I’m putting this in CS on the assumption that this is the forum for clothing/fashion discussions. Mods, move if you think appropriate.
Men’s shoes (except for sandals and such): Solid. Clunky. Usually laced. Eminently practical. Cover and protect the whole foot. Replaceable sole.
Women’s shoes (except for athletic shoes and such): Pretty. Light. Usually unlaced. Rarely cover so much of the foot as men’s do. Often incorporate some really impractical feature like high heels. Often cost more than men’s shoes even when they use less material.
I think you’ll find the answer ultimately boils down to one thing: profit. Shoe makers are in the business to sell shoes and make money. The best way to do that is what we currently have.
Men are more practical-minded and don’t like to overspend on a showy shoe. Women like to show off their pretty pedicured feet and high heels make their butts stick out nicely. And sometimes the shoes help them find a desirable or wealthy mate, which can also help them afford more shoes.
Let’s try an experiment. Imagine a man who is dressed up. He may be on TV (as a news anchor or talk show guest or game show contestant), he may be on his way to an office job or to church, but for whatever reason, he’s dressed up. What is he wearing?
Now imagine a woman who is dressed up. What is she wearing?
I’m guessing that, if we could compare answers, there’d be a lot more variety in what we imagined the women wearing than in what we imagined the men wearing. The men would pretty much all be in a suit and tie, and they wouldn’t look all that much different from each other, or from what they looked like yesterday or the day before, or from what they would have been wearing five or fifteen or fifty years ago.
The women, on the other hand, would display a lot more variety, in colors, styles, how practical their outfits were, how much skin they were showing, etc.
The shoe thing just parallels the rest of the outfit. I know, I haven’t answered the question, just expanded it. But many of the distinctions you drew between men’s and women’s shoes would apply to the rest of their clothing as well.
Because women are much less likely than men to own a pair of shoes that they wear for most (if not all) occasions.
I have a theory about why some women enjoy shoe shopping so much. You get the same fun you do from clothes shopping, but there’s an important difference- shoe sizes don’t tend to change if you gain weight. It’s much less fun to shop for clothes if you have to do it because you’ve gained weight- the bad feeling about gaining weight cancels out the joy of clothes shopping. But no matter how much weight you gain, your shoe size will stay the same, and you can have fun shopping for shoes.
I know plenty of guys who have a thing for women’s feet, but I gotta say I know of no women who get the same kind of kick out of men’s feet. I’m sure a foot fetishist is behind many of women’s shoe fashions.
Men worry less about fashion and more about function in most clothing issues. Men’s shoes reflect that fact, which is why they don’t have high heels, don’t have pinched toes, and provide plenty of arch support in styles intended to be worn while on your feet for 8 hours in a day.
As someone already pointed out, heels make a woman’s posterior do nice things when walking. They also elongate the leg and make the calf and thigh look nice. Further, they give a woman added hight, which helps socially. For these benefits, women’s feet end up looking like a battle zone by age 40.
However, one point I would like to clarify: women’s shoes are, in general, LESS expensive than men’s shoes. Most women’s shoes, even in a good department store, fall in the $29 to $59 price range, only top shelf shoes will go for over $100 (outside of fashion islands like NYC, that is), whereas a good men’s oxford dress shoe will set you back $99, and even boat shoes will cost you over $50 most places (that is, most places that sell good quality shoes).
This isn’t quite true. I lost and then regained 80lbs in the last five years, and my shoe size went up and down basically a full size in the process. But my pants went up and down 3 sizes, so it’s quite a lot closer to being true.
Stillettos are sometimes called ‘limousine shoes’ or ‘taxi shoes’ because the woman in them obviously can’t walk far and won’t be doing much work while wearing them. I’d like to believe that the whole ‘men are judged by what they do, women by how they look’ thing has changed, but… no.
