Shoes On vs. Shoes Off

Cristela Alonzo's customized shoes that translate to "badass."
( Katie Bishop )

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. For our last few minutes today, here's a scenario. You get to a friend's house, you knock on the door, and when you greet each other, they say, "We're a shoes-off household." What do you do? Do you take them off because their house, their rules, or do you keep them on because your shoes, your rules? The latter stance was the premise of a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed called Here's Why I'll Be Keeping My Shoes on in Your Shoeless Home.

As you could imagine, it got a ton of pushback on Twitter. People saying the author was being disrespectful. A Guardian piece published this week in response was called Here's Why Your Shoes Will Be Staying the Hell Out of My House. The whole mess got us thinking, maybe this is a good question for the phone. Listeners, in our last 10 minutes today, are you a strictly shoes-off household or are you a shoes-on household? Call in and defend your choice, 212-433-WNYC, shoes on or shoes off? 212-433-9692.

If you're shoes-on kind of house, we want to hear from you. There are so many reasons to take your shoes off according to those other people, not to track mud or other city sludge, and they say excrement, it protects your floors. Why do you prefer to keep your shoes on? The author of the Wall Street Journal piece says it's the floors she doesn't want touching her feet. She asks, "Why are you assuming your guests feet are dirtier than your floors?"

To back up that claim, she talked to a scientist, a professor of microbiology at Simmons University and a founding member of the International Forum on Home Hygiene, who said, "While it's true, 96% of shoe soles have fecal bacteria like E. coli on them. E. coli is everywhere. If homeowners have babies or pets, the percentage of E. coli is undoubtedly very high already." Listeners, shoes on, shoes off?

Is this a cultural thing? People will say East Asian, I've also seen pushback online that says, "Hey, this is also people of color in the United States, Black and Latino people do it more than white people. This whole premise from the Wall Street Journal writer was racist." How about you? Shoes on, shoes off, cultural differences, if any, and basic common courtesy, geez, if someone asks you to take them off as you come into their house, 212-433-WNYC. We'll take as many calls as we can fit in after this.

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Margo: Hey, welcome to the party. I'm Margo, Kira's sister, the gifts go over on the table, and the shoes go there. Oh, Kira and Chuck don't like outside dirt coming in. The twins are always picking things up off the floor.

Carrie: This is an outfit.

Margo: They'd really appreciate it.

Carrie: Geez, if I'd known I was going to be shoeless, I would've compensated with a big hat or something.

Brian Lehrer: "The shoes are part of my outfit." Do you know that scene from Sex and the City? The episode where Carrie goes to a dinner party at a no-shoe household and during the course of the night, the shoes get stolen. We're taking your calls based on the controversial recent article in the Wall Street Journal called Here's Why I'll Be Keeping My Shoes on in Your Shoeless Home. Chauncey in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Hi, Chauncey.

Chauncey: Hey, how are you, Brian?

Brian Lehrer: Good. Shoes-on or shoes-off household?

Chauncey: Shoes off. My wife's Japanese, and that's a huge thing in Japan. Also I live in the neighborhood where there's a lot of dogs, so definitely shoes off.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you very much. Darlene in Queens, you're on WNYC. Hi, Darlene.

Darlene: Hi. I'm going to really exaggerate this whole question because ethnic families even sweep the front stoops, and Black families, which I am one of, would not even let you get on a bed with your outside clothes on. This whole notion of shoes off, which I support, I don't understand why we don't take it to the next extreme, like eliminating your dog from getting in the bed with you or sitting on your sofa. Shoes off for me, but pet owners and people who don't sweep their steps and do all that other stuff, to me, you're just gradually litigating the effects of walking on New York City streets.

Brian Lehrer: Interesting. Since you identified your ethnicity, do you think this is, to some degree, a Black thing, or is this just you?

Darlene: I think it's a combination of cultural predisposition, what your parents did and also awareness of how nasty it is out there. Some people can't cope with all of the complications of living in the city, walking on the subway, walking in the subway, and they just close their eyes to it. They just feel they can't control it.

Brian Lehrer: Darlene, thank you very much. Margaret on Twitter writes, "At a meeting in a shoeless apartment, we had to move furniture around, and a sofa banged my toe, breaking it. Shoelessness has consequences," says Margaret from Twitter. Adrey, am I saying your name right, in Rahway, you're on WNYC. Hi there.

Adrey: Yes. Hi. How are you, Brian?

Brian Lehrer: Good. Shoes or no shoes?

Adrey: No shoes. I just figure, it's not my space. If I'm going into some one else's space, they ask you, it's a common courtesy. I don't know where we are going with the society today, but it just seems a lack of people who believe that we're a community and it seems to be all about me.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. I don't have to get vaccinated to go into your workplace. Right?

Adrey: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: I don't have to take off my shoes if you think they bring in too many germs. Marie in Peekskill, you're on WNYC. Hi, Marie.

Marie: Hey, super cool. I actually didn't know about this whole shoes on, shoes off controversy, but in my house we're definitely shoes off. My dad is from a tropical country. You were mentioning, it's important to take your shoes off. You don't know what you've stepped in.

Brian Lehrer: Marie, thank you. Oh, go ahead.

Marie: We live in Hawaii.

Brian Lehrer: Go ahead.

Marie: Because of the Asian population, sometimes visitors are even provided house slippers to wear while they're inside the house.

Brian Lehrer: Marie, thank you so much. Eric in Manhattan, you're on WNYC. Hi, Eric.

Eric: Hi. I just wanted to offer that these two conflicting notions create a conundrum that we have on our hands. In the winter time, a great way to keep your floor clean is to take off your shoes at the door and not wear them around the house. You're not going to track everything all over your house, all over your apartment, what have you.

Brian Lehrer: You talk about snow and slush and that kind of thing, right?

Eric: Yes. That's the winter alone. I'm not talking in the summer time. You've just been walking through a park, you have dirt on your shoes. That's a great way to keep your floor clean, but then say you're social. Say you want to have people over, you want to have these events, have house parties. At the same time, you're stretching yourself in two different directions because then you're asking every guest to come over and take their shoes off.

On one hand it's not fair that you should have to cancel the rule for a party. Especially if you have carpets in your apartment, that's going to create a huge mess for you to have to clean up, but then on the other hand, it's also going to create a mess of shoes, a big pile everywhere in that Carrie's going to get her shoes stolen, so to speak.

Brian Lehrer: One in sympathy with Carrie and yes, on the one hand this, on the other hand that. Eric seeing the shades of gray, the shoe questions, which the Wall Street Journal did not. Tina in Manhattan, you're on WNYC. I think you're going to get our last word. Hi.

Tina: Hi, Brian. Thank you for taking my call. What I was going to say is just that we have to respect whichever household we go to. If they wish for us to take off the shoes, then that's what we should do. At my home, we do take our shoes off. I totally believe in that. I do have the shoe covers just in case there's somebody that doesn't feel very comfortable with it. Also, I went to a breeder and she made me take off my shoes, which was great because she was trying to protect the puppies from not having a parvo, which I believe that has been going on in the city a lot, it's a virus in dogs. That's my take.

Brian Lehrer: Tina, you got the last word. Thank you, listeners, for your shoes on, shoes off calls. The Brian Lehrer Show is produced today by Lisa Allison, Zoe Azulay, Amina Srna, Carl Boisrond, and Ryan Andrew Wilde, our interns, Anna Conkling, Diego Munhoz, and Gigi Steckel.

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