Antonia Gentry Responds With Positivity After Racist Trolls Target Her Amid Taylor Swift Backlash

After Taylor Swift criticized Netflix for a shady line referencing her love life on their show Ginny & Georgia, actress Antonia Gentry faced a slew of criticism and even racist comments from fans on social media.

During an argument about dating on the show, Ginny (Gentry) tells her mother Georgia (Brianne Howley) that she has “gone through men faster than Taylor Swift.” Swifties took such offense to the swipe at their fave that they trended the hashtag “RESPECT TAYLOR SWIFT” on Twitter. Swift then responded with her own shade. "Hey Ginny & Georgia, 2010 called and it wants its lazy, deeply sexist joke back," Swift tweeted on March 1. "How about we stop degrading hard working women by defining this horse shit as FuNnY. Also, @netflix after Miss Americana this outfit doesn’t look cute on you. Happy Women’s History Month I guess."

Swift's biting remarks were all her fans needed to descend on those who wronged her — but instead of just targeting Netflix (aka those who actually wrote the joke), they took shots at Gentry, who was the mouthpiece for the joke on the show. In addition to flooding her socials with the phrase “RESPECT TAYLOR SWIFT” and “APOLOGIZE TO TAYLOR SWIFT,” however, some turned to harassment and racist attacks against the Black actress.

On March 4, Gentry posted a long statement alluding to the backlash on Instagram. "[Ginny] loves. she lies and she stands up for what she believes in — even though she may not have all of her facts straight. She makes mistakes — morally, mentally, physically, emotionally — and not just within herself, but within the broken world she lives in." Gentry also called into question what types of stories and events are the source of outrage in today's society. As an example, she shared the story about the 317 young girls in Nigeria who were kidnapped at school last week, and provided resources for people to educate themselves on the abduction crisis in the country.

Some Swift fans, however have realized how out of control the situation has gotten, and have responded with their condolences. "I'm sorry on the behalf of all the Swifties who commented shit on your post," one fan wrote. "We know it's not your fault, you didn't write the script. I hope you have a good day and please don't give a shit about the people who harassed you. Deeply sorry for this mess."

"i love taylor sm but y'all need to stop harassing antonia. she didn't write that line, pls leae her alone. she doesn't deserve this," wrote another commenter.

Another commenter wrote: "This just proves feminism was never made for black women smh."

Defending feminism by responding with racism? Not it.