[Blarg]

They're standard throughout Asia and the Pacific -- Micronesia, Polynesia. They're perfect for places too hot and humid to feel comfortable wearing shoes and socks(yep, plenty of places are just that hot), but where nobody wants you to leave your foot sweat and gunk on their floors, and even the truly leather-footed locals like a little protection sometimes.

I don't mind seeing people's feet and did so all my growing up years in the Pacific. I don't get the erotic charge out of it some people do, though, maybe because I'm so used to seeing them. Feet are just feet. Hair on toes? About as startling or repulsive as hair on the back of someone's hands. I'm going to reach a little farther than that to find things to get repulsed about.

As for awful looking toenails, wearing shoes is approximately infinitely more likely to result in toenail and other foot problems, as you don't get any air and your feet are crammed into a tight space with pressure put on the sides with every step, and your sweat-soaked socks breeding whatever those things breed crammed in there with you for hours. You can even tell "haole feet" if you're from the pacific because people often have crushed together, misshapen toes from growing up having them in shoes. Not healthy and not good. Plus, having your toes in shoes means you're less likely to watch their appearance, because nobody can see them.

I agree with you that flip-flops are not preferred footwear for visiting the Whitehouse. They are not appropriate for some other places too.

As far as them being basically banished, that's silly. Believe me, if you live in hot places, they're a godsend, and if you didn't wear them too, you'd be the sucker, not the rest of the population. One thing people who are professionals love about Hawaii is that much of the professional and business culture there finds it perfectly acceptable to not wear idiotic things Americans burden themselves with like neckties, and long-sleeved shirts and jackets no matter how brutally hot it is and how much you're roasting alive in your own stink inside them.

See? It works both ways.