This week, as we all on campus have noticed, is Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week. Well, are you aware yet? Whether you were one of the people “experiencing homelessness” near the chapel or just a student on this campus, are you now aware that homelessness exists? Are all of our lives now positively affected by this week-long campus-wide event?

While I think that hunger and homelessness is a serious issue not only in our local communities but as a nation, and as fellow human beings, I think this week’s focus is probably the most sickening of the various awareness weeks on campus. Do not mistake me for saying that the homeless face an easier fight not worthy of an “awareness week” or that hundreds of thousands in our state and millions nationwide do not suffer every day because of it. In fact, I take their plight so seriously that I consider this week an insult to their cause.

Why so callous, Alex? Because this is absolutely an example of privileged white people thinking they can understand what it is like to be part of the downtrodden and powerless classes of society and demeaning the actual experience of homelessness. Yes, homelessness means sleeping outside during bitterly cold November winters, and yes, by taking part in this simulation you may at times feel hungry and as if you’re living a life drastically different from your own.

Never confuse the isolated experiences of spending a week outside rallying behind an agenda for a week as “learning what it is like to be homeless.” It is a downright travesty that students confuse leaving their warm dorm rooms for a few nights to spend it in a cardboard box for an actual experience of homelessness.

Although it might be an edifying experience for those involved, what is replicated is not homelessness. It is a bunch of largely white students who can afford to attend this college and have the privilege of post-secondary education having a little pow-wow so that they feel like they’ve done something valuable.

Did you ever once have to actually worry about anything in that time? Could you not have escaped to your rooms for shelter? Could you not use the restroom right in the Chapel when nature called without having to worry about public ordinance? Did you still get to attend your classes, walk freely about campus and sleep through the night without being forced by the police to pack up and move even though it’s three in the morning? Did the police ever confiscate your belongings because they suspected you had stolen them? Did you have all your belongings in a shopping cart, completely vulnerable to both the elements and your fellow humans?

See why I get so upset about this? Why not, if you want to “live homelessness,” actually go and live it with people who are actually homeless? Why not go out and engage people who currently are homeless, spending time in their worlds and getting to hear their stories? Why not as a campus community even try to understand the homeless not through statistics written on cardboard signs but through getting to know an individual who is homeless?

Homelessness Week may be a great experience for those involved and may feed us all some information about the demographic makeup of the homeless and why “they” are in the situation “they” are in. But we completely forego an attempt at making an impact on campus through actual social involvement.

The air outside Chapel might be polluted with ash and some students may choose to sleep outside, but that is doing nothing to actually help the homeless.