Allison Stokke is a young, athletic, beautiful pole vaulter who's had her pictures spread virally around the Internet for a few weeks now. The Washington Post finally went to look her up last week, and it turns out (surprise, surprise, leering message board frequenters) that there's an actual person behind those photos. And that person doesn't exactly appreciate being stared at, even virtually. From the piece: "Even if none of it is illegal, it just all feels really demeaning," Allison Stokke said. "I worked so hard for pole vaulting and all this other stuff, and it's almost like that doesn't matter. Nobody sees that. Nobody really sees me." Actually, millions of people have seen her. But only now are a few of them starting to realize the attention was unwanted. Fascinating.

---

Posted on Tuesday, June 5th, 2007 at 3:05 pm. Filed under miniblog.