There’s been a recent trend of upcoming influencers creating content on their college campuses in hopes of reaching social media virality. This epidemic has reached Chico as more influencers flock to the streets. Young adults have been complacent in consuming unoriginal content that defames others. 

Many influencers have found a similar niche that gets more online traction: Asking questions to drunk college students. The concern is the increasingly oversaturated market of influencers using drunk young adults as a way to gain traction. This often leads to either an inaccurate depiction of someone’s character or unjustified media attention. 

After interviewing two local Chico influencers, Tyler Clink and Ramsey Mann, they share a common similarity; they both seek clips of intoxicated Chico State students to promote their content. 

Ramsey Mann, a sophomore entrepreneurship student at Chico State — and aspirant influencer — explains that he looks for unfiltered behavior when interviewing students. “If they have dumb answers, or like, if they are loud and obnoxious, I’ll put it in,” he said. The common rule of media attention is that negativity gains more traction online.

When creators are actively trying to capture students acting dumb, loud or obnoxious, it’s not surprising that the interviewees could unintentionally ruin their future with their words and actions posted on social media. 

Mann has a common theme of degrading the people, mostly women, he interviews. Mann often poses questions that make the interviewee answer incorrectly. In one of his videos, he asked students, “Who is the 55th president of the US?” There is no 55th president of the United States. When someone does answer a question correctly, he acts surprised and condescending.

His clickbait posts have captions like, “wow, they are actually smart,” or “did you graduate elementary school?” Even when they get it right, interviewees will never be depicted in a positive light. He is another example of an influencer who cannot make entertaining enough content without using other people as a crutch for virality. These demeaning captions only represent how he feels about Chico State students.

Mann describes Chico State students as “very focused on anything but school.” Yet, when asked if he could spell “experience,” he spelled it “expereince.” Chico State students should not have to endure influencers who pick up their cameras more than books. 

Mann also admitted to using ChatGPT to come up with interview questions. It’s ironic to be unable to create interesting enough questions, but expect entertaining answers. 

On April 18, Clink and Mann collaborated as they went around downtown asking individuals, “Diddy or Epstein?” Asking the interviewees this open-ended question only results in wrong answers. 

Mann doesn’t see how asking the “Diddy or Epstein” question could be seen as offensive or insulting because “it’s not that deep, I mean, it’s like not affecting me.” Empathy has been lost in media culture and content creators like this contribute to this selfish ideology. 

Not only is this question offensive, but it is also lazy, sloppy and quite frankly, boring. When are we, as content consumers, going to stop giving our attention to content creators who can’t even elaborate on what their questions imply? 

Clink, a self-proclaimed full-time “party major,” is the man behind the cat suit. His approach toward depicting people in his content is less about questioning their intelligence, as Mann does and more about highlighting the circus that Chico is. 

Clink agreed that the “Diddy or Epstein” questions were meant to invoke shock value, hoping to gain more traction online. 

When asked what people gain from being interviewed, Clink and Mann explained that the videos could be seen as time capsules for the future, a way for students to look back on memories in Chico. Usually, when people reminisce, they go to happy, cohesive memories, not those being asked questions about convicted pedophiles by a tall man dressed as a cat and his sidekick holding the mic. 

The solution to get rid of these college campus influencers is either for them to make the conscious choice to stop or for the university to intervene. Their content contributes nothing to society but predisposed opinions, usually negative of the individuals being interviewed. 

Andrew Staples, Chico State’s public relations director, gave a statement via email acknowledging influencers’ presence on campus. As long as they do not harass individuals, they are permitted to film. “In open environments where filming may occur, it must not be conducted in a harassing, disruptive or otherwise inappropriate manner. Any activity that disrupts the learning environment, violates University policies or impacts the well-being of our campus community is taken seriously.”

Filming is only permitted in public areas on campus, such as outside the Bell Memorial Union or Meriam Library. Filming in private spaces, such as offices and classrooms on campus, is not allowed. Under the California Penal Code 632(a), when recording individuals in public, “The state doesn’t have a problem with you capturing their image, just their words. If you want to record the conversation, you’ll have to get their consent.”

The way to bring a community together is not by defaming the people who make it up. Influencers in Chico need to start prioritizing the depictions of the communities they are a part of over the short-lived virality of social media. 

Hannah Cabral can be reached at [email protected]