Last week, Netflix released the trailer for its newest original series based on the 2014 indie film “Dear White People.” In response, a group of special white snowflakes have boycotted Netflix, cancelled their subscriptions and gone on Twitter rampages about how the show promotes white genocide. 
“White genocide” isn’t a thing. This theory that immigration and integration are a conspiracy to turn whites into the minority is complete nonsense. According to the White Genocide Project, white people believe they’re being “forcibly assimilated” to accept a diverse population.
Calling the integration of intersectional ideas “genocide” is not only ridiculous, but it is also insulting to cultures who’ve actually experienced genocide — most of the time at the hands of white people. 
“Dear White People” is not a story about how much black people hate us. It’s a satire about how students of color survive in a predominantly white Ivy League college. I believe the people boycotting this show don’t know what it’s going to be about, which is particularly unacceptable given the show is not an entirely new idea. The movie is free to stream on Amazon Prime, and you can rent it on iTunes and YouTube. There’s no excuse to judge this content based on the title. I thought everyone was taught not to judge a book by its cover. 
If you watch the film — and you should — you’ll know it is not about white people. It’s not written by white people. The intended audience is not white people, and that’s okay. 
Netflix has produced more than 80 original, live-action drama or comedy shows and movies, and, to my estimation, about 15 percent of those have a person of color as the central character. That’s 85 percent of Netflix’s original programming catering to a white audience. 
Netflix will always make shows for white people, but not every show needs to be for us. Sometimes, black people like to stream shows and movies that display what the human experience is like for them. There isn’t enough content available to meets those needs.
White audiences did the same thing when “Luke Cage” was released because they thought having a bullet proof black man on screen was a threat to the police. 
Since the dawn of the entertainment industry, whites have dominated, and it’s time we realize it is a privilege and not everything needs to be about us. 
“Dear White People” showrunner Justin Simien said it best in his response to the backlash.  
“Equality feels like oppression to the privileged and thus three benign words send them into a fight for their very existence, which happens to actually not be in any real danger,” Simien said. 
The thing about these protests against Netflix is it will not make a world of difference. According to a 2015 study from Statista, Netflix has more than 75 million subscribers. The tiny population of bigots who are outraged over this show are a speck on the map to a giant company like Netflix. 
I’d wager their protests won’t last long, just until the next time they need to rewatch “Friends.”
Abbie Shull is a 23-year-old mass communication junior from St. Louis, Missouri.