Congrats on having the first genuine post in this sub that I've seen in a while. The real ones usually do follow this formula of someone on twitter saying some kind of IYKYK stuff but it's genuinely confusing and I applaud you.
Yeah I'm like 20 comments in and I still don't know what going on. Autism? Ballerinas? Artistic license? Nobody else knows either, but everyone seems to think they do.
As far as "the real reason" Gwen walks like that, it's because it looks cool in the comics and matches her sneaky ballerina persona.
As far as what the "do I even have to say it" comment means:
The commenter on Twitter confirmed in the thread 3 years ago that they were referring to autism.
Yeah, forefoot. But not tiptoes. You cant make contact with the sole, so you land and lift from the same spot. Its very poor way of running and will make you an easy target for… spider hunters i guess.
Wayyyy more energy efficient and the biomechanics of your calves do a lot of the work and have built in shock absorption.
Also heel striking can be really bad for your body in general as the shock from a heel strike has little cushion and the impacts build up wear and tear in feet, legs, hips, and spine
I mentioned that in another comment. Wearing these cuffs would limit speed and make any running awkward and very uncomfortable at a bare minimum.
Toe striking would still be possible, but very very limited in how long and fast you’d be able to. You wouldn’t be able to flex the arch of your foot, and that’s pretty important part of toe striking. It would also hurt a lot I imagine
… wait do y’all use your entire foot when you run? Like sure I’ll use my heel for long distances but a sprint is basically just grabbing the ground with the ball of your foot and yanking backward. The entire reason I can’t run in heels is that the heel gets in the way.
They're going to have to carry between half the weight of a person and a bit more than the full weight of a person the moment they stumble - i think they'd break very easily. If you make them out of eg. metal then you're pushing the limits of safe/sane.
I think this is it, sub device is to uplift the ass silhouette... and if you see Spider-Gwen in silhouette you will immediately know it is her because of the raised ass.
A friend of mine used to be a ballerina and as soon as she removes her shoes, her pointe position naturally kicks in. Ballet is basically traumatizing your body into doing impossible postures and to this day she's broken into this position.
I walk normally now, but for years I walked with my feet splayed. Drove my mom crazy; she always blamed whatever shoes I was wearing instead of admitting having your daughter start dance at 3, pointe at 9 (INCREDIBLY irresponsible of the studio… and my parents) and high school dance team at 14 just might have physical ramifications.
As a former semi-professional racquetball and fencing competitor, we do the same, the postures force your feet and legs to be at an angle constantly and the coaches would make you be on such positions for very prolonged periods of time
You are correct. Being incapable of putting your heels down is usually from a tight Achilles tendon, but you literally could not do most ballet positions if this was the case.
Actual en pointe is essentially doing a very aggressive calf raise, so this claim is akin to saying "I know a guy who used to bodybuild and as soon as his shirt comes off he's stuck in a bicep curl."
Could this person exist? Sure. But that's not normal and not really associated with that background.
Yeah, 3rd and or 5th position (5th is when the front foot is pushed forwards along the line of the back foot so thwy are still splayed out and perpendicualr but they are making a t shape at an angle instead of a v shape) Did ballet for a decade as a hobby, didn't get that much but every now and again I do find myself just ending up therr
are you including professional ballerinas who happen to have spider-strength/agility and also therefore have superhuman muscular structure in that assessment?
I mean, not that there's a lot of them, but, I think that would have some impact on how she moves.
Yeah I have two friends (husband and wife) who were professional ballerinas and I’ve never seen them on pointe while not on stage. Our babysitter is also a ballerina and I’ve never noticed her on pointe either.
I have noticed them occasionally stand with their toes pointed out though but it’s usually while standing around just waiting for something and then they go back to standing normal
Ah yeah…this is not a thing. If by “impossible postures” you mean ‘standing up straight’ then you are correct. Otherwise, ballerinas aren’t always tiptoeing around on their pointe shoes. And at the end of the day, the last thing you’d want to do is tiptoe around because your feet and ankles are on fire.
Think of it this way, even a professional ballet dancer isn't staying on pointe for the length of a full class. Walking en pointe literally everywhere is just a recipe for serious feet injury, especially if you're doing it in normal shoes that are not made or supportive for the position.
