(May 29 2025, 3:37 PM)ptittle Well, no one forced them.

Woman's high-heel petition receives 100,000-plus signatures A petition started by a woman who was sent home from work for not wearing high heels has been signed by almost 110,000 people in less than 48 hours.

Nicola Thorp, 27, said she reported for work as a receptionist at a PwC office in central London last December wearing flat shoes, but was told she had to have a 2-4in heel. After refusing to buy a pair of heels as directed by a supervisor, she was told to go home without pay, she said.

(May 30 2025, 10:29 AM)Izanami Unless it's a running shoe, it's hard to find a women's shoe that doesn't have some kind of heel on it even today. Women in general just have a pain tolerance for bad shoes and it's really sad. Reminds me of #kutoo in Japan where women posted how messed up their feet were from wearing heels to work. (Heels are mandatory for most office jobs and not wearing them to interviews hurts your chance of getting hired.)

(May 30 2025, 10:54 AM)Clover

(May 29 2025, 3:37 PM)ptittle Well, no one forced them.

?????? What?

Are we just going to ignore overarching coercive societal expectations and pressure for women to wear heels in order to look "professional" in many industries, especially white collar office jobs, especially in the past?

And not even that, literally they were "forced to" by some jobs, as recent as 2016:

Woman's high-heel petition receives 100,000-plus signatures A petition started by a woman who was sent home from work for not wearing high heels has been signed by almost 110,000 people in less than 48 hours.

Nicola Thorp, 27, said she reported for work as a receptionist at a PwC office in central London last December wearing flat shoes, but was told she had to have a 2-4in heel. After refusing to buy a pair of heels as directed by a supervisor, she was told to go home without pay, she said.

From https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/12/nicola-thorp-high-heel-petition-receives-100000-plus-signatures

Found via High Heels, Female Pilots And The Uniforms Of Our Jobs from Fairygodboss: https://fairygodboss.com/career-topics/high-heels-female-pilots-and-the-uniforms-of-our-jobs

And what @Izanami points out—many women's shoes have a built in heel just be-fucking-cause. It's bullshit. Even goddamn BIRKENSTOCKS now sell "women's shoes" that have a fucking heel. A fucking shoe brand created for orthopedic health reasons now sells fucking heeled shoes for women.