

Mensa     * Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert [18]     * Dr.Isaac Asimov, author and biochemist [19]     * Jean Auel, writer [20]     * Derek Barbosa A.K.A Chino XL, rapper [21]     * Theodore Bikel, actor [22]     * Terance Black, screenwriter [23]     * David Blackman, honorary professor     * Richard Bolles, author [24]     * Asia Carrera, (former) porn actress [25]     * Adrian Cronauer, radio personality [26]     * Bobby Czyz, world boxing champion [27]     * Geena Davis, actress [28]     * Christopher Elipas, Founder- Scuzz International [29]     * Buckminster Fuller, inventor [30]     * Glenne Headly, actress [31]     * Maurice Kanbar, inventor [32]     * Peter Karmanos Jr, owner of the Carolina Hurricanes hockey team [33]     * Alexis Kasperavičius, Producer and author     * Anthony Kiedis, vocalist     * Richard Lederer, author [34]     * Scott Levy AKA "Raven", professional wrestler [35]     * Steve Martin, actor [36]     * Henry Milligan, World Boxing Champion [37]     * Ellen Morphonios AKA 'Maximum Morphonios', former model, current judge and radio personality [38]     * Ellen Muth, actress [39]     * Barry Nolan, TV personality [40]     * Joyce Carol Oates, author [41]     * Karen A. Page, author [42]     * Paul Parducci, actor     * Donald Petersen, Chairman of Ford Motor Company [43]     * Dr. Julie Peterson, former Playboy Playmate, current doctor [44]     * Tarek Saab, The Apprentice contestant     * Norman Schwarzkopf, Army general [45]     * Marilyn vos Savant, author [46]     * Jean Smart, actress     * Alan Rachins, actor [47]     * Dr. Abbie Salny, Psychologist [48]     * Deborah Yates, Radio City Rockettes [49]

