Forcing female employees to work in heels is no longer acceptable in 2025. Many airlines, where high heels dominated for decades, now introduce comfortable sneakers instead. But the new Japan Airlines sneakers are far more controversial than they seem. High heels play a deep and symbolic role in Asian culture.
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Why Japan Airlines sneakers matter in 2025
Yumi Ishikawa gained international attention in 2019 with a post on X, then known as Twitter. She complained about the pain she felt after a day of working in heels. The 32-year-old writer and actress found it unfair that she, like many other women in Japan, was required to wear heels while working as a receptionist at a funeral home.
After her post, the hashtag KuToo emerged, a play on the Japanese words for shoe and pain. Ishikawa launched a petition calling for a law that would ban mandatory heels in the workplace. She stressed that such rules amount to gender discrimination. Within ten days she collected thirty thousand signatures, but politicians responded weakly. Takumi Nemoto, the Japanese Minister of Health, Labour and Welfare, even stated that heels at work were appropriate and necessary.
His reaction caused global outrage, after which he retracted his statement. Japanese law prohibits gender discrimination, but in practice the rule was rarely enforced. Ishikawa received widespread support both inside and outside Japan. Studies showed that more than sixty percent of Japanese women were required to wear heels or had colleagues who had to. Eighty percent said heels caused pain.
Despite these numbers, the rules and their enforcement in Japan did not change.
Japan Airlines sneakers: the cultural shift behind the new dress code
Japan Airlines’ decision to introduce sneakers is therefore striking. In a press statement on 13 November, the airline explained that it chose the new shoes to protect employee health. The sneakers also match recent uniform updates designed to help crew cope with the summer heat.
That explanation sounds reasonable, but in a country where women have been required to wear heels for decades, this shift is anything but simple. Japan Airlines is not acting out of tradition, it is responding to growing international pressure.
Unlike companies that operate only within Japan, Japan Airlines must protect its global reputation. Since the rise of the KuToo movement, international audiences have scrutinised Japanese airlines. How can a country that legally bans gender discrimination still allow it in practice?
To avoid becoming the centre of that debate, Japan Airlines took earlier steps. In 2020, the airline scrapped the rule that forced female cabin crew to wear skirts. Women could now choose trousers, and the company reduced the maximum heel height to five centimetres. All Nippon Airways, Japan’s largest airline, quickly adopted the same approach.
Airlines in Taiwan also face pressure
Pressure from inside and outside does not always push companies to change their policies. In 2024, Taiwan’s National Human Rights Commission stepped in and directly confronted several companies, especially airlines, for enforcing discriminatory dress codes. Most female cabin crew still had to wear skirts, stockings, heels and makeup.
Taiwan had already signed a treaty protecting women’s rights, yet airlines continued to ignore it. Employees and unions filed complaints, but management dismissed them. Even when the government suspended more than one and a half million dollars in financial support, airlines refused to adjust their rules.
The situation only changed after the NHRC published a scathing report that made international headlines. Once the pressure grew, EVA Air, China Airlines and Starlux Airlines finally allowed female crew members to wear trousers.
What Japan Airlines sneakers symbolize for gender equality
The introduction of Japan Airlines sneakers may look like a small uniform update, but the step carries real weight for an Asian airline. Japan ranked 110th out of 149 countries on the World Economic Forum’s gender equality list in 2019, and has since fallen further to 118.
By replacing heels with Japan Airlines sneakers, the company actively challenges long-held expectations about how women “should” present themselves at work. Let’s hope more organisations follow this example, so female employees finally receive equal treatment. It is long overdue.
Greetings,
Aileen