A woman on TikTok recorded herself being approached at a gym by a man who she says has been harassing her for months.
After the footage went viral, the gym, Crunch Fitness, identified and banned the man.
The woman, Chelsie Gleason or user @justchesslee on TikTok, has over 31,000 followers on the platform and often posts videos of herself working out at a gym.
Gleason’s recording of the encounter is her most viewed TikTok with 9.8 million views and more than 21,000 comments as of Thursday. She facetiously captioned the TikTok, “Being a female is fun.”
The footage shows Gleason lifting weights by herself before the man approaches and tries to talk to her. It's unclear what he says because of the music being played at the gym.
The man appears to start walking away as Gleason didn’t stop working out or turn to acknowledge him. But then he circles back and approaches her from behind, at which point Gleason jumps back and yells, “Don’t come near me.”
“Notice how fast he walked away when you brought attention to the situation,” one viewer commented on the video. “He knew he was in the wrong.”
Several viewers applauded Gleason for standing up for herself, while others expressed disgust that she faced harassment while working out at a gym in sweatpants. One viewer said that they would have thrown the weights at him in defense.
“And people question why I go to an all women’s gym,” one person wrote.
Another commented, “This is why I only work out at the women’s section.”
Multiple other viewers encouraged Gleason to show the footage to gym staff, saying that no gym wants to have strange men approaching women or anyone else during workouts. Gleason apparently already did.
In a comment on her TikTok on Thursday, Gleason wrote that the man had been identified and banned, and she thanked Crunch Fitness for its help.
Neither Crunch Fitness nor Gleason immediately responded to the Daily Dot’s request for comment.
