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The University of Maryland has revealed that there is a new cultural center on campus for people with disabilities. As a disabled person myself, I was so excited when I found out about it! This only happened because I heard from a friend of a friend who has connections to some administrator that is vaguely associated with one staff member who heard someone in Accessibility and Disability Services whisper about it through the vents… but I eventually found out!

Then came the issue of accessing it. I have ‘short fingers’, meaning most of my fingers aren’t fully developed. So you can imagine my surprise when the only way to get in was by scanning both hands and fingerprints— fingerprints that I most definitely lack. I, therefore, was unable to get into the room.

Other disabled students felt weird about this security system as well. They also felt weird about the singular wheelchair path made of spikes, the room’s tendency to start rapidly flashing lights with no warning, and the fact that the directions to get to the cultural center are entirely on video with no closed captioning.

We spoke to a student with ADHD on her opinion about the cultural center:

“I didn’t really feel one way or another about it until recently,” she admitted, “they advertised this ‘Finals Study Session’ for students with learning disabilities and I decided to go because I was having trouble focusing. We found out when we got there that they brought in a heavy metal band to play ‘background music‘ for ‘ambiance’. I did not do well on the final.”

In response to these claims, Accessibility and Disability Services issued the following statement: “Meh.”

Curious about this center, I sent my friend to the room, who got in after solving the riddle posed by the troll guarding the door and providing ten pages of medical documentation. He reported back to me, saying that the interior wasn’t too bad but the giant banner saying “Fuck you!’ in the front was a bit much. 

It’s clear that the disabled students of UMD don’t like this new cultural center, and I don’t understand why! I mean, who would’ve thought that limiting accessibility in a place made for disabled people would make disabled people mad? Crazy.

NOTE TO THE READER HELLO HI: So as you could tell, this article was satire. BUT there isin fact a new disability cultural center on campus in the Cole Student Activities Building, which lacks wheelchair accessibility at the front entrance and is located on the top of Stamp hill. I amongst many other disabled students on campus would really appreciate it if you could take two minutes to sign this petition to demand that the center is relocated to a more accessible location. Thank you all for reading and I hope you enjoyed the article!