Christian Lander knows what white people like.
Author of the blog “Stuff White People Like” and a book under the same title spoke in Hoff Theater last month on the the free-trade-coffee-sipping, organic-food-shopping, NPR-listening white people of today.

How does someone get started in such a field?

“I mean, look at me. I’m born into this,” Lander said. “This is my cardigan,” he said, pointing to the navy blue sweater he donned over a fitted white T-shirt.

This uncovers the true charm of Lander’s work. He knows he fits the mold of the competitive, yuppie, musical supremacist, iPod-toting, farmers’-market-shopping, liberal white man.

His reflections came from years of practice. “It really is who I am,” Lander said in a pre-show interview.

But take notice of a reality that tends to be overlooked: in the attempt to be unique, the white people he satirizes are all one in the same.

But Lander, 31, is unique in what he’s done with this identity and he recognizes how fortuitous his story is. This humility came across when he spoke to some 200 students attending the Nov. 17 lecture.

Lander constantly interrupted his discourse to remind students how something he started as a joke eventually earned him a book deal. Now, after making The New York Times Best-Seller List, a Fox pilot is in the works and the book is on international shelves.

“Again,” he reminded the audience, “January, a joke. March, I have a book deal.”

The concept emerged from a January 2008 online conversation Lander had with Myles Valentin, his Filipino friend who would eventually help him with the site. The two were discussing how white people love HBO series “The Wire.” After throwing into the mix concepts like therapy, yoga and divorce, Lander knew “that [was] it – it’s blog time.”

In “Stuff’s” early stages, Lander said, he got a lot of misguided Internet traffic looking for organic coffee.

Caitlyn Carr, a junior English major who attended the lecture, said she was searching for a hummus recipe when she stumbled across the blog.

But in a few short months, the blog started developing its own traffic-- a lot of it. Sixty-three million hits and 129 posts later, the site’s success speaks for itself.

Lander discussed why he thought his blog took off, citing his authenticity on the subject of white people and the content itself as prime reasons behind “Stuff’s” success.

“No one was calling out the white snobs who were all trying to be unique,” Lander said. He added jokingly, “I don’t know if it’s pent up self-hatred or I just hate white people.”

He wrapped up by addressing the naysayers who comment frequently on his blog.

“There are two kinds of people who hate me,” Lander said, “There are the idiots and the intelligent ones.”

According to Lander the idiots say, “I’m white; I don’t like shorts; you’re racist.”

The smarter ones view his work as elitist, meaning only white people can like said “stuff”, but they fail to realize, Lander said, he’s not talking about whiteness as a race. Rather he is referring to a “progressive” class of liberals who surrounded him growing up in Canada and can be seen at a Starbucks or expensive sandwich shop near you.

“You don’t have to be white to be white,” Lander said, “You have to be rich.”

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