In 1955 in Italy, defense shoes, complete with spurs on toes and heels to kick away sex pests, were designed by a Roman shoemaker to protect young girls from street. Police at the time referred to those harassing young women as “parrots” – because the girls said they repeated the same silly phrase all the time.
Reviews of the shoes suggested such a girl would be “publicly displaying her vanity … that her own good looks would encourage pursuit” and that the wise boy would give the spur-shod girl a wide berth “because of the unmistakeable evidence of spurs on the heart and probably the tongue.”
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