Buzzfeed's 19 Signs You Googled Penn

Disclaimer: While UTB usually tries to keep it short and sweet, forgive us for getting a little worked up over this article.

Buzzfeed makes lists. It's what they do. They aggregate some information, pepper it with GIFs, and try to get at the strings of human existence that tie us all so profoundly together, so that we post it on each other's walls and go OMG, THIS IS SO US! And a lot of the time Buzzfeed does this very well--see here, here and here.

But in "19 Signs You Went To Penn," BuzzFeed just gets lazy. They dredge up facts that even the tour guides are getting tired of: Penn kids throw toast! Penn kids pretend they have sex under public art! Penn kids get confused with Penn State kids! Penn kids hate to walk all the way to DRL, man that is just so PENN of them!  While some of these tidbits are actually pretty cute and secret-y, like Sink-or-Swim or Shoutouts, most of them barely scratch at our complex, stereotyped surface.

Even worse, the article disseminates into cyberspace some stuff that's just not true. Do you know someone who got mugged between 40th and 41st street? Wait, let's break that down. 1) Do you know someone who got mugged? Probably not, as our campus in the heart of Penntrified University City is swarming with yellowjacket Penn Police. 2) Are you scared of 41st street? Hopefully not, as it's the gateway to our beautiful West Philly backyard. 3) That picture they use of a trolley is not remotely on Penn's campus; it's at 41st and Lancaster. Worse than beating a bunch of dumb "Penn" things into the ground, this article perpetuates the kind of rumors and hogwash our University and its student body have worked so hard to dispel.

To top it all off, the same website managed to come up with a whopping 46 signs you went to Princeton. Buzzfeed, we expected better. Especially with hilarious UTB founder Hillary among your ranks. There are so many beautiful, silly and monumental things accomplished on this campus everyday, and plenty of other great traditions you neglected to include. If this is the best you can do, then we won't hear it and we won't respond to it.

(Except to make a list of our own. Take a crack at it--leave some legitimate signs you went to Penn in the comments, and maybe they'll end up in our rebuttal.)