Let’s put issues with Nancy aside for a minute. Do you agree with my statement that “No one suffers a status hit for catering to wide-feet people the same way they do if they are perceived as actively catering to fat females.”?
Let’s put the store-side issue aside for a minute. Do you agree with my contention that, “A man with wide feet will look less fashionable—irrespective of any fashion sense he might have—as a result of not having access to the variety of shoes that people with normal feet have?”
Why does your question have more importance for this issue than mine? And why do people get to ignore the reasoning I give with impunity when replying to me?
“A man with wide feet will look less fashionable—irrespective of any fashion sense he might have—as a result of not having access to the variety of shoes that people with normal feet have?”
I’m not sure I agree with that. It seems plausible but I’m not sure people pay that much attention to shoes or for that matter to how “fashionable” people are dressed (there’s a necessary disclaimer here that I’m a math grad student. It might very well be different if one were talking about more status and signaling conscious professions like law and business.)
Why does your question have more importance for this issue than mine?
Because a yes answer to my question would imply that whether or not the answer to your question is “yes” the status issues being discussed in regards to clothing for fat people is not what is causing a lack of shoes for wide-footed males.
I’m not sure I agree with that. It seems plausible but I’m not sure people pay that much attention to shoes or for that matter to how “fashionable” people are dressed (there’s a necessary disclaimer here that I’m a math grad student. It might very well be different if one were talking about more status and signaling conscious professions like law and business.)
How justifiably confident can you (JoshuaZ) be about the impact of shoes on someone’s fashionability and the resulting prejudices people have on that basis? Like you say, you’re a grad student, with little real-world experience in this. Everything I’ve read about the matter says that the shoes men wear do matter.
Because a yes answer to my question would imply that whether or not the answer to your question is “yes” the status issues being discussed in regards to clothing for fat people is not what is causing a lack of shoes for wide-footed males.
But why would it have that impact? Fat women can, introspectively, understand why they don’t give a shit about helping wide-footed men, and why they’d take a hit to status if they did so. They are surely capable of inferring therefrom why higher status people don’t want to take a hit to help them out.
How justifiably confident can you (JoshuaZ) be about the impact of shoes on someone’s fashionability and the resulting prejudices people have on that basis?
Very low confidence. Hence my remark that your claim seemed plausible.
But why would it have that impact? Fat women can, introspectively, understand why they don’t give a shit about helping wide-footed men, and why they’d take a hit to status if they did so.
Missing the point. No one is going to take a status hit from helping out wide-footed men. People might get a status hit for helping out “people with crappy shoes” but that’s not the same category. Close to no one has the same negative status association of “wide-footed men” that they have with “fat women.” That’s the distinction. Let’s say you’re at a cocktail party. Which do you think we’ll have a larger negative status impact when asked what you do for a living? “Oh, I’ve started a company that makes clothing for fat women” or “Oh, I’ve started a company that makes shoes for men with feet that are wider than the norm?” These don’t have the same status result. And if you want to make it more stark, imagine a male who works as a model for wide-footed shoes as opposed to a female who models clothing for fat people. Which one do you think will cause more of a status hit on a random internet forum if an otherwise anonymous individual mentioned that as their job?
I don’t know, but it must be pretty big of a hit for the wide shoe model, since, um, there aren’t any.
Close to no one has the same negative status association of “wide-footed men” that they have with “fat women.” That’s the distinction.
But not the relevant distinction. If I show up at that cocktail party, all people know is that I have crappy shoes. And no, I can’t just say to them, “Oh, discount this aspect of me: I have crappy shoes because they don’t make them in my size; really, I totally get that nice shoes are important, I just can’t find any that fit.”
It doesn’t work like that.
Which do you think we’ll have a larger negative status impact when asked what you do for a living? “Oh, I’ve started a company that makes clothing for fat women” or “Oh, I’ve started a company that makes shoes for men with feet that are wider than the norm?”
Framing effects would dominate. What if you said, “wide variance women” instead of “fat women”? Or “men that are underserved in the high end shoe market” instead of wide-footed men?
Again, the only real difference is that fat women have made self-pity into an art form, while wide-footed men haven’t.
Framing effects would dominate. What if you said, “wide variance women” instead of “fat women”? Or “men that are underserved in the high end shoe market” instead of wide-footed men?
Let me tentatively suggest that in that circumstance framing would not dominate. In the first case many people would after hearing “wide-variance” be thinking “oh, he means fat ladies” or something similar and would only not say that explicitly out of politeness, whereas even if you said the second one without the framing, most people would ignore it.
