While reading the article "UH dorm plans plow ahead," I could not help but chuckle at the concerns that the University of Hawai'i-Manoa students had about the new dorms being built on campus. It seems that this is just another way for the students to complain about something just for the sake of complaining.

The students were unhappy that it was going to cost around "$4,250 to $6,990" per year to live in the new dorm, saying that only rich students could afford to live there. These prices are a steal — you would be hard-pressed to find comparable housing anywhere on O'ahu for a year for this price.

In fact, I'm sure many families in the surrounding area pay at least that much to live in their homes a month. I pay around $7,000 a semester to live in the dorms at my school and my friends all pay around the same amount at their respective colleges. The rates are not just "low in comparison to other institutions" as the university's spokesman suggests, they're a steal.

And with rising costs of just about everything these days, it would be foolish to think that it would cost the same to live in a brand new dorm as it does to live in the older, run-down facilities.

I have visited friends staying at UH and have seen the dorms firsthand. I have also heard people on campus complaining about the living conditions in the dorms. I must say that the dorms were not as bad as they were made out to be and any improvement on what is already there is going to cost more.

The dorm I saw was similar to many that I have seen during my trips to the college campuses of my friends. Students are paying much less to live in the dorms at UH than those studying on the Mainland. If you are going to complain that the current living conditions are sub-par and unacceptable (when, quite frankly, they are not), don't whine when the improvements may cost you a bit more than you are used to paying — especially when these "high costs" that "price average students out of the market" are still amazing deals compared to everything else.

The concern that the students had about the new dorms having an "unfriendly atmosphere, since it is being designed to include choke points to restrict student movement and prevent large groups of students from just walking by the front desk without each individual person checking in" are ludicrous.

During my freshman year of college, I visited no fewer than 10 different universities that my friends attended and all of the dorms that they lived in had few open spaces for students to "hang out" in. And all of them had check-in desks where you had to show your student ID and sign in.

At Johns Hopkins University, there are even electronic gates in the dorms that only open when a school-issued card is swiped through an electronic reader.

Schools do not want students congregating in dorms for several reasons. It's no secret that college kids consume alcohol and when many drunken students are allowed to gather in small spaces, bad things can happen. This year, a student who was binge drinking with friends was found dead in the basement of his dorm after being shoved down a trash chute. His friends did not report him missing for a few days because they had been drinking and were scared of the possible repercussions. By making it hard for students to partake in such activities, the possibilities of such tragic events are minimized.

The "check-in" desks are set up for safety reasons as well. One could argue that it is possible that the incident at Duke University could have been prevented had they lived in a traditional dorm, where guests must check in as opposed to the unsupervised house that they resided in.

At my university, every student is only allowed to sign in one guest in at a time and security guards constantly patrol the halls at night. This serves to keep the dorms safe from students partying in the dorms, which could lead to trouble, but it also keeps people out who should not be there in the first place.

This year, during finals week, when all of the students who work at the check-in desk at my dorm were busy studying, my school could not find anyone to monitor the front desk of my dorm. Somehow, a man managed to get into the dorm and onto my floor and was found in the women's restroom, peering under bathroom stalls and trying to peek into the showers.

It amazes me that students would complain about safeguards being put in place that keeps them from being harmed.

UH must take the steps that it is taking to ensure that its students are safe from harm. If you would like to meet with friends, go outside — remember, you live in paradise, and it's never too cold to go talk outside here.

It is both sad and funny that regardless of what the university does in regard to this new dorm project, someone is going to be seething with anger.

Students don't want modern security measures being put in place. But if the university decides to give students what they want, it will only be a matter of time before a mishap occurs and someone gets hurt. Parents, the media and society may be upset when that happens, but at least the students won't have to swipe a card to get into the building and won't have "big brother" looking over their shoulder — or whatever excuse the college crybabies would like to champion to try and circumvent having a security force around.

Joshua Masayoshi Huff, a student at George Washington University and graduate of Moanalua High School, is a former Advertiser Youth Community editorial Board member. He wrote this commentary for The Advertiser.