Opposing NSNSNS - just why?

Several times. Had a cut on the beach as a teenager (before I started to go barefoot regularly... from being stupid, sliding with my feet on a very slippery and sharp oyster bank... when you drag your feet you make a sliding/cutting movement and can easily cut your foot even when something isn't near sharp enough to cause damage when you'd just step straight on it). It was about 3 mm deep and yet it didn't bleed, it was all callouses (no, I didn't walk barefoot except for beach & back yard then). Then I have the occasional splinter; I pull them out and only once a year do I get the tiniest drop of blood if I really squeeze. I've removed splinters from other people too, and a colleague took a chunk out of the pad of his foot last year, also dragging his feet on a road with embedded stones. Put a bandaid on it and it was fine. Everyone in my friends/family circle comes to me if they have *anything* happening to their feet since they're all perpetually shod and see me as some kind of expert... Yet cases of severely bleeding cuts are suspiciously absent. (and they wouldn't hide those instances from me... quite a few would tell me about any drop of blood, either worried or gloating)

Also, the chances of it happening are *really* low. I walk *everywhere* barefoot, including train stations, parking lots, etc, etc. I am often in a hurry, especially in the morning, so I will often be running. There's lots of glass there. Splinters? Never had one yet on my commute.. elsewhere just a couple a year (on trails mostly).
Now I know there's quite a bit of breakage in a busy store, and there's always the chance they'll forget a small piece, but any normal store will immediately clean up the large chunks (like the bottom of a bottle, which could cause a serious cut with the jagged edge sticking up). Besides, those are easily visible and easily avoided. So any injury would be a splinter only, and those do NOT bleed badly, if at all.

I *have* had bleeding injuries in stores twice in these past 8 years of barefooting -on my HANDS! Papercuts, one from a box and one from, indeed, a sheet of paper. Yes, I keep track, precisely for this reason.. because it's so silly to worry about feet specifically... Shall we require gloves?

 

They are in Australia? That'd be cool, at least they are consistent... I would actually care less about a bare foot ban for 'safety' if I knew that other types of footwear that are as dangerous or even much more so were banned too. However, in the US and here in the Netherlands I've never seen a 'no high heels' sign, except for in a martial arts place with a smooth, wooden floor (didn't want their floor marred!). Of course, bare feet were fine there...

Actually yes, I would rather be barefooted. I've already mentioned several times I walk lots of places where there's broken glass without any trouble -now what was that about selective reading? But I'll gladly give more details. Glass is *not* as dangerous as many people think.

When I ride my bike to the glass recycling bin I usually park it a few yards away and walk up to the bin to toss the glass in, because my feet are both tougher than the tire and if I do get a splinter in either, my feet heal by themselves and my tire takes work. So far never actually picked up a splinter there, in feet or tire...

In such places or elsewhere, if there is a *lot* of scattered glass, I'll often make sure I step a little lighter and don't accidentally drag my feet (see previous post), however I'm also often late for my train and I've more than once ran full-speed through the bicycle shed & train station only to notice glass when I was already halfway through... yet several years of that and I'm still 100% injury-free during my commute...

One more thingy about sharp stuff... At work (history theme park), we regulaly knap flint. Now I don't know if you know anything about working flint, but it is at least as sharp as glass. There's a US eye surgeon who prefers obsidian flint to surgical steel. You take a large rock, hit it with another rock (at the right angle and all), and you get shards that can either be used directly or can be further shaped to serve as arrow heads, spear heads, scrapers, etc. Apart from the useful pieces, there's a lot of crappy shards coming off too.. especially since most of us aren't near as good as the Prehistoric people were There are shards of flint laying all over the place in the back yard of 'my' little house, and I'll be starting my seventh season of work there this spring.. Number of cuts? Hands several (it's not quite as easy as it sounds, 'take a rock and hit it with another one' , feet... zero.

To be fair (and not selective ) I'll also list where I do pick up my occasional splinters... The occasional glass splinters have come from random city streets and one or two from hiking trails in the woods, and recently one in the kitchen after my mom had dropped a glass & we'd missed a tiny piece (how's that for barefoot safety -how many people go barefoot inside without giving it a moment's thought?). More common are thorns & thistle pricks -picking blackberries barefoot is a bit of a challenge Still not solely a barefoot hazard though, since I often pick those at work where I'm also in a skirt so my lower legs tend to get a scratch or two as well. Thistles don't bother me when fresh but when the leaves dry, often the sharp prickly part will break off when you walk on and remain stuck in the foot... far from a serious injury but yes it is a splinter and it does need pickin' out... Those are kinda common when it's dry in summer... last year we had a very wet summer so everything rotted away without drying out first.

