Shoes have been a powerful, unifying symbol for #MillionsMissing since the first global protest in 2016. Demonstrations across the world have displayed rows of shoes to represent what people are missing from their lives due to myalgic encephalomyelitis. The haunting image of rows of shoes symbolizing the effect of this disease on people’s lives continues to be told through its portrayal in the Unrest documentary.
There have been many variations of the shoe display. One person in the Netherlands put out a small arrangement in front of her home. There was a simple display to accompany a small rally in Massachusetts. Sydney used flip flops on the beach. Melbourne created an impressive display of shoes on the lawn in front of the Victoria State Library.
If you are unable to attend a demonstration, we encourage anyone to host their own “visibility action,” which can be as simple as putting out a pair of shoes with a tag explaining what you are missing from your life, or holding one of our posters with a message, or creating your own. 
Even for individual actions, we encourage you to register. Check out the step-by-step guide for instructions: [Global] [AU] [USA] [UK]
If you would like to send your shoes to a demonstration, here is the list of locations accepting shoes.

Tips for displaying shoes

If you plan to use shoes in your demonstration this year, here are a few tips:
Have a plan for collecting and removing the shoes.

  • You can ask people to bring a few pairs of shoes to represent people with ME, and then encourage them to take them home at the end of the event. 
  • You can ask people to send you shoes. Be clear about what you will do with the shoes afterwards. We recommend donating the shoes to a charity afterwards.
  • Print this tag to attach to the shoe to tell a story about the person. 
Facebook
Twitter
WhatsApp
Email

2 thoughts on “The Power of the Shoe”

Comments are closed.

Latest News

Graphic of yellow canary over black and white photo of a coal mine. Text reads "Canary Corps"

CANARY CORPS – Alison’s Story

Have you registered yet to join us this Wednesday, December 6th at 4pm ET / 1pm PT for a community presentation introducing the Canary Corps program? Ahead of Wednesday’s event we wanted to share with you Alison’s story. Alison Sbrana will be co-presenting this event, and much of the design of Canary Corps has been

Read More »
A rectangle image with a blueish/purple background. The words, "A Year of Exciting Medical Education Achievements" is in white font on the left hand side with the #MEAction logo underneath. On the righthand side is an image of Jaime Seltzer with a step and repeat and poster at the SDMI conference.

A Year of Exciting Medical Education Achievements

A year ago, we were proud to announce that #MEAction and Mayo Clinic Rochester had won a grant for diagnostic improvement, with Ravindra Ganesh, and Stephanie Grach, and I on the grant as co-investigators. Our project, Improving Diagnostic Accuracy of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Through Implementation of an Enhanced Education Protocol and Care Process Model

Read More »
a light orange rectangle with a burnt orange outline. in the box, there are orange flag garlands hanging in both top corners with orange confetti in the middle and at the top. in the bottom corners fall leaves. in the middle of the box the word, "OUR BOLDEST THANKS" in burnt orange. the #MEAction logo at the bottom.

#MEAction Shares Our Thanks for Your BOLD ACTIONS

During this time of thankfulness and gratitude, #MEAction staff wants to share what BOLD ACTIONS we are thankful our volunteers and community have taken throughout the year. We thought we could reflect together on all that we have accomplished this year and how every single one of us is important in this powerful community. A

Read More »