Okay, you know you watch too much TV when you turn on The Tyra Banks Show and actually watch for a few minutes.
Recently, Tyra’s show included a discussion about women who will do anything for fashion. I only stuck around for two such women – the first had hammer toes and had surgery to shorten and straighten the second toe on each foot (only one had been done at the time). Uh, gross and ouch. But almost understandable. ALMOST – most everyone I know has funny looking feet, so why stress?
The second woman, though, kind of disturbed me. Her complaint was that she wore high heels every day at work – 8-9 hours on her feet, and it was getting to the point she was in so much pain she (gasp) couldn’t go out at night in even higher heels! Oh noes! She also complained that it was affecting her knees and lower back, and whinged about having to resort to wearing sneakers, and sometimes even flats, to work.
This was unacceptable. She wanted her heels, dang it all! So what did she do? She went to the doctor and had collagen injected into the balls of her feet. No more pain, yays. Now she can wear her heels all day and have no problems. Really? Collagen miraculously removes the side effects of bad knees and bad back?
When asked why he performs these surgeries, the doctor replied (paraphrase), “I’m liberating women. I’m giving them the chance to wear what they want, what fashion calls for.” Here Tyra confessed to hating heels and thinking they were very unnatural…but that she couldn’t stop wearing them. Yeah. Liberty and freedom for all feet.
Okay, now. Whatever. People can do what they want…but it really makes no sense to me that this woman found it more acceptable to inject collagen into her foot than to simply wear shoes with a smaller heel. There are plenty of cute shoes that have heels shorter than 3.5 inches. I should hope women would only be willing slaves of fashion if it didn’t damage them in some way.
Apparently that’s not always true. Why do we do this to ourselves?
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I’ve never worn heels much, but I’ve twisted both of my ankles so many times that heels aren’t even an option anymore. I can take a dive while barefoot (I swear I can trip on my shadow), so I’m not strapping on 3″+ heels to make it even easier.
I stick to flats and shoes with a max 1″ heel. Heels may “look pretty” but I’d much rather be comfortable. Even without wearing heels I have plantar fascistis that can cause a lot of pain. I can’t imagine purposely wearing shoes that would make it worse.
Nialla(Quote) (Reply)
I never understood why tall women (and I assume they were all reasonably tall to get on the show in the first place) have a compulsion to wear heels all the time. I’m 170 – the tall side of average – and I usually wear flats or wedge heels, stilettoes only when I know I’m mostly going to be sitting down. That means I’m tall enough that when I go clubbing in pants and closed shoes, I can wear flats, and when the shoe companies of the world think to make nice, going-out sandals in flats, I’ll wear them clubbing, too :p
Muscle tension tends to be the body’s way of telling you ‘hey! a little break here!’. What kind of person is so vain, so fashion-obsessed, that they ignore the body’s signs like that?
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
I hardly ever wear heels, and maybe it’s this that’s keeping me from understanding how a person thinks it’s the best solution to have some kind of cosmetic surgery just so she can wear them. Because, to me, the best solution is simply not wearing them.
Any back or knee problems I have now or in the future are not going to be because I wanted to look cute in shoes. Y’know?
sbg(Quote) (Reply)
Heh. But she didn’t ignore the signs! She fixed everything with collagen.
I wonder how she’s going to feel in 20-30 years, physically, I mean. Yeesh.
sbg(Quote) (Reply)
I don’t actually think heels DO look pretty. I think small heels can – for men as well as women. Plus, I find a little bit of heel – no more than an inch – better for my arch than totally flat soles.
My max is something like 1.5 or 2 inches, and that’s only if the shoe is so well-constructed that it’s perfectly comfortable despite the heel. All but two pairs I own right now are about in that inch-maximum category.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
I just don’t get it. There are exceedingly cute shoes out there with lower heels. Surely you can satisfy all your fashion desires without contorting your feet?
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
The only reason why it would make sense to me for someone to go to that length to wear heels would be if she were very short and liked to look a little taller. Otherwise, it does seem ridiculous.
To be honest, I’ve never understood the obsession with heels anyway, particularly the weird but apparently common fetish that an otherwise underclothed woman looks better in high heels – or any sort of really conspicuous boot (wearing something like that when not fully clothed just strikes me as unnatural-looking).
Glaivester(Quote) (Reply)
And even that is a poor reason for unecessary surgery, IMO.