 

Again, the question at hand is not whether bare feet are safe or not. Re-read the initial post in the thread.

And Myranya. Changing laws? To provide protection for BAREFOOTERS? That alarms me. Walking around unshod is not a civil rights issue. It is a personal choice at best and a silly societal rebellion at worst. Who will you define as a protected class next? I shudder to think. Come to think of it, I must be very unfortunate to have been born a white heterosexual male; if people like yourself have their way, it'll be illegal to be me in a few years.

 

First, in order for your statement to have any relevance, we would have to have established that insurance policies do indeed have stipulations that patrons must be shod.

THIS HAS NOT BEEN ESTABLISHED, AND NO ONE HAS COME FORTH WITH A QUOTE FROM A STOREOWNER INSURANCE POLICY THAT MAKES SUCH A STIPULATION.

So arguing that "proper footwear requirements are not one of the things in insurance policies that don't make sense" itself does not make sense, because we haven't been shown that such requirements are even present in insurance policies.

If you are making this claim, it is incumbent on YOU to prove that insurance companies put this language into their policies. So far, you have been falling down on the job. Do a little research to back up your assertion, okay? Until then, you can't be taken real seriously. On the other hand, people from the SBL HAVE looked into numerous policies and report back to us that no such clauses have been discovered.

So the amount of blood is the determining factor? First of all, no, I haven't seen how much blood comes from a foot wound. Have you ever seen how much comes from a head wound? I suggest that helmets be required in ANY STORE that has ANY ITEMS stored above shoulder height.

-Jeffrey

 

I agree that the laws don't need to be changed and barefooters don't need special protections.

But it is sad that despite me saying that, it will still fall to society choosing to define us as they do. Let me explain...

Astaroth, you're exactly right - it IS a personal choice at best. Like choosing to dye one's hair green, or to wear a kilt if you're a man, or to deck yourself out in the American flag. All those are personal choices in how one chooses to be identified in this country, and are a way to express one's individuality. Just like walking around town barefoot...or at least that's how WE see it.

All those examples above can be construed as offensive to someone else. Just the other day I saw a young guy wearing a plain black shirt that said "Fuck you" in stark white letters on the front. I kept expecting someone to say something to him, because it was obviously an "outrageous" thing to do, according to the norm of American society (at least judging from the moral upswing that swept the country in the past election). No one did. He wasn't asked to leave the premises (we were at a store inside of a shopping mall, where many people were milling about, including a lot of children).

Barefooters, IMO, aren't actually seeking special protection, or changes to existing laws. It seems that way because of this reason - We're simply challenging the notion that we are somehow "different" from everybody else, because of our choice to live life as we feel comfortable. There is such a vehement opposition to the NSNSNS signs because they single us out in such a way that we feel is unfair.

Defending a properties legal right to exclude a certain segment of the population is dangerous territory...since it wasn't that long ago that stores and businesses carried other signs that read "No women. No coloreds." and so on. Are we claiming to be a minority group here? No. But if the principle is upheld for those groups, why not for all?

Really, the silliest thing that I often get asked is "Why are you adamant about wanting to go into businesses barefoot? It's just stupid."

I always reply - "Yeah, it is stupid. I just want to go somewhere barefoot... why do these places seem to go out of their way to make it such a monumental problem for me?"

 

The question at hand?? Well, I'm sorry if we have to stick only to the exact parameters defined in the first post of a thread. The discussion has moved on since that first post and I *am* talking about the validity of the reasons behind the NSNSNS signs, and have been for several posts... If that bothers you, I'll gladly start a new thread or if that's possible on this forum, splitting this one off at post #42.

I do NOT want a law specifically naming bare feet, however I would like a civil rights law against discrimination based on ANYTHING that does not directly harm others... not just sex/race/religion, but also age, hair color, tattoo's, piercings, whatever anyone is or is not wearing, etc, etc.

I've already mentioned why I think it's just as wrong to discriminate against something that is a personal choice as against something like race that one did not chose, I am not going to repeat myself. Look it up or don't, I don't care.

