Tilly Middlehurst and I are the only people in Cambridge sitting down in Honest Burgers at 11:20am. But despite the rather empty setting, I’m eagerly anticipating our conversation. Those who frequent the Union will be familiar with the third year HSPS student, and those who don’t are sure to recognise her from the many viral videos of her debating. Middlehurst is known for speaking out, both in the debate chamber and online, but when did she first realise the power of her voice?

Middlehurst takes a minute to think. She recalls a mock Brexit debate that her class held in primary school: “I put myself forward but wasn’t chosen to speak”. Listening to her fellow 10-year-olds, she remembers “the salience of certain ideas about immigration” being “really quite powerful, even amongst these young kids”. Middlehurst tells me that she raised her hand and pointed out that the pro-Brexit girl’s arguments were “unfair, wrong, and false information”. She reflects on how this empowered her. Fellow students came up, eager to talk: “I remember feeling like I had some kind of voice”.

“I don’t think debate is always the solution. I think there are many important ways of doing politics”

The power of debate followed her through life. When Middlehurst started competing, she met strong characters, recognising that “debate gets a bad name for a reason”. She’s not wrong – debaters are often characterised as strong-willed and argumentative, and she voices her concerns that some of these “extreme” individuals are likely to enter politics: “I know what their views are and that terrifies me”. The viral undergraduate defines what she believes debate is: not a refined chat to win someone over, but a “formalised challenge in a neutral space to a set of prominent ideas”. She says decisively: “I don’t think debate is always the solution. I think there are many important ways of doing politics”. This perspective struck me, and shaped the rest of our conversation. People are often highly defensive of their own area of expertise. Middlehurst takes a contrary position: there is no singular way to “do politics”.

I note that, nowadays, people often hesitate to speak out on issues that they disagree with because of concerns about how they’ll be perceived, the impact on future careers, or because they feel unqualified and unable to make an impact. Middlehurst responds immediately: “I would say they’re all right! No one is qualified enough, no one knows enough; it will impact your career, it will impact how people see you, people will call you performative, and you will feel embarrassed all the time. But if you have to do it, you have to do it”.

Middlehurst stresses her belief in speaking out “even if it’s privately frustrating”. “There’s one thing that people could never say about me which is that I don’t believe in my methods – I believe it wholeheartedly. You should utilise your skill set to do politics the way you think it should be done.”

We fall into a comfortable silence, taking a break from tackling the challenges of political engagement to tackle our burgers instead. Refuelled, I ask Middlehurst about the topic I’ve been most interested in discussing: misinterpretation. In an age where social media governs our content consumption and algorithms flood our feeds with out-of-context clickbait, it’s an issue that affects us all. but Middlehurst more than others. “There are times where I feel I have been misinterpreted a lot, where the first two or three seconds of a video I make will go viral”. She opens up about the personal attacks she receives. “I can’t sit with friends anymore and just discuss something, or joke, because someone could be listening and Camfess about me, which has happened. It sounds a bit self-centred, but that’s just how it is”.

“There are times where I feel I have been misinterpreted a lot”

She compares her fame to the experience many young girls have of finding out that there’s a whole group-chat dedicated to talking about you: “Now imagine it’s 800,000 people”. People forget, Middlehurst says, that she has a personal life too, and that there is always a personal context behind her public activism. The conversation takes a serious tone when we touch on the video she made predicting the repercussions of Charlie Kirk’s death following his assassination. “The day before I posted that video, I filed a police report for a death threat”. When she reported it to the police, she said the officer “knew who I was,” and dismissed her as “a leftie trying to get someone arrested for ‘free speech’”.

It’s easy to forget that social media doesn’t show the whole picture. Speaking earnestly, Tilly implores her audience to “trust the work that I do, trust that I am doing work behind the scenes as well”. She tells me about her off-the-record conversations with Conservatives and BBC journalists, things that people just aren’t aware of.

Continuing our discussion about misinterpretation, Middlehurst talks about her interview with GQ, and how she felt “so upset” when she read it. The end of the article saw the writer predicting Middlehurst’s future. “He mentioned [working in] HR at an investment bank, which couldn’t be more distanced from how I view myself and my job”. After this “unfair” assessment, I give her the chance to envision her future herself: “that I write about things that are important, and get to document history as it’s occurring”.

I ask Middlehurst what she hoped a reader might take from the interview – she stresses her frustration that politics “is so individualised,” and argues that people waste time debating over particular individuals, losing sight of the wider problems. “Be far less concerned about whether or not I, Tilly Middlehurst, am problematic, and far more concerned with what politics looks like”.

So, what does Tilly Middlehurst want you to think about her? The answer: she doesn’t. Engage in her content, or don’t. But do engage in politics in whatever way you can, be it debate or otherwise.