Make strappy heels imply high heels

Posted under Tags

MysteriousLounger

zetsubousensei said in forum #419862:

Wiki says it applies to platform and wedge footwear. There are plenty of posts in the tag that aren't high_heels. post #7179496 post #8191555 post #2584596

Wedge heels, platform heels, and block heels all count as high heels, per the high_heels wiki page.

With regard to the examples your raise, post #2584596 certainly counts as high heels; see the child, post #2584600, which shows a clear side-on perspective of the footwear; these are indeed strappy heels, and they are high heels. no drama here. The shoes in post #8191555 are simply... not strappy heels. There's no strap around the ankle, as is explicitly required by the strappy heel wiki. The ribbon instead goes around behind the character's heel. They are also not heels. These are platform sandals and should be tagged as such.

It is the shoes in post #7179496 around which I want to make my argument. The shoes are flat-soled and have several straps, including an ankle strap. I argue that these are not strappy heels, because they are not heels. I argue in favour of a narrow interpretation of the tag, wherein strappy heels include only shoes that are also heels. I thought this would be obvious from the name of the tag; If I search for strappy heels, and the result is flat-soled footwear, then the tag has lost some meaning. I argue that shoes which have ankle straps but which are otherwise not heels, should not be included in the tag.

You have argued that the strappy heel wiki page allows for non-heel footwear. I will contend against this in two ways. First, on the ground of the existing text of the wiki page:

High heels, sandals, wedges, platforms, or other high-heeled footwear that have ankle straps...

I have added emphasis to high-heeled footwear because my reading of the text is that the forgoing footwear types--high heels, sandals, wedges, etc. are understood to be high-heeled in order to qualify for the tag. This is my understanding, first and foremost, because the name of the tag itself implies that the footwear is a strappy (high) heel. So, it is my understanding that the text of the wiki page does not, in fact, endorse using the tag for flat-soled footwear. Note, of the four types of footwear listed as examples, sandals are the only one that do not carry an explicit high-heeled implication. Note that the "platform" hyperlink links to the wiki page for platform_heels, not platform_shoes. If you had clicked the link to check, you might have noticed that, per the text of the wiki page as currently written, post #7179496, a flat-soled platform shoe, is not, in fact, a valid strappy heel.
If you intend to argue that the wiki page as written allows for non-heels to be included in the tag, the only kind of such flat sole shoes that are currently even ambiguously allowed by the text are sandals. Even the category of "other footwear" is explicitly specified to be only footwear with high heels, which would therefore qualify as high heels. This is a very silly argument to make, and I find the much more sensible reading of the text is that the sandals in question are understood to be heeled sandals, just like the other three given examples of footwear.

My second line of argument is that wiki pages are not the be all and end all. They are written by collective agreement. I argue that if the wiki page says that a flat-soled shoe can be tagged as a strappy heel--which it does not say--it is wrong, and it should be changed to reflect the name of the tag; or, the tag should be changed to "strappy footwear" to reflect the new, broader definition. Words have to mean something. Strappy heels are a particular subset of high heels. Expanding the definition of the tag, beyond what the words represent in plain english, dilutes it's usefulness as a search term. The term should encompass only the kinds of shoes that immediately come to mind when you hear the phrase "Strappy heels", which is to say, t-strap heels, ankle strap heels, and heels with multiple straps or ribbons on the ankle and calf; this is also, conveniently, the exact definition that the wiki page already gives.

This position is, of course, subjective. Another person may read the text of the wiki article and interpret it differently (as you have done, although, as I have already pointed out, following the hyperlinks in the text does disambiguate for us that "platforms" was referring specifically to platform heels; similarly for "wedges"). A different reading is not right or wrong. I have posted a detailed breakdown of my own reading, and my reasoning for reading the text in that way. I have also argued, again subjectively, that the tag should be narrowly defined. I have presented two different lines of reasoning why I believe that the tag should have a narrow definition: first, that the narrow definition adheres more closely to what the tag means in common vernacular, which is a very specific category of shoe. Separately, I have expressed frustration that I could search for "strappy heels" and find results that are not, in fact, heels, but only strappy; making the tag a misnomer.

I was not expecting this implication to be controversial, which is why I did not lay out all of my reasoning in such detail in the initial BUR. However, different readings are valid, and if you have pressing reasons why you believe the tag should be made to include flat-soled footwear, or why you believe that the wiki in fact already allows this, I am open to listen and possibly change my mind. Still, I believe that if the definition of the tag is unambiguously being changed to allow flat-soled footwear, it should not be "strappy heels" but rather something like "Strappy footwear".

