“A lot has changed over the past 10 years on the University of Akron campus and along the surrounding areas, and it continues to change in many ways. Some changes are for better, others for worse. Now, homeless people are at an all-time high, and it’s a problem that needs to be dealt with.”
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A lot has changed over the past 10 years on the University of Akron campus and along the surrounding areas, and it continues to change in many ways.

Some changes are for better, others for worse.

Now, homeless people are at an all-time high, and it’s a problem that needs to be dealt with.

No matter how one tries to understand their situation, whether it’s by sleeping in a box complete with blanket, winter coat and hot chocolate, it’s always short-sighted and downright offensive.

We can’t understand what it’s like because we have homes and money.

But we could know, though.

Everybody’s life is a direct result of the conscious decisions and effort that they put into it. We all strive for the things we want and the people we want to be, and we all do things to pursue those goals.

That being said, had any of us made the same decisions as the homeless people, we could then truly understand their plight.

It’s important to understand that their lives are the way they are because of the things that they did and the decisions they made.

Homeless don’t deserve special treatment because they only have themselves to blame for getting in such a situation.

Organizations such as the Haven of Rest, Salvation Army and religious groups provide services to help lighten what I’m sure is a heavy burden for these people.

What’s really a problem is when they’re on campus, sleeping in the library, wandering around the Polsky building, sponge-bathing themselves in bathrooms and picking cigarette butts out of ashtrays.

And try walking from the Starz Market to Speedway without being asked for change or cigarettes. Most of us just lie and say we have neither.

It’s frustrating, especially when, after refusing to give someone some change, you get harassed and called a ‘cheap-@$% mother-$^%#&@.’

Someone needs to do something about this growing social plague, so it might as well be college students.

Whenever someone asks us for change, we should interrogate them to learn their specific intent for it and argue with them about whether they really need it.

Then, we should lecture them on how they could have made better decisions in life but chose not to, and that it’s their fault their life sucks.

Next, we’ll lie and say we don’t have any change.

Perhaps if we actually succeed in making homeless people cry, they will start making better life decisions.

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