In recent days, Netflix, perhaps the biggest streaming service in the world today, has been coming under heavy criticism following an action that has been perceived as an attempt to remove Christian movies from its platform. Many have been wondering why Netflix is doing so in removing Christian movies or what that bodes for other faith-based content in the future. Here, we will explain why with Netflix, what this is and the effect it will have on the faith-based community.
What is Netflix?
Netflix is an American media services provider and production company that provides subscription-based streaming to millions across the globe. In 1997, Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph established the service, which over time grew into one of the largest streaming services in the world, having millions of subscribers globally.
Why is Netflix Removing Christian Movies?
Some major factors have been attributed to the reason for removing Christian movies on Netflix. Netflix adds and removes content from its platform based on several factors, including viewer ratings and licensing agreements, among others. In the case of the Christian movies, they probably did not garner enough viewership to keep them in the lineup.
The other possible reason could be that Netflix is avoiding controversy and is taking a more neutral approach towards religion. The streaming service faced backlash in the past while handling religious content and hence may be avoiding similar controversies by removing such content altogether.
Added to these factors could be economic reasons tipping the scale or contributing to and strengthening the decision. Netflix is an area for making money, with business interest in maximizing returns and revenues. Thus, economic reasons may be included in the decisions to drop some specific content. For example, if a particular genre is not able to attract more viewers to add to the revenue stream, Netflix might withdraw it to give way to more possibly lucrative content.
Impact on viewers
This might affect the viewer significantly who searches for programs that best suit his or her religious beliefs. To many Christians, movies specifically made for their faith are a big part of intake of media, and the removal of these movies from Netflix might limit their chances of accessing such programs.
It could also be viewed as an action that reflects Netflix’s values and priorities and is therefore turning away the Christian viewer, maybe even losing subscribers.
Conclusion
In other words, Netflix’s decision to pull all the Christian movies from its service is likely due to the way licensing agreements interact with the availability of content and economic considerations. If it disappoints the viewers searching for such content, well, it is their decision on what titles are streaming on Netflix. Most interesting, though, will be how the question of content selection and availability is approached by the other platforms as the streaming landscape continues to evolve.