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trapster77

btw we also have heel-less heels which also don't imply high heels and a heel-less heels can have strappy heels

i don't agree with it either. imo "high heels" is just the heel of the foot is raised high, it shouldn't matter what is actually on the shoe. basically we have 4 different thicknesses of heels

since heel-ful shoes can be tagged with the latter 3 it shouldn't be necessary to exclude the first one from the high heels implication just because there is no heel on the actual shoe

so i think it should all be implied to high heels imo. a similar point was raised creating the high-heeled mechanical legs tag in topic #34432

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zetsubousensei

MysteriousLounger said in forum #419876:
SNIP

Wedge heels are currently not aliased to high heels I was unsure when I responded if they counted as such so I specifically tried not to include examples. If I had realized post #2584596 was wedge I wouldn't have used it I thought they were high raised flat clogs like the Ushiwakamaru. That being said if all wedge heels are high heels they should be implicated correct?

I raise that not all heels are high, or at the very least the tags are a mess. post #10571177 are in platform heels but not high heels post #672811 would be another example. When I read the wiki for strappy heels, I don't read them all as being variations of high heels, but high_heels being one in a list of things that can be tagged with strappy heels, the "heel" having the potential to be wedge, platform, pump, or any other variation. I agree that the wiki for platform heels makes them mistags, but at the moment they are being lumped in with the others. If forum #413104 goes through it will only get messier, or perhaps force clarity? Regardless I acknowledge your reading, and don't think it's wrong.

Regarding the "flat" ones, I think that is the most pressing issue here. post #6231735 post #7493293 post #9027721 post #9883075

I think we can agree these are strappy but not high heels, currently they are in strappy heels, where do they get rehomed to if they aren't strappy heels? We have ankle strap, which is used with strappy heel, but especially for the one with the Backrooms image I think it's worth denoting when the strap is attached to the shoe which is the purpose strappy heel is providing that just ankle_strap isn't.

Apologies for not being clear. Generally when I see a BUR the first thing I do is search for exceptions or things that would make it invalid. Those ones in the initial post we just a few posts that stuck out of a search as not fitting the high heels tag and I too was not prepared to heavily defend or defeat the BUR. Strappy footwear would have been a good rename, but our footwear tags are being killed for more clarity like boots, sandals, shoes, ect. Actually in regards to forum #413104 it almost seems like the solution would be to rename these to strappy shoes and use high heels when appropriate, but it is not something I feel strongly about outside of making sure there is a way to, again, denote when the strap is attached to the footwear regardless of heel elevation.

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MysteriousLounger

zetsubousensei said in forum #419891:

I raise that not all heels are high, or at the very least the tags are a mess

I'll certainly agree with you there. As things currently stand--and, I admit, I really should have looked into before creating the BUR--currently, of the various types and designs of heels listed on the high heels wiki page, only stiletto heels, pumps, and high heel boots imply high heels.
The high heels wiki page lists a total of 12 "design" tags, and, again, only 2 of those "designs" currently carry the implication. High-heels boots are listed as a subtype, not a style; the other 3 "subtypes" also lack the implication, including high-heel sandals, high-heel slides, and high-heel sneakers, all of which should, I hope fairly obviously, carry the implication.

I should have probably made a BUR, or rather a series of BURs, to add the implication (style_of_heel) -> high_heels, uniformly, for every tag that is a style of high heel, which is to say, all the tags named with the convention something_heels, including block heels, wedge heels, and, perhaps controversially, heel-less heels and low_block_heels.

If forum #413104 goes through it will only get messier

That particular proposal has been defeated. However, the high-heels implication is actually currently being discussed for high-heel sandals, at topic #34864; but the same person that created the BUR to deprecate platform heels has derailed the implication discussion and it is now an argument about deprecating the high heel sandals tag. For now, though, I think we should proceed as though the tags will continue to exist; I do not think the deprectaion BURs are likely to go through.

Regarding the "flat" ones, I think that is the most pressing issue here.

I agree. I think that we should establish a clear cut-off between what is a flat-soled shoe, and what is a high heel.
The definition of high heels as we currently have it states:

from high heels wiki:
Footwear which raises the heels of the wearer's feet significantly higher than the toes.

This definition is good, in my opinion. It is a single line, very short and clear: Any shoe that has the heel much higher than the toe, is a high heel. Coming back to the comment made by @trapster77, the definition as it currently stands, explicitly includes heel-less heels as high_heels; the definition only requires that the wearer's heel rest significantly above their toe, not that the shoe have any structural heel. Indeed it makes no specific requirements of any part of the shoe, leaving that to the various style tags. I therefore see no problem with them carrying the implication. They fit the definition as it currently exists.

