“Instagrammers, living their best lives, being their best selves,” is what Netflix teased was in store for its new reality series Byron Baes—never mind the messy love triangles, heavy pours of Savvy B, and petty drama among its cast of wellness-seekers, tanned surfers, trendy photographers, and aspiring influencers.
Premiering on Wednesday, the show (think The Hills, but Aussie) follows a group of mostly single, beautiful twentysomethings who’ve come to the beloved and chilled-out shores of Australia’s Byron Bay in the hope of making a name for themselves.
But the Netflix show has not gone down well with the town’s proud locals, many of whom are declaring that they have no intention of tuning in. In the lead-up to the premiere, they worked for months trying to get Netflix to abandon its plans, staging protests and teaming up with restaurants and businesses to deny Netflix filming permissions. Even its mayor had asked the town council for help in shutting down the production.
While the small beach town, 470 miles north of Sydney and home to a tight-knit community of around 10,000 people, has long been a haven for yogis, hippies, surfers, and just about anyone looking for a quieter life—its slogan is, after all, “Cheer up, slow down, chill out”—in recent years, the once-quiet town has drastically changed.
Last year, it surpassed Sydney as the country’s most expensive real estate market, with wealthy out-of-towners eagerly dropping millions on vacation homes and investors snapping up properties to transform them into Airbnbs to house the surge of visitors.
The result has been all but catastrophic for the locals, many of whom have been priced out of their beloved hometown. Some have even resorted to living out of their cars to keep their jobs. Businesses have taken a hit too, as many have struggled to find staffers who are able to afford to live in the increasingly pricey area.
Economic impact aside, many longtime residents feel that these “blow-ins” have little to no respect for the town’s community and culture, much less the area’s history, as the Aboriginal Arakwal Bumberlin people have called the land home for more than 22,000 years.
As a result of these stressors, Byron Bay locals are pissed about the series—worried the show’s global reach on Netflix will further upend its already-unaffordable housing market, and paint an inaccurate portrait of the town and its people.
“We love sharing our town with people,” filmmaker and photographer Oli Ayo, who grew up and still lives in Byron, told The Daily Beast. “It’s a beautiful place and it’s open to everyone to enjoy. We just don’t like people coming in, cashing in on our name and taking advantage of our home, and showing no respect to our history, community, and culture.”
“I’ve lived here for 30 years, have a tight community and village here and know a lot of people—I have never met any of these people,” Holly English, an artist who has lived in Byron since she was a teenager, added. “Byron Bay and the true locals—people who have lived here 15-20 years or more, families who have lived here for generations, local indigenous peoples whose families still live and survive here—we objected to this. This is not us.”
“The issue is the authenticity of people and businesses in Byron now,” added Caroline Cantrell, who grew up in Byron and returned from Sydney in 2016 to raise her children. “True spiritual and environmental significance comes from using less, whereas the capitalist, consumption-driven nature of modern Byron Bay spits in the face of everything the region used to mean. The people in the show are simply cashing in on a popular place at its most popular time.”
The outcry against the new reality series came almost immediately after Netflix announced it last spring. The town quickly organized emergency meetings, petitions, and protests. In April, around 100 surfers participated in a paddle-out protest—a Hawaiian surfer tradition normally held to honor a loved one’s life after they’d passed away.
Ayo took part in the paddle-out, explaining he was mostly opposed to the shallow reputation that the show would be giving to Byron, already evident in its cheesy title. “We felt Netflix was tarnishing our name with a show that doesn’t represent who we are,” he said. “If they called it anything else, I’m sure a lot of us would have been okay with that. But they used Byron Bay’s name with a show about dramatized, plastic relationships and a bunch of mediocre Instagram influencers who aren’t even from here.”
“Byron is a small tight-knit community of all walks of life, and is rich in history and culture,” he continued. “My whole life, there have been industries trying to take advantage of and capitalize on our piece of paradise. We tend to get together and stand up against those, as we are trying to preserve the culture and the dignity of our town. So, that’s what the paddle-out was all about.”
The show even had a tough go at recruiting cast members who are actually from Byron Bay, with many refusing to participate because they were worried they’d be harming the very town they call home. Influencer Ruby Tuesday Matthews was among those approached by the production and successfully made her way through the interview process, but ultimately decided she wanted nothing to do with the show.
