you are viewing a single comment's thread.

view the rest of the comments →

[–]Canbot 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

It is largely not true that they get stronger the more you deny them. They simply continue to exist and the harder you try to deny them the more they stand out to you because you expect them to diminish and they don't. They can't. Stereotypes exist for a reason and they won't go away until the underlying truth changes.

There may be specific examples of situations where, for example, a stereotype is mostly ignored until someone tries to attack it and in doing so they bring it up and into the consciousness of everyone. Then of course, anyone who isn't a complete sheep, will quickly realize the attack is ideological and the stereotype usually holds true. This will reinforce the stereotype. But that dynamic really only works when no one else is talking about the stereotype. Otherwise, it is already in the consciousness and does not get stronger or weaker.