Stereotype‑Taboo as Political Signal

The social prohibition on making or representing stereotypes functions less as an epistemic safeguard and more as a partisan signaling device: groups enforce anti‑stereotype norms selectively to gain cultural authority while exempting favored narratives. This produces asymmetric enforcement, weakens evidence‑based reasoning about group differences, and biases representation practices in media and institutions. — If true, it reframes DEI and media‑representation debates from purely moral remediation to questions about who controls moral enforcement and how that skews public knowledge and institutional hiring/selection.