"After all, if your employer allowed you to wear open-toe shoes, it would have to allow everyone to wear open-toe shoes, and when it comes to toes, our ideas of what is acceptable tend to vary according to gender."

"'Culturally we’re more accepting of women showing a bit of skin, whether cleavage on top or at the toes,' [said Susan Scafidi, the founder of the Fashion Law Institute at Fordham University]. 'And "mandals" have never read as business attire in the U.S.' Put another way: Your peep-toe pumps may be a casualty of his fisherman sandal."

I'm reading "What Is a ‘Work-Appropriate’ Shoe? Workplace dress codes can be frustratingly vague. Our critic has some guidance on navigating different interpretations and on picking your footwear" (NYT).

Is that really the law? Can't you require men to wear jackets and ties without requiring women to wear jackets and ties? 

I am reminded of my post from August 2010, "Can lady lawyers wear peep-toe shoes?" A discussion about peep-toe shoes in court took me back to my time working in Wall Street law firm — 1982 to 1984. Somehow it was an occasion to tell you about all the shoes I wore: "2 pairs of closed-toe T-strap Ferragamo shoes — 1 brown and 1 tan... a pair of black Bruno Magli pumps — low-heeled — that were very comfortable and useful... beautiful Perry Ellis black suede high heels with thin, buttoned straps... [and] beige Evan Picone shoes that were sling-back and — yes! — peep-toe." I said: "It never occurred to me that there was anything wrong with them. Maybe I missed a dress-for-success memo, but they were beautiful, dressy-looking shoes. They looked perfect... a quarter century ago." 

They still look perfect in my memory, a distance now of 40 years. But it never occurred to me until today to think that if they accepted women in peep-toe shoes, they'd have to accept a man in whatever sort of crazy peep-toe man's shoe might exist somewhere.