The best explanation I’ve heard is that high heels supposedly make a woman’s legs look longer or better or something. To me, that’s not true, so I remain mystified by the whole thing.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
After Babe–the scene where the pig ‘sneaks’ across the wood floor–whenever I see wpmen in high heels, I imagine pig legs. I can’t help it. Heels make one walk in that same ‘Babe sneaking’ tippy-toe mince.
baskerville(Quote) (Reply)
I have no idea what difference a heel makes on me, though I have had people…okay, guys…tell me I should wear them more often because it accentuates my big calf muscles.
I tell them to tell that to my aching feet, and that my calf muscles are just fine when they’re not all knotted up.
sbg(Quote) (Reply)
I agree. I know I ranted about this insane insistence that every short woman looks so much better when she’s trying to make herself look less short once before, so I’ll refrain now.
I do remember once wearing my really quite cute 3 inch heels (this was years ago, before I came to my senses) to a meeting in someone’s office. Lots of people in there, few chairs. I had to stand. Halfway through, I slipped out of the shoes because, well, they were killing me.
And my boss saw me lose 3 inches instantly and exclaimed very loudly at finally seeing my actual height.
sbg(Quote) (Reply)
LOL. Sorry, I have nothing of worth to say except…LOL!
Baa Ram Ewe.
sbg(Quote) (Reply)
I think there’s a bit of a class issue that comes into play with high heels, too. If you’re wearing impractical clothing of any sort – heels, some kinds of skirts, starched white shirts, expensive suits – you’re making a visual statement about the amount of physical labor you won’t be doing in that outfit. So while I think the signal that most people will consciously perceive from a woman in heels is something like “she wears heels to be pretty” or “heels make her legs sexier”, there’s also at least a smidgeon of “she’s not been in a field all day in those” or “no way would she wear shoes like that while bricklaying” (to choose two random examples of physical-labor-intensive jobs – no disrespect to farming or bricklaying intended!).
Why would anyone put up with the discomfort of heels? Fashion, yes, but also a different kind of social status, I think.
Revena(Quote) (Reply)
There’s some interesting analysis and thought provoking discussion to be had here, but I’m gonna focus on the part of this post that really grabbed me, instead.
Holy crap! I had some minor surgery performed on my feet this summer – parts of both big toenails removed, to correct a persistent ingrown nail problem (because I have naturally splayed feet, for the curious. I’ve compensated all my life by wearing shoes with wide toe-boxes, and sandals for as many months of the year as I can stand, but biology finally caught up with me this year) – and it was the most painful thing I’ve ever experienced.
That’s saying something. I’ve been hit in the face with a board with enough force to split the tissue of my brow down to the skull. I’ve had fourteen teeth removed (not all of them permanent, I hasten to add!). I know pain. The only thing even close to the pain of the surgery was the pain of the ingrown nails themselves, which is why I had it done.
But I can’t even imagine letting someone stick needles in my feet again, except in direst, direst emergency. Like, I dunno, to prevent amputation or something.
Voluntary collagen injections?
I think I’m gonna have nightmares tonight!
Revena(Quote) (Reply)
Oh, that’s a fascinating point!
I’ve heard similar remarks about long nails. Whether on modern women or ancient Chinese Emperors, long nails suggested these hands weren’t doing any hard work.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
I’ve also had foot surgery for the same thing, and the idea of getting unnecessary foot surgery boggles my mind.
I know there are men out there who have a fetishitic interest in women wearing heels, but I’ve never understood it.
Patrick(Quote) (Reply)
I’ve had an even more miserable foot surgery, too – for a bunion. They break the bones, shave off the calcium growth, and then it’s a year before you can get fully back to your exercise routine, and if your metabolism is like mine, you put on 20 pounds. Willingly subjecting myself to any kind of foot surgery… no.
But there’s a reason I’m bringing up this woeful tale.
Contrary to popular theory, bunions don’t come from wearing bad shoes, which I’ve never done: it’s a genetic condition that can be exacerbated by shoes, but can also develop no matter how you treat your feet. But my podiatrist did inform me of something very interesting: that all women’s shoes, even sneakers, are cut on a different bias than men’s – one that exacerbates one’s genetic tendency to form bunions. If we all wore men’s shoes – which I can’t, because my feet are too small – the incidence of bunions would be significantly reduced. And there is no reason cute feminine-looking shoes can’t be cut along the same bias as men’s. So why on earth would they do this? And why don’t they change?
