Agreed. It’s most definitely on the list of women’s fashion that men find an abomination, along with capri pants and those shirts that make your neck look like vaginas (bottom of Fashion tips for women from a guy who knows dick about fashion. ).
But now I’m begging you down on my bended knees
Oh honey, please don’t wear those shoes
You can whip me, beat me, rob me blind
Baby I don’t mind, but please don’t wear those shoes
- Weird Al
I love shoe shopping, it’s a joy. And I HATE clothes shopping. Shoes are pretty universal. You lose weight, you gain weight, you still fit in the same shoes (mostly). It’s a bad hair day but look at those shoes!
I buy 3-4 pairs of shoes a year. I buy them really cheap and don’t expect them to last more than a couple of years. I can’t help it. I love sandals and I love pretty shoes. And I wear them for myself.
Speaking of which is it sandal weather yet???
I think the groundhog ixnayed cute sandal weather for a while. Drag.
I can’t be the only woman here who sometimes dresses with the express aim of wanting men to find her attractive, surely? Not all the time - sometimes I dress for comfort (amd warmth, at the moment!), sometimes to look more professional (actually, my very highest shoes tend to come out when I have difficult meetings to attend - most of the senior managers at my work are 6 foot plus, and being to meet them eye-to-eye makes me feel much more confident), and sometimes to impress my girlfriends - but yes, there are times when I get dressed with the express purpose of wanting to see grown men drool as I sashay past.
And the shoes do help with that - granted, most men don’t notice the shoes themselves, unless they are truely spectacular (I have a particular of red 4" stillettos that I defy ANYONE not to notice) - but they do notice how long they make my legs look, how they give an extra wiggle to my walk, how pert my arse seems…
Also, in summer when I’m in pretty sandals, with tanned feet and painted toenails, I’ve lost count of the number of times that guys have spent considerable time staring at them before announcing, in a surprised tone of voice: “You know, it’s not the kind of thing I normally notice, but you have really pretty feet.”
I used to work with a guy who, at parties, would look a woman slowly up and down, then comment: “Nice shoes!” It always got a laugh and quite often a date.
For my husband, sure. He’s got low standards, though - he picked me after all 
- so it’s not that tough to get him to notice me. I don’t spend an hour figuring out which pair of shoes to wear, either.
He notices my shoes in cold weather. In other words, he gets on me to put on my boots after any sign of ice or snow outside, as I broke my wrist a couple years ago after slipping on the ice in slippery-soled shoes. I don’t have Uggs, I have real boots. (And not in a pattern. Plain, with a tan-gray color that the Zappo’s selection referred to as “Dirt.”)
Oh, and I will not in this lifetime or the next have pretty feet. Size 10s are not pretty. 
Y’know, Gary, if you noticed it once in a while - just because you know she wants you to - she might notice you a little more and do more of that thing you know you like.
Just sayin’.
IM(Male)E, if men are noticing you, then women will think you look slutty, fat, and slobbish. And they’ll hate your shoes too.
…if you want guys to desire you, then yes. How is that different from any goal whatsoever? If I want the Dodgers to start me, I need to hit a 90-mph fastball. If I want to be hired by a company, I need to have what they want. How is it a strange or offensive concept that to bag a guy, you need to strive for his ideal?
In before the “oppression of women” rant.
Sure, but no one has necessarily said that they’re trying to look attractive to guys. They may want to look attractive in general according to whatever standard they’ve decided is attractive.
Yes, I find this curious also. A few men have made comments to me about how women dress and what men do and don’t care about with regard to women’s fashion, and it just seems so self-centered to me, to think that women actually are thinking of men, or the speaker in particular, when they get dressed. Unless a woman is deliberately setting out to attract a man, or men, or I guess other women, this is definitely not the case. When I get dressed in the morning, I never think of whether how I look will please a man. It’s interesting to me that some men think we do consider that and points out yet another glaring difference between how the sexes think.
Do men think that everything women do is for them? Do they think that the first thing on a woman’s mind is how or whether she is attracting a man? Sometimes I think men do think this.
The last time we did this thread, for the record. Apparently it’s still shocking to some men that women don’t dress to please them all the time, every day.
Please. If another woman looks good, great; it doesn’t take anything away from how fabulous I look.
(As I sit here with no shoes, in workout clothes)
I don’t think this is necessarily true; I’ve seen plenty of women running around looking stunning, and I don’t envy them. Instead I take a look at what they’re wearing and think about whether something like it would look good on me. 
Not all women are envious of other women getting male attention. Besides, I’ve bagged my husband; as long as I’m happy with how I look and he isn’t unhappy with how I look, what do I care what other men think? Most of the guys I know have no fashion sense anyway, so I’d much rather get a compliment from one of my girl friends.
Besides, no one else may notice the shoes, but I feel noticeably better when I’m wearing great shoes. (Alas, today is not one of those days, as I had to slog to the train station in waterproof hiking shoes.)
I’m not kidding myself, I explicitly addressed this in the section of my post that you chose not to quote. Of course women sometimes pick out an outfit with the goal of looking sexy to someone else. One part of such an outfit would be the shoes. But I don’t think I’ve ever known a woman who believed that shoes were the best way to attract a man’s attention, or that anything short of the very obvious “sexy” styles of footwear were likely to catch the eye of straight men at all. (I doubt many gay men care that much about women’s shoes either, but there’s at least a stereotype that they do.)
Yeah–it’s kind of like if I started a thread that said something like…“Guys, you don’t have to wear neckties, play WoW, watch football, [insert “manly” behavior”]–we don’t care!" It’s just kind of irritating to think that what we do is about guys. No one assumes that when a guy does something that it’s some kind of mating display ritual–women aren’t constantly “on” for men either.
Post deleted. I should have read the thread first. It’s turning out more contentious than lighthearted (which I didn’t expect) and in that context my post might offend.
Carry on; nobody here but us chickens.
Seriously. 100% on. This is a great example of sexism that may be mild but is pervasive. People scoff, saying it’s not sexism, it’s “just how it is”. No, it’s not, okay?
Ding ding ding. I get so miffed (not angry, just eye rolley) when people suggest that I wear a lot of makeup/ have fake nails/ whatever to impress men. That makes no sense as I am certain that if we did a poll here, most guys would say they think a lot of makeup or fake nails are unattractive. Don’t get me wrong, every so often a guy will refer to my “sexy ass nails” or somesuch, but most guys don’t exactly find my long, glittery nails hot. So, why do I do it? FOR ME. I like them. That’s why.
Sure, it’s nice when a guy finds something I enjoy doing especially attractive, but that’s certainly not why I put eyeliner on each morning.
And, as someone mentioned, sure- sometimes I do dress or do certain things to impress guys, but that’s hardly the norm or what I think when I get dressed for work in the morning.