“It always helped in college to be a little different, especially if you wanted to play a leading role” (Ellison 178). Ralph Ellison explores stereotypes of multiple races and socioeconomic status to comment on racist America and its contribution to invisibility in Invisible Man. The narrator is systematically misunderstood in multiple situations depending on how we want to see him, whether as a black man from the South, as a black man from the North, as a traitor or as a leader. Ultimately, the burden of stereotypes leaves such a scar on the narrator that he becomes what society expects of him and thus loses his own sense of self. The narrator puts on his own facade without realizing it, and it is only when he is mistaken for Rinehart that he recognizes his pretending nature. This idea of ​​hiding behind a mask to please society at the cost of individuality fuels Ellison's critique of racism. He notes that classifying groups according to race deprives individuals of their identity and prevents them from interaction and originality. The Battle Royal sets a precedent of white men abusing blackness for entertainment purposes and forcefully placing stereotypes. The men of the community attending this "Battle Royal" are fully aware of the night's entertainment as the narrator innocently believes himself to be invited to give a speech; he is unaware that he and the other boys (and even a white woman) were invited only to be humiliated and victimized. The community deliberately invited a poor young stripper to dance in front of the black boys to capture their reactions to a naked white woman: "The Battle Royal encapsulates the trend toward the psychic and sexual emasculation of the black man and the confinement of his individual. .... middle of paper ...... learns that stereotyping and classification leads to loss. All those who claim to want to advance the black race end up using their ideology only to advance themselves and leave the minority at the bottom of the ladder. Those who kneel before stereotypes of the black race are rewarded by the ruling class but degraded by theirs. In Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison explains that invisibility only deteriorates a person's ability to make change and influence society toward strength through the use of stereotypes. As the narrator's grandfather advises him to give in to stereotypes and become invisible in order to succeed, the narrator learns that submitting to stereotypes leads him nowhere except failure and destruction: "... the novel's strange and uncomfortable images suggest a lingering underlying preoccupation with dynamics. of automatism and perception” (Selisker 571).