The definition does contain some ambiguity, though, in the word "significantly". I believe that a lower bound, a cut-off, could be helpful--if we can agree on such a thing. I propose that a new line be added to the wiki, below the definition line:

The heel of the foot should rest noticeably higher than the toes for this tag to apply; in other words, the sole should arch, and not lie flat. As a rule of thumb, apply the tag if the heel looks like it is at least one inch, or 3 centimeters, above the toe.

This gives a lower bound that I think is quite reasonable, ensuring that any post with the tag should have at least a noticeable heel, but allowing for even relatively low shoes to be included. I understand that 1 inch / 3 cm might be a bit short for some people to consider a high heel, but in my own opinion, at 3cm, the sole is pretty clearly no longer flat, and i just doesn't make sense to have a tag for intermediate shoes. Lots of pumps, for instance, have short heels like this, but I reckon it still makes the most sense to classify pumps as a subset of high heels.

I think we can agree these are strappy but not high heels

I actually don't agree that all of these are not high heels. post #10571177 post #6231735 post #7493293 I would all classify as low block heels, which are high heels (at least by my definition! note that, there is room under the current definition to argue that they are not "significant" enough to qualify as high heels; I believe they are high heels because the raise at the heel is immediately noticeable. They all look to raise about 1 inch or sightly more, to my eyes.)

I do however agree that post #672811 post #9027721 post #9883075 are all flat shoes. In particular, I think that they should have their heel-related tags removed (post #672811 already has both platform heels and platform shoes; the inappropriate tag should simply be removed; no harm done, as the correct tag already exists and is applied.)

Strappy footwear would have been a good rename, but our footwear tags are being killed for more clarity like boots, sandals, shoes, ect.

I think that more specificity and clarity is good. I believe the tag should remain Strappy heels, and we should exclude flat-soled footwear. A new tag for strappy shoes could be created, and even could be linked on the wiki page as an alternative tag, ie, not to be confused with strappy shoes, which are similar to strappy heels but have a flat sole. in the fist few pages of strappy_heels -high_heels, there are at least a few examples that would fit, post #10844902, post #10411951, post #9357235, maybe post #9184196?
There's also a few flat-soled yet strappy sandals in the mix, post #9732766 should probably be tagged gladiator sandals, but for (NSFW) post #9486410, that tag isn't appropriate. however, the sandals don't look particularly strappy to me. They just look like ordinary sandals, maybe with an ankle_strap.

However populating a new tag (or tags) will be a lot of work, mostly because there are a whole ton of images in strappy_heels -high_heels which should have the high_heels tag. The vast majority, in fact; a cursory glance at the first few pages indicates the ratio is on the order of 50:1. I think this is because most uploaders likely already assume the tag carries the implication, and don't bother to check; this is the problem I aimed to address with the initial BUR; someone searching for high_heels shouldn't be missing out on... at least a thousand posts that are only tagged as strappy heels.

I feel strongly about [...] making sure there is a way to [...] denote when the strap is attached to the footwear regardless of heel elevation.

Just due to the amount of work to populate the new tag--and given that, as the guy who brought it up, I'm somewhat liable to find myself doing that work--I'd rather not create new tags; but I can be convinced if folks reckon there is a demand for them. For now, I propose that flat-soled shoes be re-tagged with ankle strap if they don't already have it, an appropriate shoe tag, if they don't already have it, and have strappy heels removed. I further propose that the definition of ankle strap be amended to explicitly state that it is an ankle strap as part of a shoe. the definition as it stands is already at least suggestive of this, if not outright stating it; and, I see it as a perfect opportunity to make the tag meaningfully distinct and useful, compared to the horribly overlapping ankleband, which can be amended to clarify that it refers to a free-floating band around the ankle in the vein of a wristband, which, again, is implied but not explicitly stated in the definition of that tag. Now those are messy tags. Two birds with one stone, maybe? Or, maybe more work for me-- ankle_strap -shoes is quite sizable, and would need to be cleaned up. Frankly I probably shouldn't have opened this can of worms--making a new tag might be much easier than trying to clean up and redefine two messy old ones...

If nobody has objections by the next time I'm around, I'll start by amending the wiki page of strappy_heels to make it clear that it explicitly excludes flat-soled footwear; but I won't start on that right away. I also do plan to make BURs to add the implication for all of the "heel style" tags, although of course I won't start on that until the fate of strappy heels has been decided.

Apologies for not being clear

Thank you for your detailed and well-constructed response. It has also helped me better express my thoughts about the tag and led to me doing more looking in to the state of the tag. I find that it is easy for a message I write to be unclear or come off poorly, and I think some of my emphasis in particular in my initial response came off quite poorly, reading it back now. Thank you, then, for being accommodating and civil, and apologies for anything that came across as snide or rude. I do try to ensure that my posts are polite, but I am not a very good writer, so my posts often end up very imperfect in this regard--not to mention, very long.

Updated by MysteriousLounger

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