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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!geoff
From: geoff@burl.UUCP (geoff)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Re: Body Image, High Heels and All...
Message-ID: <698@burl.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 21-May-85 13:03:48 EDT
Article-I.D.: burl.698
Posted: Tue May 21 13:03:48 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 22-May-85 02:12:27 EDT
References: <2231@decwrl.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Technologies, Burlington NC
Lines: 42

> > If women *truly* didn't want to wear such shoes they wouldn't buy them and if
> > they didn't buy them the vendors would begin selling something that they
> > *would* buy.
> 
> 	Ah yes, "normal" market forces.  Which happen to include advertising, a
> profession dedicated to the mass manipulation of behavior.  A profession which
> has an astounding battery of research findings and techniques to accomplish just
> that.
> 	Please don't give us an Economics 101 lecture.  If you can't resist the
> urge to enlighten people about how wonderful "normal" market forces are, at
> least keep it in net.politics.

And your solution?  Deny the advertisers right of free speech?  The women
the right to buy the shoes they want?  I realize that high heels are not in
vogue in this news group, but the people here are hardly representative
of women as whole (I can feel the heat already -- does it help if I add the
obvious corallary that the men in the group are hardly representative of men
as a whole, either?). I have known many women who LIKE high heels (my
sister-in-law is one of them).  Whether this came about because of advertising,
girls wanting to imitate their mothers, or a racial memory back to the
Great Foo Foo doesn't matter.  They like them now (if you think not,
just imagine the hue and cry if they were abruptly removed from the market). A
lot of people don't like them.  They need not wear them (I have a suspicion
I would look kind of funny in them anyway :-)).  If you can convince the
shoe manufacturers they are not popular, they will change (might be hard to
do if they keep selling well, though).  I suppose my point is don't look
around for someone to blame if people don't act the way you think they ought
to.  People are weird enough on their own -- they don't need help :-).
And they will only be convinced by advertising when they WANT to be convinced.

> 		<_Jym_>
> 
> :::::::::::::::: Jym Dyer
> ::::'  ::  `:::: Dracut, Massachusetts
> ::'    ::    `::
> ::     ::     :: DYER%VAXUUM.DEC@DECWRL.ARPA
> ::   .::::.   :: {allegra|decvax|ihnp4|ucbvax}!decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-vaxuum!dyer
> ::..:' :: `:..::
> ::::.  ::  .:::: Statements made in this article are my own; they might not
> :::::::::::::::: reflect the views of |d|i|g|i|t|a|l| Equipment Corporation.

		geoff sherwood