Secondly, at least one of those things currently protected by law *is*, in my opinion, a matter of personal choice. While sexual preference may be at least partly genetic, I would argue that religion is a personal choice we make. A very *strong* choice and belief, true... but still a choice. After all, people sometimes change their religion, do they not? And quite a few people don't belong to the same church they grew up with. It's not something genetic, determined at birth, like race, sex and even sexual orientation.

 

I am still wondering what a person is to do if they MUST go someplace and they only have ONE choice of a place to go and that place choses to deny service to you just because you are barefoot or shirtless. If that is the only place around and people MUST go there to buy food or whatever or they have no other options then that place should allow you to come in however you wish.

 

If you desire to play Lawyer it should be played with all Posts.

Logic/Common Sense appears to be wasted on you.

I've solicited/evaluated/paid for enough Insurance Policies to have a Good Comfort Level in the Facts I'm Posting.

If you don't like them/disagree - you put forth the effort to disprove me/my Insurance Cos.
If you wish, PM me for the Retainer amount/remit addy for my Office to pull and copy the Documents.

I noticed you abandoned our last Legal convo...


As to the subject of Seriousness, frequently you're far beyond the Realm of Believability.
I find the first half of your nic to be quite humorus at time...

 

You talk about lacking common sense?!
I am not the one making a claim and casting it out to be believed, you are. You are claiming that insurance companies make "no-bare-feet" stipulations. I don't believe you. Common sense says that all you have to do to PROVE YOU ARE RIGHT is back up your (bullshit) assertion by quoting an insurance policy clause that makes the requirement. JUST ONE. Is that so hard? And yet, you're telling me that I'm the one who is supposed to disprove what you said? I cannot collect all of the insurance policies in the universe, which would be the only way to prove that not one of them has a no-bare-feet clause. YOU, on the other hand, can prove that at least some of them have the clause by bringing to us the text of just one.

That's a pretty wild claim. "Far beyond the realm of believability"??

This isn't about nicknames, man. You're digressing.

-Jeffrey

 

Let's not blame barefooters for high insurance costs. Blame the sue-happy people and the legal firms that try to take advantage of all this.

The few people who come in here stirring up the mud aren't shop owners. You can tell by the way they talk. Most are just psychologically frustrated with something like barefooting because they see it as unsightly or socially rebellious, which goes against the grain of their pro-establishment, follow-the-rules type of approach. They use the 'store owner rights' argument because they feel it's the best argument they have against something they feel is unsightly. They derive satisfaction from imagining themselves as being a store owner with authority to throw out people whose appearance they don't agree with. They use this room as an outlet to vent their frustrations.

Some of you may remember the poster in here a while back who claimed to be a police officer who said he would arrest barefooters and nudists. Same situation.

 

Nice typical Forum style selective editing...*c*

The 'wild claim'/your lack of Common Sense observations are based on your HF Posts.

The nic comment was in reference to your tendency to 'go ballistic'...*L*


Don't like my Observations? Don't Post what/how you Post.

 

My coffee hasn't kicked yet this am.

Who are this Post's mud slingers?

 

My coffee hasn't kicked yet this am.

Who are this Thread's mud slingers?

 

Well, I am a police officer...

I would arrest a nudist if the said nudist was, eh, practicing his or her "way of life" on a public beach. I make no apologies for that... it's my job, and I did not write the laws. You want-a drop yer britches, you get-a your ass to a private and clearly designated area for such activities

Arresting barefooters, that's a mite extreme, unless you start smashing up storefronts of NSNSNS businesses

 

Sure you are. We believe that story as much as the fictitious one about the NS sign at the skydiving club. You guys need to be more creative than this. Here we go again. Wonder what ever happened to the Cervantes de Leon nick.

Just more people fantasizing about having authority and frustrated with others who have an independent hippie lifestyle.

PS: A policeman who went skydiving and saw an NS sign on the airplane. What next? A sighting of Bigfoot wearing shoes after being forced to by a police officer?

 

*shrug* Blah... And pray tell what is wrong with a skydiving cop? (No, I don't skydive on the job, at least not since I left the Armed Forces.).

Fantacizing about authourity... Mmmmm... I envision being... ummm... I envision being God. HAHA! Die, little peons! *lightning crashes* WORSHIP ME, YOU MISERABLE TWITS!! ON YOUR KNEES!!!

Man, that felt good!! And now I'm one of those authority-fantacising people! Um... Joy..?

Bigfoot sighting (and picture) forthcoming. Just need to develop the film.

 

umm i think asaroth has issues...

Peace