A thread on the barefooters.org mailing list sparked this post, in it people kept mentioning 'the barefoot myths' without actually telling what those myths where, even after several people asked them to explain themselves. In an effort to hopefully answer what those myths could be according to me, I replied, but as I was typing, I realized that allot of these myths are know by name to barefooters, but might use a bit more explanation to non-barefooters, so here's another post about it, joining the dozens of barefoot sites in spreading the information.
It started with the barefoot myths, which to me means myths like the one where people are convinced driving barefoot is illegal (it's legal in about every country I've checked, which includes most western European country's and the USA), or the myth that there's a health regulation banning barefoot customers from entering stores (mainly a myth in the US, there is no such health regulation).
The typical stuff where people are convinced there's some kind of law against barefooting, just because they never thought about checking what they where told while they where growing up.
While the mailing list I was posting this on was USA centric, I'm sad to say that at least the barefoot driving myth also lives in Belgium where I live.
Then there's the stuff that isn't really a myth, more of a bad understanding, like the glass and dirt on the street and tenderfoot arguments.
When I started barefooting more often, it would often happen that I visited my dad and as we walked into his backyard, he would give a warning that I would be walking into one of his dog's droppings, or onto some bugs, or onto a piece of glass. A warning that other people too, would often give me.
And every time again, my first thought was 'I haven't walked into dog droppings or glass for years, while my feet where blind inside their shoes, why would I start now when I can feel bad things on the ground even before I put my weight down?'.
There's several important parts to that bad understanding I think, the first part is that barefooters tend to know where they are putting their feet allot better than other people, simply because they've learned that they can't just smack down their feet and hope it wasn't on a pointy stone.
A barefooter learns to scan the ground for their feet before they put them down, and to feel the ground before they puts their weight on their foot, something that (just like driving) might take some practice at first, but quickly becomes an automation.
A non-barefooted person however is taught to rely on their shoes, as they are supposed to protect their feet and dampen sensations. There's another myth in there, but getting into that would double this post's length. The non-barefooter however soon learns that they can stamp down their feet wherever they want without much trouble, so they soon stop bothering with keeping an eye on the ground and before you know it they've stepped on something nasty.
I also know there's an interesting medical article related to foot puncture injury (which I can't find just now :( I'll keep looking though) that researched the amount of children that came into hospitals with puncture wounds on their feet (from stepping onto nails etc.). It found that while there where both barefooted and non-barefoot children brought in, the barefoot ones generally had lighter injuries, with only slight punctures that quickly healed, compared to the non-barefoot children who generally had more severe injuries that damaged muscles and even bones, probably because they didn't realize they had stepped on a nail until it was already deep inside their foot.
The second part to understand is that the streets aren't littered with glass, poop, rusty nails and nasty insects, most people just don't tend to notice. What they do notice is the one time in years when they do step into something nasty while walking along oblivious to the ground, but those few instances disrupt the monotony, so they get remembered due too selection bias.
A third part to understand is that a barefooters feet are also tougher than you'd think.
While those journalists who step out of their shoes and immediately start running across pointy asphalt for their 'barefoot experience' article might think otherwise, you can't just loose your shoes and stand on nails, just like about everything else, it takes some time.
If you start walking barefoot regularly (a few hours a day is a good start), then it won't take long before your feet notice, they'll think 'hey, I'm no longer inside a hot, sweaty and overprotective coffin anymore, I better get a little tougher!' and before you know it, your soles start changing.
First they will get a little harder, while you'll feel less of every pebble you walk on. After a while however, they get softer again, turning into a tough leathery skin that while it can resist most punctures, is still quite flexible. That flexibility is even part of it's defense against puncture and as an extra gift, your feet will be even cleaner looking than you thought, as the skin becomes less sweaty and the dust has a harder time sticking to it.
And after a while of regular barefooting, you can run across pointy asphalt and even broken glass isn't that much of a worry anymore, tweezers will get out the few shards that do get in or you can just wait for them to grow out, your feet have learned to defend themselves again.