After Shane Gillis' "Joke," Women Are Sharing How Men Really Act At The Gym

When comedian Nina Kern watched Shane Gillis’ viral Saturday Night Live monologue ― the one where he said women at the gym “just dress like whores now” ― she rolled her eyes. The joke was offensive, sure, but what made it worse was that it felt uninspired and more rage-baiting than anything.“Shane Gillis had the opportunity to make his opinion funny, and he chose to be offensive and just rant. It was giving open mic energy,” Kern, who lives in Chicago, said.A few minutes into his monologue, Gillis, a stand-up comedian and star of Netflix’s Tires, made his much-scrutinized SNL remarks. “Look, I’m sorry, there’s no other way to describe [it],” he said. “Have you seen it? I’ve seen it. The shorts? Have you seen the shorts? They’re neon, like, artificial bait-colored.”“And the wrinkles go around the cheeks and all combine at the butthole. And don’t look ― you’re not allowed to look. For real, don’t look, because they are filming. I’m in the background of like 10 TikToks right now,” Gillis said.

Kern told HuffPost she couldn’t believe SNL allowed it to air. Was no one reading the room, she wondered? “With women’s rights being put into question every single day, the Cornell rape case making headlines, and now having a comic go on public television and call women whores for the way that they are dressed, I feel defeated,” she said.

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It’s also shocking to Kern how many people ― mostly men ― sided with Gillis. “If Gillis is critiqued at all, even in a joking manner, women are labeled as sensitive and told that we are overreacting,” she said. “As women, we are held to impossible standards, and I think that as a collective group we are tired.”Here’s what women experience in the gym, regardless of what they wear.

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Women are also tired of the leers they get from men at the gym when wearing leggings, bike shorts or sports bras — athletic wear that’s often far more practical for working out than an oversized shirt. Too much fabric can be restrictive; just ask any man wearing quad-exposing short shorts and a tank top with armholes so huge, they reveal his nipples. (Some of those scantily clad men are even content creators filming themselves for TikTok, but don’t tell Gillis.)

Abby Murphy, a radio host based in Tampa, Florida, has mostly gone to fitness classes that are predominately women in the last few years, but prior to that, she’d endured quite a few uncomfortable experiences with men at the gym.

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Murphy recalled a class when she wore a sports bra she’d worn countless times before and noticed the man next to her repeatedly looking over as she bent down to deadlift. “My immediate thought, in classic eldest-daughter fashion, was, ‘Ugh, I shouldn’t have worn this sports bra,’ not, ‘Why is this man staring at my chest?'” she told HuffPost.

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“Even though I’d never felt self-conscious in it before, somehow, I’d managed to make his behavior my problem. Like I was the one who needed to do something differently,” she said.

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When Murphy posted a tongue and cheek video about putting on her “wh*ore outfit” ― a wrestling doublet ― for the gym on TikTok after the SNL monologue, Gillis’ male fans came out in droves. “Chill, it’s a joke,” one said. More bold commenters remarked that she was, in fact, dressed the part. “What lie did he tell,” one person remarked.

“Apparently a lot of men in my comments can’t comprehend that I might wear something form-fitting simply because I like it, not because I’m looking for male attention,” Murphy said.For Miranda, a podcast host in London, it’s easier just to wear a hoodie when she wants to work out in peace. She said she often sees guys trying to show off or “use the gym as a hunting ground.”

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Some men use mirrors to try and disguise their staring, but it’s pretty obvious, Miranda said. “I’ve even experienced men moving closer to the workout station I am and initiating conversation by asking questions they clearly know the answer to.”

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Not just ‘creepy guys.’

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It’s not just “creepy guys” that feel free to remark on women’s bodies and exercise routines, said Ell, a fitness model who lives in the Gold Coast of Australia. A few years ago, Ell said she befriended a man at the gym, who had young daughters, and was friendly. On one occasion, though, she caught him laughing at her with another man so she confronted them.

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“My ‘friend’ awkwardly went backwards and forwards about not wanting to admit their conversation. He eventually proceeded to tell me that they were speaking about how I had lost a significant amount of my glute muscle since he had last seen me,” she said. “I was 22. He was 45. I cried in the bathroom,” she remembered.

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Going to the gym, Ell said she dresses for “literally anyone but men.” “Most importantly I dress for myself, and occasionally my gym besties when we color coordinate,” she said. “The more obnoxiously bright my outfit is and the shorter the shorts, the happier and more importantly, physically comfortable I am to train in.”

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As for Gillis’ jokes, she said, she’s proudly spent six years building her body, and doesn’t “need some hack comedian trying to minimize it for a cheap gag.”

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Kern, the aforementioned comedian, doesn’t dress like a “gym baddie.” (Though she doesn’t judge those who do.) She said she prefers leggings or biker shorts and a large T-shirt. “I like wearing big shirts because I have large breasts, and I feel self-conscious at the gym if they’re out… mainly because I know it will bring attention,” she said.

One time when she did wear a V-neck gym top to workout, she happened to run into someone she knew. The two briefly chatted, and she didn’t think anything of it; the guy was a person she’s never felt uncomfortable around and always liked.

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“Then he slid into my DM’s a few days later and commented on how good I looked in the top,” she said. “It made me feel uncomfortable because I wasn’t trying to be perceived in a sexual manner at the gym. I wanted to just get my workout in and go home, especially because I was easing myself into working out again after developing a chronic illness.”

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Julia Young, a fitness and lifestyle creator in Los Angeles, said Gillis’ joke suggests women can’t simply show up and work out without making it about men. “But we can, and we do, every day.”

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“I’m not dressing for anyone but myself. If it’s hot and I’m doing cardio, that’s shorts and a sports bra, because I’m about to sweat through everything,” she said. “On leg day I want to be able to see my form. I’m dressing for the workout and for how I want to feel, not for an audience.”

Emilija Manevska / Getty Images

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Most days she just wants to train in peace, and usually she gets to. But every woman who trains regularly has stories, she said, before sharing one of her own. “Imagine this: I’m mid-set, headphones in, hoodie zipped all the way up, clearly in my own world — and a guy still walks over to ‘correct’ my form and then asks for my number,” she said.

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After that, Young stopped for groceries on the way home still in her gym clothes, which led to another unsolicited conversation with a man there. “I’m standing in the produce aisle just trying to pick out avocados — and a stranger decides that’s an invitation to comment on my body. I’m not at the gym anymore. I’m buying avocados,” she said. “The outfit is still treated like an invitation, but what I wear has never been the thing that decides how I’m treated.”Young hopes that comments like Gillis’ ― and off-putting comments received while working out ― don’t discourage women from going to the gym, which can be intimidating enough as it is.Research published in PLOS One last year underscored the complicated relationship between women’s body image and their gym experiences, finding that feeling judged or “on display” around men can shape women’s exercise choices or even lead them to avoid the gym altogether.

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Young also brought up the timing of Gillis’ joke; the fact that the monologue aired while the Cornell case was all over the news just made the joke feel even more tactless. “We’re asking to be safe and respected, and the response was a punchline about what we wear,” she said.

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Murphy, the radio host whose comment section was flooded with angry Gillis fans, said she’d never suggest that you can’t make jokes about what women wear to the gym. Of course you can. But she thinks good comedy takes an observation, even one that’s uncomfortable or that people disagree with, and finds a way to make it funny.“Because if the entire punchline is just calling women whores, you haven’t really told me a joke. You’ve just told me what you think about women.”

This article originally appeared on HuffPost.

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After Shane Gillis’ “Joke,” Women Are Sharing How Men Really Act At The Gym