“Byron isn’t a joke,” she told The New York Times last May. “They’re basically branding our town.”
And for those who did sign on, including 10-year Byron resident (and crystal-lover) Hannah Brauer, they still were hesitant how things would play out. “It was scary,” Brauer told The Guardian. “I started second-guessing my decision to go on the show… I was literally like, oh my god, what have I done? I’ve only ever felt comfortable living in this town. I’ve only ever felt loved within this town. Have I destroyed my Byron life by going on this show?”
Netflix said they were taken aback by the sheer force of the backlash. As a result, the streamer had to “react, adjust and pivot in certain ways,” including where the show was filmed, as many Bryon Bay businesses refused to allow the production to film on their premises.
“I think we were all very, very surprised by it, in terms of the intensity of [the reaction],” Que Minh Luu, the director of local content for Netflix Australia and New Zealand, said. “But we also really understood that there is a real curiosity and skepticism of what it is that we’re trying to do. And I think—what I hope, what I feel and really have a lot of faith in—is that when people see the show, they will understand what it was that we were going in to do.”
Locals have two major issues with the show—the first being the impact it will have on the area’s already dire housing market. Last summer, the median house price jumped to around $1.8 million, nearly $1 million more than Sydney.
Celebrities seem to have played a role in the beach town’s allure, as the Hemsworth brothers, Zac Efron, Matt Damon and Nicole Kidman have all either bought property there in recent years or have had prolonged stays. Plus, the pandemic brought in droves of people from the bustling cities of Sydney and Melbourne, all looking for a slower pace of life on Byron’s idyllic shores.
But the market boom has caused locals to be increasingly displaced, as they are now unable to afford the multi-million-dollar homes that doubled in price in a single year. Many fear the show will force even more long-time residents out of their hometown, but English believes that ship has long sailed.
“Over ten years ago, people who had a disability, were on a low income, or single parents and students were already priced out,” she explained. “Only if you bought here before the boom or have a fuck-ton of money can you afford to live here. Even locals who did buy here before the boom feel lonely [and] excluded as their good friends, family and kids can’t afford to live here anymore.”
“We used to be a very strong and united community,” she added. “It has destroyed this town.”
Cantrell agreed, saying her parents had lived in the area for close to 30 years but now refuse to make the 30-minute drive from their farm anymore because of how much things have changed. “My mum said she’s too heartbroken and that Byron Bay has lost its soul,” she explained. “Byron locals are now a rare breed because everyone who was raised here has either left because they can’t afford to live here, or they just simply can’t stand it anymore.”
“The gentrification of the town has resulted in the house prices skyrocketing and people who grew up here can no longer afford to buy a home,” Cantrell added. “Homelessness is a huge problem in Byron, not to mention infrastructure, traffic, waste management, and the erosion of the beach.”
Ayo echoed their concerns, saying most of his friends have had to move a bit further out due to rising costs. He also pointed out that many of those in the service industry have had to leave town, leading to a worker shortage.
The other concern among locals is that the show will be an inauthentic portrayal of their town at best, and a mockery at worst. The sense of community and environmentalism is strong in Byron Bay, and many fear the show will sensationalize or poke fun at aspects of their way of life.
The influencers of Byron Baes
NetflixIn short, they feel the cast members don’t truly represent the people of Byron; rather, they’re just Instagram influencers breezing into town to capitalize off the aesthetic and give a false perception of their town without truly supporting or immersing themselves in the community.
“The trailer mentions spiritual healers and crystals—the true spiritual and cultural significance of Byron Bay to local Aboriginal people, the Arakwal people of the Bundjalung Nation is the only true spiritual importance,” Cantrell explained. “How are they truly showing their respect to the Bundjalung people? Are they donating advertising proceeds to local Aboriginal corporations? Are they providing resources to the local homeless? Are they planting trees or cleaning the beaches?”
“There’s so much more here than a bunch of mediocre Instagram influencers fighting and bitching about each other who aren’t even from here,” added Ayo. “I said it before: I’m OK with that, but they used our town’s name, which to us means so much more than what this reality show is showcasing. And it’s being broadcast to the entire globe. We don’t want to be perceived in this way.”