But not the relevant distinction. If I show up at that cocktail party, all people know is that I have crappy shoes. And no, I can’t just say to them, “Oh, discount this aspect of me: I have crappy shoes because they don’t make them in my size; really, I totally get that nice shoes are important, I just can’t find any that fit.”
Is this the relevant distinction? It seemed like the topic of discussion was why there wasn’t any clothing of specific forms. That’s not the same question as whether or not status hits occur to the people in question. (And even then, if one is talking about say just online conversation, a status hit from being a fat woman is going to be much larger than “I’ve got wide feet.”).
Again, the only real difference is that fat women have made self-pity into an art form, while wide-footed men haven’t.
Let me tentatively suggest that the level of status issues here is so different that the difference of degree really does become a difference in kind. Indeed, our earlier discussion sort of highlights this. Even in situations like academia, where looks don’t matter that much, being a fat woman seems to have some status hit associated with it.
Let’s put issues with Nancy aside for a minute. Do you agree with my statement that “No one suffers a status hit for catering to wide-feet people the same way they do if they are perceived as actively catering to fat females.”?
Let’s put the store-side issue aside for a minute. Do you agree with my contention that, “A man with wide feet will look less fashionable—irrespective of any fashion sense he might have—as a result of not having access to the variety of shoes that people with normal feet have?”
Why does your question have more importance for this issue than mine? And why do people get to ignore the reasoning I give with impunity when replying to me?
I’m not sure I agree with that. It seems plausible but I’m not sure people pay that much attention to shoes or for that matter to how “fashionable” people are dressed (there’s a necessary disclaimer here that I’m a math grad student. It might very well be different if one were talking about more status and signaling conscious professions like law and business.)
Because a yes answer to my question would imply that whether or not the answer to your question is “yes” the status issues being discussed in regards to clothing for fat people is not what is causing a lack of shoes for wide-footed males.
How justifiably confident can you (JoshuaZ) be about the impact of shoes on someone’s fashionability and the resulting prejudices people have on that basis? Like you say, you’re a grad student, with little real-world experience in this. Everything I’ve read about the matter says that the shoes men wear do matter.
But why would it have that impact? Fat women can, introspectively, understand why they don’t give a shit about helping wide-footed men, and why they’d take a hit to status if they did so. They are surely capable of inferring therefrom why higher status people don’t want to take a hit to help them out.
Very low confidence. Hence my remark that your claim seemed plausible.
Missing the point. No one is going to take a status hit from helping out wide-footed men. People might get a status hit for helping out “people with crappy shoes” but that’s not the same category. Close to no one has the same negative status association of “wide-footed men” that they have with “fat women.” That’s the distinction. Let’s say you’re at a cocktail party. Which do you think we’ll have a larger negative status impact when asked what you do for a living? “Oh, I’ve started a company that makes clothing for fat women” or “Oh, I’ve started a company that makes shoes for men with feet that are wider than the norm?” These don’t have the same status result. And if you want to make it more stark, imagine a male who works as a model for wide-footed shoes as opposed to a female who models clothing for fat people. Which one do you think will cause more of a status hit on a random internet forum if an otherwise anonymous individual mentioned that as their job?
I don’t know, but it must be pretty big of a hit for the wide shoe model, since, um, there aren’t any.
But not the relevant distinction. If I show up at that cocktail party, all people know is that I have crappy shoes. And no, I can’t just say to them, “Oh, discount this aspect of me: I have crappy shoes because they don’t make them in my size; really, I totally get that nice shoes are important, I just can’t find any that fit.”
It doesn’t work like that.
Framing effects would dominate. What if you said, “wide variance women” instead of “fat women”? Or “men that are underserved in the high end shoe market” instead of wide-footed men?
Again, the only real difference is that fat women have made self-pity into an art form, while wide-footed men haven’t.
Let me tentatively suggest that in that circumstance framing would not dominate. In the first case many people would after hearing “wide-variance” be thinking “oh, he means fat ladies” or something similar and would only not say that explicitly out of politeness, whereas even if you said the second one without the framing, most people would ignore it.
Is this the relevant distinction? It seemed like the topic of discussion was why there wasn’t any clothing of specific forms. That’s not the same question as whether or not status hits occur to the people in question. (And even then, if one is talking about say just online conversation, a status hit from being a fat woman is going to be much larger than “I’ve got wide feet.”).
Let me tentatively suggest that the level of status issues here is so different that the difference of degree really does become a difference in kind. Indeed, our earlier discussion sort of highlights this. Even in situations like academia, where looks don’t matter that much, being a fat woman seems to have some status hit associated with it.