When Antisemitism Feeds on Itself: The Stigmatization Rebound Effect ~ Elder Of Ziyon

Friday, September 26, 2025

When Antisemitism Feeds on Itself: The Stigmatization Rebound Effect

We see a familiar pattern with most public instances of bigotry. A racist incident hits the news, and the public response – at least in open, mainstream circles – is usually horror and shame. People distance themselves from the racism, organizations reaffirm their opposition to it, there is outrage in the media and social media, perhaps prompting some protests, and prejudice is pushed a little further back underground.

Antisemitism, though, behaves differently. When antisemitic incidents occur – whether disguised as “anti-Zionism” or brazenly explicit – they often don’t generate horror. Instead, they seem to embolden others. What should be a cautionary tale becomes a rallying cry.

Antisemitism strengthens on its own exposure.

It is a kind of stigmatization rebound effect.

There are studies that explain parts of this phenomenon:

Prejudice rebound in psychology. Social psychologists have long documented that when people try to suppress their biases, the thoughts can come back stronger. Monteith and others called this the stereotype rebound effect: the act of pushing prejudice out of sight primes it to resurface later with greater intensity.
Reactance against stigma. Stigma campaigns can backfire when people perceive them as policing thought or speech. Studies of stigma reduction show that those told “you must not think this way” sometimes double down out of reactance【turn0search10†source】.
Secondary antisemitism. German social psychologists Daniel Imhoff and Rainer Banse ran experiments showing that reminders of Jewish victimhood actually increased antisemitism in some respondents, once social-desirability filters were removed. They called this secondary antisemitism – hostility that grows stronger the more one is confronted with the suffering of Jews.
Permission structures. Surveys and testimonies show that many Jews perceive the rise of antisemitism not as the creation of new hatreds but as the release of old ones. A 2020 Pew study found Jews saying, in essence: “It’s not that people became antisemitic; it’s that they now feel freer to say it”. Dara Horn recently described this as a “permission structure” for antisemitism in The Atlantic.

Put together, these lines of research help explain why antisemitic incidents don’t reduce antisemitism. They activate latent prejudice, provoke reactance against stigma, and signal permission to express what was already there. This is unique compared to other prejudices:

Antisemitism is widespread but under-measured, since most surveys rely on self-reporting. People know the “correct” answers so it is difficult to measure how many people have latent antisemitic feelings. I've mentioned one study that found it indirectly; and the German study above managed to get people to admit antisemitic opinions when they were told that they were hooked up to a reliable lie detector. The people with latent antisemitic attitudes are the ones who are more likely to look at antisemitic incidents not as something horrific but as evidence that they are not alone. The antisemites may even be admired as "speaking truth to power."

One other reason that antisemitic incidents don't provoke the same reaction as violent incidents against minorities, women or the disabled is because Jews are not hated for their weakness but for their perceived power. The idea of the powerful getting knocked down a peg is a mainstream meme in entertainment and media.

The result is a self-reinforcing loop. Antisemitism doesn’t wither under the light of day; it metastasizes.

The scholarship gives us pieces – prejudice rebound, reactance, secondary antisemitism, permission structures. But none quite capture the full picture.

That’s why stigmatization rebound is a useful frame. It names the paradox: incidents that should stigmatize hatred instead rebound, drawing out and intensifying the very prejudice they should suppress.

Recognizing this dynamic matters because it exposes why antisemitism cannot be fought with the same tools used against racism or other prejudices. Public shaming, exposure, and education alone don’t work the same way. With antisemitism, exposure often legitimizes and emboldens. Holocaust education, often seen as the only tool in the fight, can backfire.

This is why it is so maddening when people claim that existing anti-discrimination education is adequate to deal with antisemitism. It is not only inadequate - it is entirely wrong, and its themes of aa binary oppressor/oppressed dynamic often exacerbate rather than ameliorate antisemitism.

That doesn’t mean we stop fighting. It means we need new strategies that acknowledge how antisemitism feeds on its own visibility, and how easily anti-Zionism provides moral cover for what is, at its core, an ancient hatred looking for new clothes.

I think that the key tool to fight antisemitism is to attack the malign philosophies that encourage it - ideas like decolonial studies, Marxism and social justice. They claim that they are anti-discrimination but they are, in fact, one root of the problem.

There may be other methods and tools that can fight the scourge. But at the moment, I have not seen too many good ideas from the many strategy papers I have read..