On The Street

Online street interviews reveal the wider perception of Columbia students.

By Caroline Nieto

Illustration by Selin Ho

In New York, I want to believe that I am anonymous. Ignoring people, for better or worse, is what the city is known for, and I rely on it when I’m in no mood to be looked at. I am unabashed, I am free, I am—

“Excuse me, what song are you listening to?”

Being interviewed?

New York is experiencing an emerging surveillance culture—one brewing since the rise of the cell phone. Now that anyone can have a camera and an online platform, man-on-the-street interviews have taken over social media. It is impossible to walk through Washington Square Park without witnessing one of these interviews or being accosted yourself. 

Since moving to New York last year, I have grown self-conscious that at any second, a street interviewer will approach me and I will be entirely unprepared. It is not an irrational fear by any means—these videos rack up millions of views daily. I am not afraid of the interview itself; I am afraid of getting the answers wrong.

In the social media age, we get a say in the way we present ourselves; we cultivate an online persona.  cultivating an “act that is rehearsed.” It is easy to lose track of where our acted selves start and our true selves end. When we post on social media, we can take refuge in our  rehearsed performance. When we are approached unawares on the street, we must immediately drop into character; saddle up, remember the self we've made, or be caught on camera unprepared.

Online, people can form opinions solely on what they see posted, regardless of the truth that exists offline. And who can blame them? We’re meant to see street interviews as the more candid, spontaneous alternative to a rehearsed interview. There’s no further questioning the interviewee, so their words are taken at face value.

Columbia students have been the objects of flawed online perception, especially since the university has recently become a media target. Before the gates were closed to non-Columbia affiliates, interviewers could enter campus to talk to students on camera. They would make videos titled, “How many presidents can Columbia students name?” or “Asking Columbia students their SAT/ACT scores.” Each video is an attempt to characterize the “typical” Columbia or Ivy League student, if such a student could ever exist.

Take the aforementioned video, posted by @Quizard on TikTok, in which an interviewer asked Columbia students to name presidents until they repeated a name or took too long to respond.  The students perform impressively; they produce obscure names like Warren G. Harding, who died two years into office. A friend of mine, featured in this video, told me that she only agreed to participate because it was a topic she knew a lot about. Naturally, there’s a slew of comments scrutinizing the students and Columbia itself. One comment reads: “I felt really dumb before I read Columbia.” Another: “Yet these people won’t know that Europe isn’t a country.” 

Comments on similar videos are equally erratic. On “Asking Columbia students their SAT/ACT scores,” one comment reads, “The stupidity of American colleges. All about sports, gym, parties. Most these students have zero intelectual [sic] knowledge.” Another reads simply, “They don’t seem like Columbia students.” And that’s the crux of it all: What do Columbia students seem like? And if nobody’s sure, are these videos even helping us find out?

These types of videos feed a confirmation bias involving long-held ideas about Columbia. The videos seem to be tangible evidence of what the university’s students are like. But the sample sizes are meager, selection bias is rampant, and Columbia students are not a monolith. This is not a woe-is-me defense of our student body but instead a call to consider who and what gets to represent Columbia. Last spring, it was no longer TikTokers pouncing on Columbia students looking for quotes, but instead the mainstream media, politicians, and university administration. Suddenly, the question of who gets to speak for us was more pressing than ever, as our mundane performances were imbued with political weight. Columbia students combatted this attention through embracing it, using the authority of the “Columbia identity” to speak up and protest.

It seems there is no solution to the culture of hyper-perception but moving to a secluded cabin in the forest. But what kind of life is one where nobody can know you? Maybe the only solution is to invest in the part of ourselves that knows we’re performing and let the facade drop when we can. Do not live in the performance; do not let an audience decide your fate. It is okay to break.

To be honest, I was listening to “Something’s Coming” from West Side Story.