One blind man has opened up about his experience of being asked to leave the gym after a woman accused him of staring at her.
Toby Addison, a footballer who was born with sight, began to dramatically lose his vision around the age of 11. By the time he reached his early teens, he was down to just 20 per cent of his sight.
Now the 21-year-old has around four per cent of his sight remaining, which has led to him arriving into some awkward situations.
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Speaking to the Happy Hour Podcast, Toby explained how when he was 17 he visited a new gym for the first time but was approached by a furious woman who accused him of staring at her.
The now 21-year-old attempted to make it clear that he was blind but the lady did not believe him before she called him a creep and asked the staff to remove him.
Toby said, as quoted by the Daily Star: “I don’t really know where I am looking a lot of the time unless I am talking to someone like I know that I’m talking to you so I am trying to look in your direction.
“So I was just staring straight ahead and unfortunately there was a woman doing some exercises. I don’t know what she was doing, whether it was some squats or whatever, where you may be in a more vulnerable position maybe and don’t want to be stared at.
"She came over to me, and I didn't know she was talking to me at first because I’m not doing anything wrong. I’m just doing my thing.
“She said something along the lines of ‘Why do you keep staring at me? Stop. Don’t be so creepy.’ I was like ‘Oh no sorry, I’m blind’. I had my cane with me, it was folded up in my lap but she wasn’t having any of it”.
He added that there is now a culture of catching creeps at the gym in the act of staring at people and recording their workouts. He suspects that the woman may have thought his cane was a prop as part of a disguise.
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