Petition: Get The Homeless Off The Streets, And Into Deborah’s Room Because Her Roommate Is Studying Abroad For The Semester
Get your pens ready! Unless you’ve been under a rock for the past few days, you’ve probably seen this change.org petition floating around: “Get The Homeless Off The Streets, And Into Deborah’s Room Because Her Roommate Is Studying Abroad For The Semester.” WE. LOVE. THIS.
The author, 21 year old Medill student Alicia Billings, says she first came up with the idea for the petition when she learned that Deborah’s roommate, who she doesn’t really know that well but she knows Deborah pretty well, was going to be working at a nonprofit in Morocco all next semester. “That’s great for her”, said Alicia of the absent roommate, “but what can we do here, at home?” That’s when she came up with the genius idea to take the homeless people of Evanston and the greater Chicago area, and have them crash in Deborah’s luxurious suite in Kemper hall for a while.
“You know a lot of people say they wanna do something; they say they care”, said Alicia, an intended communications major, “but will they actually go as far as to give up their own friend’s roommate’s bed to keep them off the streets?” Good point, Alicia. Through her raw ambition and willingness to ask Deborah if she’d be cool with that, Alicia was able to create the change.org petition, which has garnered more than 600 signatures from students, professors, Evanston residents, city officials, and Deborah’s RA, who says it’s kind of a violation of housing codes but if they keep it on the down low it won’t be a problem.
When asked to comment on the hundreds of citizens who have signed the petition, and are counting on her to extend the sole olive branch by protecting dozens of homeless people from the harsh Chicago winter, Deborah, as would any decent human being with a beating heart and conscience, embraced the humanitarian effort with open arms: “I mean, like, I mean I guess it would…how many signatures did you say?”.
Critics of the petition have brought up issues of spacing, saying that Chicago’s homeless population is estimated to be more than 40,000, and that Deborah’s suite , even with its gender neutral kitchenette, may not be able to accommodate such a large influx of people. Don’t worry, haters, Alicia has a plan for that: “Two people can def get cozy in those beds, no prob…and we can also like take the sheets off her roommate’s bed and put them on the ground and stuff”. Deborah, we’re behind you!
