Reinforcing Negative Stereotypes in Media Perhaps more concerning than the overarching representation trends were the tendencies of ads to depict common stereotypes. According to Madeline Di Nonno, President and CEO, Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, “Stereotypes shape our split-second emotional responses and judgments of others in ways we may not be conscious of, so media reinforcing negative stereotypes of people of color produces real-world discrimination” A few of the harmful themes included: The fact that white characters were nearly 2X as likely to be portrayed as especially intelligent than other races. Less than 1% of characters were indigenous and, of those, only 4% had speaking roles. Portrayals of people that are seen but not heard can have a tokenizing impact.