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Anytime Fitness Wisconsin Gym Posts ‘I Can’t Breathe’ Workout Challenge—Owner Apologizes

<p class&equals;"p1">Sigh…An Anytime Fitness <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;dev&period;theshaderoom&period;com&sol;white-man-accused-of-racially-profiling-black-male-entrepreneurs-at-the-gym-loses-office-lease-after-viral-video&sol;"><strong>gym<&sol;strong><&sol;a> at a Wisconsin location is receiving a lot of backlash for posting an &OpenCurlyQuote;I can’t breathe’ workout challenge for its members&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p class&equals;"p1">The image&comma; which lays out the workout including burpees and rows&comma; shows a drawing of a man colored in with black sharpie kneeling—with the words &OpenCurlyQuote;I can’t breathe’ at the top of the white board&comma; and &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Don’t you dare lay down” at the bottom&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p class&equals;"p1">Jen Dunnington&comma; co-owner of the said Wauwatosa&comma; WI location&comma; says that her employee created the workout to &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;honor” George Floyd&comma; according to TMZ&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p class&equals;"p1">Apparently the workout was supposed to be &&num;8220&semi;a workout so hard that we felt what he felt”&period;<span class&equals;"Apple-converted-space">  <&sol;span>Dunnington &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;deeply apologize&lpar;s&rpar;” for this adding&comma; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;I was not aware of the signage that it was posted in that way…I didn&&num;8217&semi;t read it in that way&comma; but I do definitely apologize that those words were on there&period;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p class&equals;"p1">In addition&comma; Dunnington adds that the words &OpenCurlyQuote;I can’t breathe’ were supposed to be for motivation—seemingly comparing it to the protestors chanting those words as they march&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p class&equals;"p1">When it comes to the &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;lay down” line&comma; Dunnington added that she &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;apologize&lpar;s&rpar; that it said that&comma; the line on there should not have been on there&comma;” TMZ reports&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Spokespeople for Anytime Fitness aren&&num;8217&semi;t here for this and they&&num;8217&semi;re coming for their Wauwatosa&comma; WI location for the insensitive &&num;8216&semi;I can&&num;8217&semi;t breathe&&num;8217&semi; workout&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;No matter the intent&comma; we absolutely do not condone the words&comma; illustrations or actions this represents&comma;&&num;8221&semi; Anytime Fitness said in a statement Wednesday&period; &&num;8220&semi;To our employees&comma; owners and members&comma; we are truly and profoundly sorry that this incident occurred&period;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&&num;8220&semi;One of our publicly-stated commitments to antiracism work is to bolster education efforts for our franchise owners to lead with empathy&comma; love and respect&period; This incident makes it clear that we have work to do in this space&semi; immediately&comma; we are sharing this incident with our franchise owners worldwide as an example of what not to do&comma; why it is offensive&comma; and what locations should be doing instead&period;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>They continued&comma; &&num;8220&semi;We remain committed to working to inform and educate employees and owners worldwide to stand for our black communities including our members and employees&period;&&num;8221&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Prior to this incident&comma; Anytime Fitness made this post on Instagram in support of the Black Lives Matter movement&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<blockquote class&equals;"instagram-media" data-instgrm-permalink&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;instagram&period;com&sol;p&sol;CA6f5vconku&sol;&quest;utm&lowbar;source&equals;ig&lowbar;embed&&num;038&semi;utm&lowbar;campaign&equals;loading" data-instgrm-version&equals;"14" style&equals;" background&colon;&num;FFF&semi; max-width&colon;658px&semi; min-width&colon;326px&semi; padding&colon;0&semi; width&colon;99&period;375&percnt;&semi; width&colon;-webkit-calc&lpar;100&percnt; - 2px&rpar;&semi; width&colon;calc&lpar;100&percnt; - 2px&rpar;&semi;"><div>&NewLine; <iframe class&equals;"custom-ig-embed" data-src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;instagram&period;com&sol;p&sol;CA6f5vconku&sol;embed&sol;captioned" allowtransparency&equals;"true" allowfullscreen&equals;"true" frameborder&equals;"0" height&equals;"640px" scrolling&equals;"no" style&equals;"background&colon;&num;FFF&semi; 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