Others Barefoot in Public?

I haven't seen any so far this year. Male, female, young, old... None.

 

Saw two yesterday, both in a local supermarket. First was a dad with his kids, and though the kids all wore shoes the dad was barefoot, and had some really filthy black soles. The second barefoot person was in the opposite role, a son with his father. His dad looked like he just walked out of the office, but the son was barefoot and looked like he hadn't worn shoes in weeks.

 

Today I saw a mother and her three kids in a Circle K convenience store, two of the kids were girls both in flip flops while the third child was a boy about 10 years of age was barefooted.

I do see a some public barefooting in my area each summer, though it's reletively few in numbers compared to my neighboring state of California.

 

I love being barefoot, everywhere.

 

I saw some girls in flip flops at Quik Trip. As they were leaving, I was entering barefoot. The girls were kind of smiling at me, and one of them tells her friends, "I told you so." I think she wanted to be barefoot in there, but her friends didn't want her to be. I didn't chat with them, since it seemed like they were ready to go somewhere else. I just hope I had some influence on those girls that day!

 

Went to Target today during my lunch break and saw the first person barefoot in a retail establishment (besides me, but I had shoes on today) in at least a year.

Two girls and a guy, all maybe somewhere between 18 and 21 I'd guess. The girls were in shorts and flip flops, the guy was in jeans and barefoot. One of the girls must have been his girlfriend since they were holding hands. He looked really uneasy. As they passed by I heard him say "I can't believe I let you talk me into this." His girlfriend said "I'm sure you'll get used to it in a few days." He was like "I'm NOT doing this all week!" and the girls kinda giggled at him.

Don't know what the story was but I didn't have the time to hang around to overhear anything else.

 

I've actually seen more people wearing shoes this year (specifically this summer) than I usually do. I'm a part of a theatre during the summer where, in past years, most people have gone barefoot, in and out of the theatre. This year, I am one of the few who remains barefooted.

 

I don't seem to see as many people barefoot in public places as I used to. In fact, I've even noticed a marked decline in people going barefoot in private.

By that, I mean that I am used to seeing people in cars driving the opposite direction with their bare feet resting on the dashboard. Now, I hardly ever see that at all.

Also, most people seem to be opting for flip-flops when, by all means, they should be barefoot - like, when they're washing their cars or what-not.

 

Over the past week, I saw one guy barefoot in Mike's Jersey Deli, a woman's bare feet on the dash of a passing car, and when flying on business on Monday, there was a woman barefoot across the aisle from me.

We're out there!!

 

I was at the modern art museum at the Smithsonian Institution and saw a middle-aged man with a backpack outside. While I'm fairly bold about barefooting in public myself, I'm kind of shy about public barefooting while with my daughters, which was the case here. We entered the museum and as I rode up the escalator, I observed him entering barefoot. I didn't get to see if he was hassled at all. I expect not. I was really jealous. The Vivo Barefoot shoes I was wearing are really comfortable, but on that hot day, the cool smooth floors of that museum would have felt great. I must say, though, that DC's downtown sidewalks would be challenging for all but the most dedicated barefooter. The sidewalks had a particularly coarse aggregate. I find that sort of very hard surface with sharp aggregate to be among the least comfortable to walk on.

 

Lucky guy. The shoe police were particularly nasty at the Smithsonian (and all other DC museums for that matter) when I was there. For a short time, I was seriously concerned that they would get violent (they were going for their batons), even though I was very quiet and cooperative. I'll not likely visit DC again; probably one of the most barefoot (and generally) unfriendly places with the highest level of repressed violence I've ever seen. I'd much rather visit Hong Kong or Taiwan. Much more friendly all around and I never get hassled for bare feet.

 

I go barefoot a fair bit but I hardly ever see anyone else doing it. And I get the feeling I'm being judged for it too! Like people think it's dirty or something... weird world... on the bright side, I have a friend who NEVER wears shoes. She's awesome

 

As I understand it, lots of people go barefoot in Australia outside of the big cities, but it's not unheard of in the big cities either. But then New Zealand is the country that has a reputation for barefooting as a national pastime. I've got relatives in Melbourne and I'm planning to finally get over there to visit them this christmas, since I'll be based in Kuwait by then so 1/3 of the way there anyway. Might see if I can do South Africa as well around Easter.

 

And why wouldn't you get hassled for bare feet in DC? I mean, this a free country. You have the freedom to do whatever you want as long as it doesn't violate someone else's rights.

Wait a minute. How does going barefoot violate other people's rights...?

 

You argue with yourself most effectively .

I always get a chuckle out of the whole "free country" bit; as if there was only one free country in the world and the definition of freedom thereby naturally flowed out of it...

 

All that "freedom" reminds me of that all too fitting quote from John Carpenter's Escape from L.A.:

Malloy: The United States is a non-smoking nation! No smoking, no drugs, no alcohol, no women - unless you're married - no foul language, no red meat!
Snake Plissken: [sarcastic] Land of the free.

I wonder, if barefooters would have been sent to the fictional L.A. island for imprisonment. Or, if that fiction is all too far-fetched considering the trend of our governments making our lives "safe" by surveillance of everybody's private life and negation of privacy...
Oh well, I guess barefooters are going to be seen as suspicious beings in such a world, since they won't conform.

Wiggling a possible future dissident's bare toes,

~*Ganesha*~

 

Bare feet as a political statement? What are you? Some kind of damned hippie?

In addition to the FUD spread by shoddies and the shoe industry, the perpetuation of the association of bare feet with the "lunatic fringe" (i.e., us) is ironically a significant contributing factor in the continuing unpopularity of barefooting.

As far as associating the erosion of personal privacy with enforced conformity, I view that as a bit of a stretch. The public has clearly demonstrated a preference for the loss of individual privacy, evidenced by the proliferation of the plague known as social networking.

 

Sad, because all too true. I'm as "straight arrow" as they come (well, OK, I'm a liberal Democrat), and I'm a devoted barefooter. I went out to lunch barefoot with my wife (who was not), and I kept wondering what made me different from everybody else, whose bare feet were only "modified" by flip-flops. It's ALL perception, which is really what people are all about. Not truth. Not realization. Not understanding.

Dining barefoot sure is nice!

 

The United States is "free" only in the sense that we don't charge for admission.

Even on the 4th of July, all you see are signs warning of the impending doom you will suffer if you should desire to show pride in our nation's "freedom" by setting off fireworks.

The worst part is, people in the U.S. really DO have the freedom to go barefoot, but they don't know it. Most people believe that health regulations require them to wear shoes, but that's not true. No such laws exist.

It's just the misinformation of the corporate-sponsored media leading them astray.

 

I guess I would be considered by most to be on the lunatic fringe because I'm seriously considering anarcho-capitalism. I've started reading this book: