Shoes for Women - why is their pressure to wear uncomfortble footwear to 'fit in'?

[TwoCotbeds]

When buying shoes, I am remindeed of the old chinese culture on foot-binding. Why is it one gender ( men) can buy shoe which are smart for work AND can also walk all day, round town in comfort, or over grass, say.... but Women have the only Option of 'smart' shoes for work that go with a suit,and look professional or shoes that they can easily wear in comfort all day - but not both ?

I think this has got worse recently with the fashion for very, very high shoes which actually damage the foot.

I always think to myself, a womans and a mans foot is structurally the same. They are not different shapes, like torsos are. Of course I like to look feminine not male, but I also like to walk as much as I like.

I was also told by a chiropodist that the only reason court shoes ( ones with no strap) ever actually stay on, not fall off is because they are actually too small !

causes knee pain too

I find that about 90% of shoes in most ladies shoe shops are just unwearable. I don't wear heels and can't wear flats. I have quite large feet with very high arches, which need support. I hate wearing heel (I'm tall enough anyway and just can't get any speed or grip in heels) and court type shoes are agony because my feet try and scrunch up to stop them falling off.

When I was younger I'd ask the nurses (used to work in a hospital) where they bought their shoes, and I still think of my shoes as nurses shoes. I favour Mary Jane type shoes for work (1-2 cm heel, support around the arch, and not too frumpy), as they look neat with both a skirt and with trousers, and when I find a pair that are comfortable I wear them into the ground. Otherwise I mostly wear walking boots, which I am glad to say look almost the same in male and female fittings. I find summer the most difficult, because most sandals however much I think they fit in the shop give me blisters or sores within a few hours.

Oh, and we bought skiing gear a few days ago and my son (and to a less extent dd) is very pronated - basically he is pretty much knock kneed. The fitting guy said that insoles might help his posture (and his skiing technique) so maybe mens shoes don't offer the right support either (he was wearing basketball trainers at the time).

I find high heeled fashion shoes to be a highly repressive cultural norm.

We express horror at Chinese footbinding but how different are we really now? It is depressing.

I was always amazed at old mens feet (past job) and how it was only the men in the army that had deformed toes (army boots are really not good footwear) and the rest of the old men had regularl basic good feet. Whereas woman in their 70's and 80';s had deformed monster toes with a second toe resting on top of the middle and fouth toes or hugh bunions with the big toe forced across the second and third causing pain underneith

pick shoes that are comfortable not a name that suits others as feet are different shpes and fot different makes

I agree with all the non heel wearers. I don't even own any high heels. Why put yourself through the pain?

I recently bought three pairs of boots. I bought the first pair - knee high, heel no more than one cm, like on the average man's shoe, and they were far and away the most comfortable footwear I have ever worn, no exaggeration. After walking around in them (and I do a LOT of walking) for a week or so, I went back to the shop and bought another 2 pairs exactly the same. Having found something so comfortable, I intend to stay comfortable for a long time! (I would have bought more, but I need to pay the bills for the rest of the month...)

Sh!t, well I learned some stuff from this thread thanks. I have knee and hip pain because i'm pretty knock knee'd. I need to find some mary janes.

if you are knock kneed, you might want referral to a podiatrist (can self refer in my area, on the NHS)

They will probably tell you it is extremely important that you wear insoles, not just for your feet, for your knees, spine etc. And the NHS insoles won't fit in any mary janes I've tried.

Ivy that's very interesting about elderly men's and women's feet, and army boots being crap.

Haven't read the whole thread, but could we start a campaign for men's shoes to be made in smaller sizes? I for one, would always buy men's shoes if they made them in my size. As it is I usually wear trainers.

This was a topic that came up with my very first feminist lecturer over 15 years ago. She was insistent that high heels were a technique by misogyny to control women. Both sexually and physically.

Sexually, as already mentioned - pleasing men etc. Physically because they limit how a woman can defend themselves. They cannot balance properly should they be attacked and certainly cannot run away should they be need to. They are dangerous in many ways.

maybe that is why they are called

CFM (come fuck me) shoes

and fuck me boots

you can't run away

When I go out or to interviews I wear heels. Nice, well-made heels with solid heel.

I love being as tall as the men. I really can't subscribe to this idea we have to wear comfortable flats at all times.

It is quite a serious point that they limit the way in which you can defend yourself. Men are generally physically stronger already, so as you say unwind, it is a pretty strange and dangerous position we put ourselves in by wearing these heels.

Subscribe to the sexual stereotype, but at the same time make yourself unable to defend yourself effectively from sexual advances.

But there are so many bits of hypocrisy and also disempowerment of women in the statements above, it just gets very complicated.

Marsha, wear what you feel good in. I don't think anyone is saying what 'we have' to wear - just that a lot of people don't want to wear heels ever and get fed up of the pressure to wear them. It doesn't mean that people who are wearing heels should feel ashamed (a word someone used further down the thread, I don't mean you do) or disapproved of by other feminists.

In a practical sense I really don't feel vulnerable in an interview situation and I sure don't walk around at night in heels alone.

Generally it is far too restrictive for me that I must not wear a certain type of shoe because of the affect it has on others, or because of some one else's possible aggression.

X posts Seth. Yes I don't think anyone should wear heels too, no way.

I subscribe to the view that we make choices in a context and it is good to be aware of the context but ultimately only you know how the choices pan out from where you are so only you can make those choices. In an interview the extra height becomes more of an important factor (and I wouldn't be surprised if it actually did have an effect on you getting the job - I know there is evidence that tall candidates are preferred above short ones, all other things being equal) and as you say you're probably not going to have to run away from the interviewer....

No, really I feel more powerful. I walk into the interview room and the man stands up to shake my hand and sometimes, wow I am taller! I look at him at eye level. I feel good and confident.

They look impressed.

My primal level can't be that disconnected from my conscious or sub-conscious. I would feel some sort of discombobulation.

I feel more vulnerable in the street in heels.

Not in interviews. What about the fact that at a primal level the bigger animal always wins? And I know that.

Have read this thread with interest.

Started getting major heel/ball of feet pain about 18 months ago and eventually saw a podiatrist (self-referred NHS). Apparently my feet pronate, and I was given orthopaedic insoles which made an instant improvement.

Trial and error led me to wear DD's clumpy Timberland boots throughout last winter and fake Birkies all summer. Have had a disastrous start to this winter in my quest to find something remotely fashionable but have settled on these after many depressing hours hunting for the non-existent.

Hate the stripper shoe/ballet pump fashion and just know that there will be another generation keeping the podiatrists busy.

As an earlier poster said, 3 inches is no longer regarded as high, and 'mid' heels are rare as hens teeth.

A moot point for me, mine are languishing in the back of the wardrobe. A couple of hours wear on a night out means 2-3 days of pain afterwards

I have become my mother, I look at beautiful shoes and just think 'ooh, those soles are not good'

It's all an illusion. Even with flats a man is likely to be stronger and could still be likely catch you.

It is a liberal position, I am playing the game, not radical. But I can't accept it is always unfeminist. Because I see my increase in power as outweighing my handicapped position due to context. --- the interview.