Maddie Gardner was four when she first entered a cheering competition. She was too young to be on her sister Cassie’s team, which her mom coached, so she went to a small regional event in her home state of North Carolina to compete individually.
Maddie seemed to win over the judges with her lazy “r,” which came out when she pronounced one of her team colors: Puuuple.
It was an endearing instance that might have gone viral had this not been the late 1990s. Those moments would come later. Maddie was in middle school when her coach told her team about a site called YouTube, where they could access their routines, as well as those of their competitors.
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But there was more: A comment section where anyone could say whatever they wanted about what he or she was watching.
“That just sort of evolved throughout my time as an athlete in the sport to Twitter, to Facebook where, yes it opened the door for us to become better but we were also exposed to some of the negative sides of social media,” says Gardner, now 30 and a television personality.