"campus boots"

[dressboots]

Remember "Frye boots" in the mid to late 70's? Frye boot came to be almost a generic term to describe the tall clunky heeled boot popular at that time though many manufacturers made them. I still have a pair with 2" chunky heels that I seldom wear now. They have a lot of miles on them and pretty much worn out. I was excited to see the style resurrected recently, as "retro" and did not care that they are now advertised as "campus boots." Then became very dissappointed to discover now they are no longer a unisex style. The new ones which look just like the unisex syles of 30 years ago are now marketed for women's wear only and I have not found them in a women's size larger than American 10. So, men wearing heels takes a step back in my life time. And these do not really look like women's boots, even by today's standards other than they have a knee high shaft which seems to be a style feature reserved for women. Any other guys miss the style? Anyone know of source for them in larger sizes? dressboots

[Dr. Shoe]

Yes it's just like platforms and Uggs. Woe betide any man who has the effrontery to wear these traditionally male or unisex styles! The same goes for cowboy boots too!

[dressboots]

I wonderred why my neighbor was "lookign sideways" at my Uggs recently. My wife gave them to me years ago and thinks nothing of them being women's wear as she worries about other boots I have that are women's. I wear them out walking the dog on those cold winter nights when I am tired of having cold feet. Guess like "campus boots" they are out of fashion for men. I did find traditonal Frye "campus boots" for men on Zappos web site so I ranted too soon. However, as you stated they are not men's styles to most anymore. Give me a break!

[TXT-1]

here in australia... where the Ugg boot came from!... the Ugg is still unisex... as far as I know... then again my ugg boots are for keeping my feet warm in winter...

[dressboots]

here in australia... where the Ugg boot came from!... the Ugg is still unisex... as far as I know... then again my ugg boots are for keeping my feet warm in winter...

Here in the USA men seem to be paranoid about projecting an effeminate image. If women are wearing a style, then any self-respecting man would not.

OK that is way too general - I should qualify that my perspective is limited to my very conservative part of the USA.

If this were the rule across the board men would be going barefoot by now as every shoe that has ever designed for men or unisex has eventually been adapted/adopted for women. Either that or the guys would have to stick the ugly styles - or is that already the result!

[ShockQueen]

Sadly, this seems to be the case. The women find a style of shoe that we have, they like it, and all of a sudden, there is an instant taboo from any more men wearing them since they have claimed it for their own. The world needs to get over this overblown stereotype that women can do whatever they feel like, yet us men are restricted by some outdated societal custom. It's not "men's" and it's not "women's".....it's CLOTHING! It's SHOES! Wear what you like! If someone wore victorian-era garb that WAS meant for a man today, they'd be laughed off the street - EVEN THOUGH it was a design MEANT for a MAN! It just ticks me off that our choices are ever-narrowing while theirs are ever-expanding, so I have to just hack my own niche and just enjoy! It's time to reclaim freedom of choice!

[dr1819]

Here in the USA men seem to be paranoid about projecting an effeminate image. If women are wearing a style, then any self-respecting man would not.

Bingo! Shock Queen, I thanked you, too, as both you and dressboots hit things dead center.

The idea that heel=effeminate is horsehocky. Heels were invented by men, for men, and evolved upwards of five inches between 1500 and 1800 (that's 60% of the last 500 years, folks). They only died as men's wear because of the French Revolution, where they became synonomous with opulence/wealth.

Even so they saw a small resurgence in the 1960s and a broad resurgence in the 1970s. Many men today wear heels, including Tom Cruise and Nicholas Cage, as do plenty of rock stars including Kravitz and Prince.

The male population that has ever visited this board (more than 5,000)represents, by my best estimates, between 1/10 and 1/1000 the total Western male population that wears heels on a regular basis.

That's between 50,000 and 5 Million wearers.

This constitutes between 1 out of every 12,000 of all men in the US, to 1 out of every 2,800 men worldwide.

The stats are tricky, as there's no real hard data.

My best guess, adding up the populations of the western world from which 90% of our heel-wearing members originate, it comes to

Total male Western Population of countries represented by members on this board:

283,750,005

Total probable number of male high heel wearers out there: 2,800,000

My "best guess" as to the number of men throughout Western civilization who wear heels: .986784%

Rounding it, it comes to around 1%.

2.8 Million Western male street-heelers is a lot of people, folks!

And this represents the public figure, ie, those who've worn heels in public on more than one occasion. I believe the figure for men who routinely wear heels in private (their own homes), is between 10 and 20 times this percentage. Thus, best guess is that around 15%, perhaps as high as 20%, of all men wear heels on a regular basis.

That's significant, folks.

If women are wearing a style, then any self-respecting man would not.

I had to narrow this one down a bit.

Ok, so women are wearing pants, flats, heels, skirts, dresses, robes, blouses, shirts, gloves, body stockings, wraps, ponchos, jackets, sweaters, etc.

I guess it's time all self-respecting men dress in sackcloth and ashes or just go naked!

[Ozzard]

(Disclaimer: I'm a coder on http://www.statsdirect.com, not a statistician - but I have picked up a few points over the years).

"Total probable number of male high heel wearers out there: 2,800,000"

Is that the arithmetic mean of your low and high bound? If so, should it instead be the geometric mean (about 500k)? If your uncertainty is two orders of magnitude, arithmetic means get a bit tricky - I could equally well say 4 orders of magnitude: 5k to 50M, with an arithmetic mean of 25M.

I suspect your figures are high but, as you say, the data are* hard to come by. Either way, it's significant - and, I think, growing.

- Peter

* Yes, are. 'Data' is the plural of 'datum'.

[dressboots]

Bingo! Shock Queen, I thanked you, too, as both you and dressboots hit things dead center.

The idea that heel=effeminate is horsehocky.

Yes! You said it perfectly. However, I hear it frequently that a given man is dressed just a little too perfectly, thus he he must want to be a woman.

One excpetion. Jewelry

Remember when earings were stricktly woman's wear? Now I see very he-man men with diamond earing studs (in each ear sometimes). Also see very religious Christians with such apparel which runs in the face of the strictist interpretation of the scriptures that men and women should dress appropriately* to their sex. *Whatever that is seems to be flexible.

Braclets are now frequent man's accesories, even for white collar professionals.

Note: My daily wear accessorie is a bracelet. It is a style that is rare for anyone to wear thus it illicates more curiosty than reaction to me as a girly man though I do get that reaction from the occssional narrow minded person (mostly other men).

There are now big diamonds in rings for men.

So why is it that jewelry has been adopted by men from women with no repercutions?

Why not shoes and boots? We need to take back those styles which have been hijacked from men at the very least.