Yawn.

Another day, another study purporting to tell us that a modern miracle of engineering designed to support a human body part could actually be...dangerous.

Shhh....don't look now, but Things You Put On Your Body Are Trying To Harm You.

Again.

I am speaking, of course, of a recently unveiled, grave, serious threat to first-world runners: nefarious shoes.

We'll return to the Attack of the Crippling Shoes in just a moment, but first, I'd like to take you for a little tour of this study's ideological cousins.

This meme plays out pretty much the same way. Every time. 

1. Initial assumption: Nature knows best.
2. Tangential assumption: We are animals who, like, evolved and stuff.
3. Unarguable assertion: For most of human history, we didn't have/wear X.
4. Tangential assertion: X is unnatural and interferes with Nature.
5. Observation of correlation: Since we began wearing/using X, we've gotten less healthy.
6. Whipsaw conclusion: Therefore, X is a dangerous thing that will harm, maim or kill you.
7. Bonus round: The cosmetico-couture-industrial complex doesn't want you to know this. Share it with all your friends!

LadyKittens who have had email since the days of Prodigy are doubtless already well aware that our vain, first-world, 21st-century penchant for hoisting our floppy bits a bit higher on the ribcage constitutes a dire threat to our very lives.

We know this because pretty much once a quarter since 1995, some well-meaning auntie or distant Facebook friend we haven't seen since high school sends us an Urgent! Message! That we need to Forward! To Everybody! We CARE ABOUT! To let them know that (underwire) bras cause breast cancer! I'll bet you didn't know that!

 ^{Yes? Hello? Bestform? Why Are You Trying To Give Me Cancer?}

Yeah. Well, nobody else does, either. No legitimate studies uphold such an assertion. Nada. Zippo. Zilch.

But hey, the theory makes a certain kind of "common sense," which is of course why the half-cocked rumor continues to spread. On the surface, it stands to reason that (to paraphrase the theory) bras compress breasts and chest tissue, thereby inhibiting lymphatic drainage, thereby trapping toxins in the breasts, thereby causing breast cancer.

After all, women with free-n-floppy third-world breasts in Fiji don't get as much breast cancer as first-world western women do. So it's gotta be the bras! (Not the, oh, let's see, what else might it be?...diet, obesity levels, chemicals, genetics...nah. The real problem's gotta be Victoria's Secret.)

The same "trapped lymph" theory has begun to make the rounds on the Wild, Wild Internet in relation to cancers afflicting GentleKittens, too: I quote a particularly sketchy source here (one that authoritatively avers the existence of studies that don't exist but provides no links to said studies): "Men can go through something similar: tight briefs are thought to restrict the flow of lymphatic tissue in the testicles, thereby impeding the area’s removal of wastes and toxins. The effect could be a higher chance of acquiring testicular cancer."

(The effect could also be a thousand fruitbats spontaneously flying out of Dick Cheney's ass. Both scenarios are equally supported by the evidence.)

Not ready to go full commando just yet based on a crackpot lymphatic blockage theory?

OK, so maybe your bra and undies aren't trying to kill you.

But have you considered...your razor and antiperspirant?

Because, you know, we're animals who evolved and stuff, and shaving pits is unnatural, and antiperspirants are unnatural, and toxins and lymph and...

^{I declare my beautiful natural pits a cancer-free zone! So there! Take that, Schick and Arrid Extra Dry!}

Oh, OK, fine. I'll just shut up now.

^{Devil Shoes}

Which brings us, finally, to the breathlessly reported news from the past couple days that running in shoes is actually bad for you.  Because we're animals who evolved and stuff, and shoes aren't natural...

Only that's not the real story.

Not if you read the whole thing.

No, turns out the real story is that, all things being equal, heelstrike running is more likely to produce injuries than ballstrike running, or running with a strike on the outside of the foot. Free-and-floppy barefoot runners from pure and natural places like Kenya naturally ballstrike or outside-strike (probably because it would indeed hurt like hell to heelstrike on an uninsulated heel) , while 3/4 of shoed runners studied do heelstrike, placing additional stress on feet and legs (because the weight and force of the body are concentrated on a very small part of the foot when one heelstrikes). Note that the other 25% of shod runners are striding just fine in their shoes, thankyouverymuch.

But all things are never equal, are they?

Take, for example...me. I'm not much of a runner (as I've confessed before) but I dabble. I dabble because, thanks to the design of the most excellent and miraculous (killer!) Enell Sports Bra, I am now finally able to do so without doing my chest or my back grave bouncy harm.

Now, when it comes to eschewing shoes, I've had that religion since I was a kid. I've padded around sans shoes, developing my callouses for years. Grandma used to call me her little hippie. I have shoeleather soles all on my own. I despise shoes and I go without them as frequently as I can. (The ones I wore here today are currently under my desk, while my bare feet are comfortably tucked up into half-lotus position--this has always been my favored sitting position, whether I'm on the floor or in a chair, and shoes get in the way).

So, in general? Not a fan of shoes.

Except when it comes to running. Because, you see, I'm an overpronator, and if I don't have shoes to correct that, I get shin splints. BAD shin splints.

So no, Gentle Shoe Study Designers. For me, running barefoot would not be healthier than running in shoes. I'd be injured after the first half-mile and would stop running altogether.

The real takeaway from the study, as I see it, is that heelstrike running technique is more dangerous than ballstrike or midfoot strike technique.

The issue isn't the shoes. It's the stride.

But that just wouldn't be as sexy a story as "Burn Your (Unnatural and Evolutionarily Unnecessary) Shoes Before They Hurt You," would it?

At any rate, if based on this story you'd like to take up barefoot running but don't already have quarter-inch callouses like mine to protect the bottom of your feet? Never fear.

There's a shoe for that.