Phi Beta Kappa     * Bushrod Washington — William & Mary, 1778     * John Heath — William & Mary, 1779     * John Marshall — William & Mary, 1780     * James Kent — Yale, 1781     * John Quincy Adams — Harvard, 1787     * Eli Whitney — Yale, 1792     * Joseph Story — Harvard, 1798     * Daniel Webster — Dartmouth, 1801     * John Calhoun — Yale, 1804     * Samuel Morse — Yale, 1810     * William H. Seward — Union, 1819     * Rufus Choate — Dartmouth, 1819     * Nathaniel Hawthorne — Bowdoin, 1824     * Henry Wadsworth Longfellow — Bowdoin, 1825     * Chester Arthur — Union, 1848     * Joshua Chamberlain — Bowdoin, 1852     * Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. — Harvard, 1861     * Robert E. Peary — Bowdoin, 1877     * William Howard Taft — Yale, 1878     * John Dewey — Vermont, 1879     * Theodore Roosevelt — Harvard, 1880     * Charles Evans Hughes — Brown, 1881     * George Santayana — Harvard, 1886     * Henry Stimson — Yale, 1888     * Bernard Baruch — CUNY, 1889     * W.E.B. DuBois — Fisk, 1890     * Bainbridge Colby — Williams, 1890     * Learned Hand — Harvard, 1893     * Alexander Meiklejohn — Brown, 1893     * Harlan Fiske Stone — Amherst, 1894     * Owen Roberts — Pennsylvania, 1895     * John D. Rockefeller, Jr. — Brown, 1897     * Felix Frankfurter — CUNY, 1902     * Elihu Root — Hamilton, 1903     * John Foster Dulles — Princeton, 1908     * Owen Brewster — Bowdoin, 1909     * Harold Hitz Burton — Bowdoin, 1909     * Walter Lippmann — Harvard, 1909     * Paul Douglas — Bowdoin, 1913     * Pearl Buck — Randoph-Macon Woman's College, 1914     * James Conant — Harvard, 1914     * Dean Acheson — Yale, 1915     * Archibald MacLeish — Yale, 1915     * Charles Hamilton Houston — Amherst, 1915     * Alfred Kinsey — Bowdoin, 1916     * Irwin Edman -- Columbia, 1917     * Paul Robeson — Rutgers, 1919     * William O. Douglas — Whitman, 1920     * Eugene V. Rostow — Yale, 1923     * Herbert Brownell, Jr. — Nebraska, 1924     * Countee Cullen — New York U., 1925     * Alger Hiss — Johns Hopkins, 1926     * George Hitchings — Washington, 1927     * John Stennis — Virginia, 1928     * Harry Blackmun — Harvard, 1929     * James Michener — Swarthmore, 1929     * Lewis Powell — Washington & Lee, 1929     * Nelson Rockefeller — Dartmouth, 1930     * Jonas Salk — CCNY, 1930     * Carl Albert — Oklahoma, 1931     * Dean Rusk — Davidson, 1931     * Daniel Boorstin — Harvard, 1934     * Richard Helms — Williams, 1935     * Ed Muskie — Bates, 1936     * Robert McNamara — Berkeley, 1937     * Potter Stewart — Yale, 1937     * Byron White — Colorado, 1937     * Caspar Weinberger — Harvard, 1938     * Orville Freeman — Minnesota, 1940     * Ella Grasso — Mt. Holyoke, 1940     * John Paul Stevens — Chicago, 1941     * Betty Friedan — Smith, 1942     * Phyllis Schlafly — Washington U., 1943     * Frank Church — Stanford, 1947     * Robert Bork — Chicago, 1948     * George H.W. Bush — Yale, 1948     * Tom Lehrer — Harvard, 1948     * William Rehnquist — Stanford, 1948     * Brock Adams — Washington, 1949     * Edward O. Wilson — Alabama, 1949     * Henry Kissinger — Harvard, 1950     * Pat Robertson — Washington & Lee, 1950     * Susan Sontag — Chicago, 1951     * Arlen Specter — Pennsylvania, 1951     * Arthur Levitt — Williams, 1952     * Stephen Sondheim — Williams, 1952     * John Shelby Spong — North Carolina, 1952     * Thomas Pickering — Bowdoin, 1953     * Ruth Bader Ginsburg — Cornell, 1954     * male private part Lugar — Denison, 1954     * Victor Navasky — Swarthmore, 1954     * John Updike — Harvard, 1954     * Ralph Nader — Princeton, 1955     * Gloria Steinem — Smith, 1956     * Elizabeth Dole — Duke, 1958     * Anthony Kennedy — Stanford, 1958     * Kris Kristofferson — Pomona, 1958     * Stephen Breyer — Stanford, 1959     * Francis Ford Coppola — Hofstra, 1959     * Bob Graham — Florida, 1959     * Robert Nozick — Columbia, 1959     * Richard Posner — Yale, 1959     * Robert Rubin — Harvard, 1960     * Anthony M. Benis — Princeton, 1960     * Fay Vincent — Williams, 1960     * Pat Schroeder — Minnesota, 1961     * David Souter — Harvard, 1961     * Lamar Alexander — Vanderbilt, 1962     * Tom Brokaw — South Dakota, 1962     * Lynne Cheney — Colorado C., 1962     * Richard Epstein — Columbia, 1963     * David Satcher — Morehouse, 1963     * James Woolsey — Stanford, 1963     * David Boies — Redlands, 1964     * Michael Crichton — Harvard, 1964     * Joseph Lieberman — Yale, 1964     * Angela Davis — Brandeis, 1965     * Paul Wellstone — North Carolina, 1965     * William Weld — Harvard, 1966     * William Jefferson Clinton — Georgetown, 1968     * Henry Paulson- Dartmouth, 1968     * Laurie Anderson — Barnard 1969     * Hillary Clinton — Wellesley, 1969     * Jon Corzine — Illinois, 1969     * Frank Easterbrook — Swarthmore, 1970     * Louis Freeh — Rutgers, 1971     * Nadine Strossen — Radcliffe, 1972     * Samuel Alito — Princeton, 1972     * Benazir Bhutto — Radcliffe, 1973     * Jeb Bush — Texas, 1973     * E.J. Dionne — Harvard, 1973     * Glenn Close — William & Mary, 1974     * Christie Hefner - Brandeis, 1974     * Condoleezza Rice — Denver, 1974     * Ben Bernanke — Harvard, 1975     * Susan Collins — St. Lawrence, 1975     * Gale Norton — Denver, 1975     * Robert Zoellick — Swarthmore, 1975     * Lawrence Lindsey — Bowdoin, 1976     * John Roberts — Harvard, 1976     * Karen Hughes — Southern Methodist, 1978     * David Addington- Georgetown, 1978     * Jennifer Granholm — Berkeley, 1980     * Nicholas Kristof — Harvard, 1981     * Eliot Spitzer — Princeton, 1981     * George Stephanopoulos — Columbia, 1982     * Patrick Fitzgerald- Amherst, 1982     * Miguel Estrada — Columbia, 1983     * Dinesh D'Souza — Dartmouth, 1983     * Daniel Pearl — Stanford, 1985     * Jeff Bezos — Princeton, 1986     * Paul Clement — Georgetown, 1988     * Ashley Judd — Kentucky, 1990     * Joshua Redman - Harvard, 1991     * Anne Dias-Griffin- Georgetown, 1993     * Stephanie Herseth - Georgetown, 1993     * Jori Chisholm — Puget Sound, 1997     * Peyton Manning — Tennessee, 1997     * Gregory R. Smith — Randolph-Macon College, 2003     * Rivers Cuomo - Harvard, 2006

[baytostay]

I don't think that it does look great on paper--or if it does--only to employers who don't generally have educated/intelligent employees. I can't imagine how quickly your resume would get passed around the office as a joke if you submitted it with MENSA on it to a managment consulting firm or similar type employer.

Are you serious here?  Why wouldn't there be a benefit.  I seriously don't understand why all the hostility.  I mean do you have any solid basis for your criticism or is it all personal opinion?

At my job (or should I say previous job since last Friday was my last day...) we did an icebreaker at a meeting that essentially involved going around the room and saying something about ourselves that no one else would know.  One of the guys used his Mensa membership  - and he instantly became the total laughing stock of the office.  I work for a huge company (Fortune 50) and this was just a group of about 60 of us - but we all made fun of him for the two day meeting.  I think he was pretty embarassed, but took it in stride.

Moral of the story - many people think Mensa is a pretty big joke. 

Yeah, it would be the equivalent of putting a good LSAT score on your resume. Even though it represents something good in theory, in practice it represents a profound misunderstanding of corporate culture.  At my current law firm, and my previous fortune 500 employer, it would be shooting yourself in the foot. You would never get an interview.  We've been known to route particularly hillarious resumes that cite qualifications that are not qualifications (such as Mensa) so that everyone can get a good chuckle--like the guy who wrote a Deuce Bigalow, Male Giggalo review in an alternative paper, or the guy who included his height and weight for a paralegal job.

Phi Beta Kappa is totally different. It's actually an academic honor that means something, and therefore carries real prestige.