Hmm. Same reason Japan bound little girls’ feet? Men’s shoes are designed for what their feet are. Women’s shoes are designed for what women’s feet should be, according to someone.
Everything in fashion is about men being, and women becoming.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
Supposedly, high heels change a woman’s posture, pushing her chest out more and arching her back and accentuating the buttocks, which is supposed to be a subliminal mating signal.
Nialla(Quote) (Reply)
Just a note: foot binding was practiced by the Chinese, not the Japanese. IIRC, Japanese women traditionally wore sandals that were pretty much identical to men’s sandals.
Patrick(Quote) (Reply)
In all fairness – a couple of dresses I’ve got I’ve had a hell of a time finding heels with less then 4″ heels on that work with the dress – I think shorter, wedgier heels tend to work with ‘cute’ outfits, but not ‘sexy’ or ‘professional’ outfits.
Of course, if someone were to DESIGN a 2″ heel for ‘sexy’ and ‘professional’ outfits, I’d be buying them by the armful – and so would a lot of women, I think. I really think a lot of this obsession with heels is that the kind of shoe you want – sexy or profssional looking – is only available in 4″ stiletto.
Mind you, Perth is an odd city like that. We have no middle ground between ‘Steve Irwin’ and ‘Nicole Kidman’. My goal is to check out the availability of shoes in Sydney. Or better yet, Paris ;p
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
haha, you do make a point there – I do a lot of work with my hands (you’d be pushing to call it ‘hard labour’ but nightfill is still ‘phsyical labour’) as well as working in a warehouse in the summer – I see no point in taking care of my nails, they’re only going to get wrecked.
Maybe that attitude permeates my semi-indifference to wear heels; yeah, I know what it’s like to stand for eight hours in the things.
Funnily enough, when I got temporarily transformed to the admin part of the warehouse and, after a few days, started wearing dresses and heels, all the women commented about how nice I looked. I was very tempted to retorted ‘yeah, I can afford to look pretty, I don’t have to walk up and down a converyervelt all day in heels and a skirt’ :p
scarlett(Quote) (Reply)
*bangs head*
That’s what I get for posting while doing two other things. Thanks for the correction.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
There’s no better availability of shoes. I wanted to get some knee-boots this year, but they’re all 3-inch heels or more.
The thing is, they COULD make short-heeled shoes that are very fashionable. Right now I’m actually wearing a very feminine, very flattering pair of sandals with a delicate little inch-heel – I never thought the heel would be stable enough, but when I tried them on, I found out I can actually jog a bit in these things! So it is absolutely possible to have style and comfort.
But an awful lot of short-heeled shoes are rather masculine-looking (according to fashion standards). The implication is pretty clear: if you refuse to wear high-heels, you must be butch.
Of course, the whole idea that fashion conveys sexual interest or orientation is pretty wacked, but that could become a topic unto itself.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
Pst! Check out the boots at J. Jill!
Revena(Quote) (Reply)
Guys like big calf muscles?
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
Hammer toes aren’t just a matter of funny-looking feet unless you wear nothing but sandals – that work around the toe – all day. I know. I have one. The top of the bend bumps up against the fabric in my trainers unless I go out of the way to stretch the shoebox, which makes the rest of my feet loose in the shoe. I went out of my way to acquire shoe trees so my shoes would accomodate the hammer toe.
I went in for bunion surgery because the bunion hurt when I walked on it and threw off my stride so I didn’t walk nearly as far and as fast and as long. The hammer toe was a little bent when the bunioned toe came out of the bandages. So that surgery actually makes sense, though I won’t do it now because big shoes and heavy socks are easier than the crippling aftermath of foot surgery.
Pat Mathews(Quote) (Reply)
Oh, those are nice!
And if they go on sale for about an eighth of those prices, I might be interested!
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
Yeah, women have a definite reward/punish system for letting you know if you’re dressing femininely enough or not.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
They do run sales on their shoes, periodically, so it’s worth checking back every now and then.
I got a pair of their boots last year for my birthday, and wore them nonstop all winter, and they still look fantastic. J. Jill usually has very good quality stuff, which makes the prices a little easier to cope with.
Revena(Quote) (Reply)
That’s very true. Hammer toes are actually a flaw, and they can cause misery, and surgery can be the better alternative – it all depends how much you’re suffering without the surgery.
But the collagen injections for the purpose of wearing heels? I’m not seeing the logic.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
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