Work colleagues found photos from when I used to do pole fitness and are mocking me

Can you get the person who typed your first response to help you again?

You know, the person who helped you count to 7 in that little list?

This advice from @largeteamilknosugar is really terrible advice. I wouldn’t be encouraging it. Great advice if this was a friend or someone from your personal life but awful in a professional setting or outside of internetland.

Well, I am curious to know in what way I'm "transparent" - care to elaborate?

Genuine, not faux, confusion....

I agree with this. It’s the equivalent of someone coming back from holidays and a colleague searching up their social media for swimwear photos and passing them round the office. That’s the line I’d take: ‘Laura, I was really stunned that you decided to search out pictures of me in my fitness class from six years ago to share around and invite comment. I can only presume you did it to embarrass me. How would you feel if Brian and Kenny did the same with your holiday pictures, and circulated them to invite comments and laughs? It’s completely inappropriate to stalk me online, and to create a situation that has invited people to make sexual comments. In fact, it’s harassment, and puts me in the difficult situation of having to report it to HR due to unwanted remarks of a sexual nature.’

I'm not sure why you'd think I was trying to upset you?

Its not a sport that I have any interest in, as I dont enjoy gymnastics or dance type sports generally, but I dont really see it as any different to other sports of that type.

The below image, for example, looks a lot more like athleticism than it does titilation, to me.

Olympic sport for stripper dancing was really funny though so thanks for that
It successfully completed the (then) first major step towards Olympics inclusion, by having its governing body (The International Pole Sports Federation) obtain GAISF "observer status" back in 2017.

Unfortunately, it fell victim to GAISF being dissolved and replaced by SportAccord (the new umbrella organization for international sports federations) which meant that all in-progress applications have had to be started over.

Oh dear… OP I’m going to split my response in a few parts

As your manager(public):

• you should report to me or HR if you think you’ve been harassed in any way. All reports will be taken seriously and investigated.

• OMG why did you share this with coworkers. What else are you sharing and with whom?
• Oh FFS… this is absolutely ridiculous.

• Your coworkers are not your friends. You may be friendly with them but there is gulf of difference between ’work friends’ and your friends from school or in your private life.
• Your professional persona is important. Grow it, cultivate it, protect it.
• This will follow you either way at your current workplace. Is your pole dancing what you want be known for professionally? There is a huge difference between being proud of something personally than professionally.
• You opened this door. It doesn’t matter if it was at drinks or in a training room for your annual training on something stupid. If a coworker is present you need to have the work filter engaged.
• Work is generally not the place you want to conquer all the social injustices of the last 100 years. Don’t not stand up for your self where it matters. But is pole dancing your hill to die on?

To cut it really short… do what you want in your private life. But just as you wouldn’t wander in to work in your jammie’s while picking your nose you need to understand how to edit your life so that you are first and always known for your work and not the things you do in your private life.

Okay.

#1 - yes, many people engage in bullying from time to time but sensible people at least know better than to do it in the workplace (particularly where also engaging in sexual harrassment). Even if the OP had been an actual, literal stripper, her colleagues' behavior would still be incredibly inappropriate.

#2 - I'm not the OP so I cannot tell you why she chose pole fitness, but it has been a fairly mainstream form of fitness for at least a couple of decades now, has gained recognition as a sport and it'd be very unsurprising to see it become an Olympic sport within the next decade.

#3 & 4 - It is undeniable that pole fitness/sports still carries a stigma and, yes, you cannot control people's views (even if their views are quite ingorant).

#6 - Pole fitness is a popular form of fitness and now a competitive sport (world championships and a), in which many women (and men) engage without stripping (well, they're similarly dressed to other types of gymnast). What do you even mean by "there's no half way" or "own it or don't"? Its obviously demonstrably untrue that all pole fitness/sports enthusiasts are strippers.

The OP could be perfectly fine with friends, family or coworkers seeing pictures of her, but be upset with them passing photos around and making demeaning comments about them in the workplace. The OP is clearly not embarrassed in having participated in pole fitness, she's upset by the shitty behavior of her coworkers, which she has every right to be. I'd be upset if my coworkers were making shitty comments about me, too, regardless of whether I felt them fair or not.

Hahahaha! Projection is a real and genuine thing.

Really mumsnet??

Because pole fit isn't the same as being a stripper? It's really no different from doing a sport. It's a great way to keep fit. Why should OP need to keep it a secret?

Also OP, screw them. Just smile along and say 'yesh, that's me, don't I look cool, I was so fit during that time' or etc

No I’m not outraged.

I think much of what you have articulated is why I was finding op’s distress a bit of a mis-match with the telling people about it and, in fact, doing it in the first place.

Its fine for people to pole dance if that’s their thing; but why do things that you can’t handle the implications of?

Well I’d swim in a one piece and I’m not sure I’d be that bothered by a photo.

Your colleagues are misogynistic arseholes. Tell them to pack it in or you’ll go to HR.

💯

It’s literally bullying.

Remember this public bullying, humiliation, sexual harassment, all happened during luchtime at work.

This is 100% a HR matter.

I dont think its that hard...

If you were previously involved in a swimming club, would you welcome having one of your coworkers trawl the internet to find pictures of you in a bikini and then pass it around the office? What if they suggested you did client meetings in your bikini, to "help the business"?

The comparison breaks at the point one suggested that the OP is/was a stripper, but even before that point, it is clearly not appropriate workplace behavior.

I’m struggling a bit with this too.

On the one hand you say it was a great fitness activity, on the other you feel humiliated they have followed up on the fact you said you did it.

If you think the outfits and dancing are fine ( and I’m not suggesting there is any reason not to) why is it all so upsetting?

No conversation between work colleagues is "outside of work".

It is bullying. What would you like to happen?