Iraq News Now

A

social media campaign against dress codes and expectations that women wear high

heels at work has gone viral in Japan, with thousands joining the #KuToo

movement.
Nearly 20,000 women have signed an online petition

demanding the government ban companies from requiring female employees to wear

high heels on the job - an example of gender discrimination, says Yumi

Ishikawa, who started the drive.
The #KuToo campaign is a play on the word for

shoes, or “kutsu” in Japanese, and “kutsuu” or pain.
Ishikawa, a 32-year-old actress and freelance

writer, hopes the petition she submitted to the health ministry on Monday will

lead to changes in the workplace and greater awareness about gender

discrimination.
She launched the campaign after tweeting about

being forced to wear high heels for a part-time job at a funeral parlor - and

drew an overwhelming response from women.
“After work, everyone changes into sneakers or

flats,” she wrote in the petition, adding that high heels can cause bunions,

blisters and strain the lower back.
“It’s hard to move, you can’t run and your

feet hurt. All because of manners,” she wrote, pointing out that men don’t face

the same expectations.
While many Japanese companies may not

explicitly require female employees to wear high heels, many women do so

because of tradition and social expectations.
‘THICKHEADED’
Ishikawa said her campaign had received more

attention from international media outlets than domestic ones, and there was a

tendency in Japan to portray the issue as a health one, not a gender one.
“Japan is thickheaded about gender

discrimination,” she told Reuters in an interview. “It’s way behind other

countries in this regard.”
Japan ranks 110th out of 149 countries in the

World Economic Forum’s gender-equality ranking.
“We need people to realize that gender

discrimination can show up in lots of small ways,” Ishikawa said, from how

women are treated by their bosses to expectations that women will do all the

housework and child-rearing even if they work.
In decades past, businessmen were expected to

wear neckties, but that has changed since the government started a “cool

biz” campaign in 2005 to encourage companies to turn down air-conditioners and

reduce electricity use.
“It would be great if the country had a

similar kind of campaign about high heels,” said Ishikawa.
She said she had been the target of online

harassment over the campaign, mostly from men.
“I’ve been asked why I need to make such a big

deal about this - can’t I just work this out with your company?” she said.
“Or that I’m selfish, that this is just part

of etiquette.”
The health ministry said it was reviewing the petition

and declined to comment further.
In Britain, Nicola Thorp launched a similar

petition in 2016 after she was sent home from work for refusing to wear high

heels.
A subsequent parliamentary investigation into

dress codes found discrimination in British workplaces, but the government

rejected a bill banning companies from requiring women to wear high

heels.