A collage of Dalton Ross .
This article originally appeared on 03.30.16
Dalton Ross wanted to make sure his family didn't miss him too badly while he was studying abroad in London.
To help them cope, the 22-year-old Tennessee native did what any selfless college student would do...
He sent his mom a life-size cutout of himself.
The life-size cutout of Dalton Ross.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
"I thought maybe they'd put it in the living room corner until I got back to remember I exist," he explained about the cutout, which came with a short note: "You're welcome.”
But like any clever mom, Susan Talley couldn't just stash this amazing piece of work away when it arrived about two months ago.
Guess who’s coming to dinner.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
No, no — she had better plans in mind.
Talley decided the cardboard version of her son could be a great companion "while the real one is in Europe." So she brought him along with her to events, like basketball games ...
Can you spot cardboard Dalton in the stands?
Defense! Defense!
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
... trips to the doctor's office ...
Hello doc.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
... and sub sandwich runs.
One meatball sub please.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
Fake Dalton celebrated Valentine's Day with a fellow inanimate object.
The strange and uncomfortable.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
He enjoyed playing with a furry, four-legged friend in the sunshine.
Some complicated fetching.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
And he appreciated a good bedtime story, just like the rest of us.
Reading Dr. Seuss, “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!"
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
The photos of fake Dalton are spreading like wildfire.
Out and about for lunch.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
Without showing her son the photos first, Talley went ahead and uploaded them to Facebook. And after Dalton shared them on Imgur — explaining his mom "seems to be entertaining herself" while he's gone — the story sent the Internet into a buzzy frenzy.
"The attention is crazy," Ross told Upworthy, noting the story has gained so much traction that a restaurant featured in one of the photos, O'Charley's, sent the family a gift card.
"I hope my mom's holding up all right," he said. "It's awesome though.”
Fake Dalton has been hitting the batting cages...
Batter up.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
... taking in some nightlife...
Out on the town.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
... and celebrated Easter with his family.
Easter with the Ross family.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
Although the viral reaction to the photos has been a bit nuts, Ross isn't all that surprised his mom was up for a good laugh.
Out and about.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
"Oh yeah, my mom is very funny," he explained to Upworthy. And it's a good thing, too: Laughter can be a great tool in improving the quality of family dynamics and boosting a loved one's emotional health. (A student studying abroad should especially keep that in mind, considering being away from loved ones and familiarity can be tough.)
"We're a big family of jokesters."
Bravo, mom, for setting the bar very high ahead of April Fools' Day.
Let’s clean it up.
All photos courtesy of Dalton Ross, used with permission.
Men try to read the most disturbing comments women get online back to them.
If you wouldn't say it to their faces, don't type it.
This isn’t comfortable to talk about.
Trigger warning for discussion of sexual assault and violence.
A recent video by Just Not Sports took two prominent female sportswriters and had regular guys* read the awful abuse they receive online aloud.
Sportswriters Sarah Spain and Julie DiCaro sat by as men read some of the most vile tweets they receive on a daily basis. See how long you can last watching it.
*(Note: The men reading them did not write these comments; they're just being helpful volunteers to prove a point.)
It starts out kind of jokey but eventually devolves into messages like this:
Awful.
All images and GIFs from Just Not Sports/YouTube.
These types of messages come in response to one thing: The women were doing their jobs.
Those wishes that DiCaro would die by hockey stick and get raped? Those were the result of her simply reporting on the National Hockey League's most disturbing ordeal: the Patrick Kane rape case, in which one of the league's top players was accused of rape.
DiCaro wasn't writing opinion pieces. She was simply reporting things like what the police said, statements from lawyers, and just general everyday work reporters do. In response, she received a deluge of death threats. Her male colleagues didn't receive nearly the same amount of abuse.
It got to the point where she and her employer thought it best to stay home for a day or two for her own physical safety.
The men in the video seemed absolutely shocked that real live human beings would attack someone simply for doing their jobs.
Not saying it.
All images and GIFs from Just Not Sports/YouTube.
Most found themselves speechless or, at very least, struggling to read the words being presented.
All images and GIFs from Just Not Sports/YouTube.
Think this is all just anecdotal? There's evidence to the contrary.
The Guardian did a study to find out how bad this problem really is.
They did a study of over 70 million comments that have been posted on their site since 2006. They counted how many comments that violated their comment policy were blocked.
The stats were staggering.
From their comprehensive and disturbing article:
If you can’t say it to their face... don’t type it.
All images and GIFs from Just Not Sports/YouTube.
So what can people do about this kind of harassment once they know it exists?
There are no easy answers. But the more people who know this behavior exists, the more people there will be to tell others it's not OK to talk to anyone like that.
Watch the whole video below:
.This article originally appeared on 04.27.16