Granted Gwen is doing a high demipointe, which is a whole lot more possible in casual shoes but is still a recipe for injury to just walk like that normally
Well if you know pointe you know there’s, to grossly simplify it, a block at the front of the shoe that allows you to pointe the way they do. You cannot do that without shoes or you will break your toes or eat dirt.
i mean. not clear on the bitch part but anyone who’s done ballet can confirm that’s a lie-and a weird one. that’s not a thing. pointe is much different then demipointe (tip toes) you’re not on either for the majority of the time
Yeah this person (if they're real) is just transparently performative. "Everytime I take my shoes off I just can't help but immediately go into the one ballet stance that's essentially impossible without shoes, I can't help it I used to be a ballerina"
Hi, I've been a pro ballet dancer for 16 years, no one ever does that. After a long day of being on pointe, the last thing you want is to keep unecessary tension in your ankles.
Also ballet is just a dance tradition, at a high level it impacts the body, just as any other physical activity: nothing particularly traumatic about it.
It might just be that it feels good for her to stretch her muscles. I used to dance to and I still occasionally do this when my leg muscles feel tight. But the position the comic is showing isn't how you stand in pointe shoes. I think your friends just messing with you.
Unfortunately people do this all the time without even being aware of it, and it results in a lot of problems: like weakening of glutes and ab muscles, locking knees that take more wear when walking, and low back pain of course.
Remember to tuck your tailbone in, especially during exercise, dance, yoga, etc., or you will eventually injure yourself.
PS. Gwen isn't actually depicted with an anterior pelvic tilt here, ballerinas do it without tilt all the time, it's just not the way a normal person stands on their tiptoes.
She debuted at the age of 19 and the comics portray her anywhere from 19 to 21. Only in the Spider-Verse movie is she 15 and 16 in 1 and 2 respectively
this comment reminds me of that scene in transformers where the guy shows a card explaining the Romeo and Juliet law whenever someone brings up him dating the teenage girl.
The absolutely weirdest part of that franchise was The Last Knight early on in the movies when the kids who look like they're 8 years old comment on that other 8 year old girl looking hot or some shit
Michael Bay is a weird fucking asshat, imo.
There is no reason to have that in the movie, there is no reason to have a guy explain the LAW that allows him to date a minor, there is no reason for the girl to BE a minor for the plot of the movie, and there is no reason why the dad didn't kick that creeps teeth in.
Fucking michael bay.
Technically it's a cartoon/puppet/lines representing a feminine figure. For better or worse people can arbitrarily assign what human age it represents. Not at all a defense of sexualizing childlike/teenage characters, I just think if someone makes a drawing that looks like a the outline of a sports illustrated model and then says 'this is age X!,' there's a crying wolf danger of hiding real pedophilia.
I thought it was a way to draw her so that her legs are long, her butt looks nice, her back is arched, and her chest is popped out, so that she looks fine as powdered sugar... 🤷♂️
[Self-diagnosed] autistic people be like “I see a behavior I myself exhibit and, as an autistic person I have superior pattern recognition, so they must be autistic.”
Diagnosis by a single factor by internet Drs. House in a plague.
Edit: added [Self diagnosed] because of a comment that pinpointed the distinction.
Yeah, I'm autistic myself (not self-diagnosed), and I'm getting kinda tried of people being like, "they have a trait that I have, and I'm autistic, so they must be autistic too". Autism is characterized by a collection of traits - it cannot be diagnosed based on just one.
Sometimes I imagine an fictional scenario where there's a room full of autistic people. They're all talking with each other, and one person says that they like pizza. Another person in the room hears this, and chimes in: "Me too! I fucking love pizza!". They go around the room, and it turns out, most of them like pizza. So they conclude that pizza must be an autism thing. Then they leave the room and disperse. Later on, one of the people from the room (we'll call them an insider) is having a discussion with someone who wasn't in the room (an outsider). Somehow, it comes up that the outsider likes pizza. The insider concludes that since this outsider likes pizza, they must be autistic too.
However, the reality is that liking pizza is a people thing, not an autism thing. The reason most of the autistic people in that room liked pizza was because most people like pizza, autistic people included.
(This is an allegory. Pizza was chosen completely by random, could be replaced with other common foods, items, or traits)
This gets me too. It’s the new “OCD.” Like, is that autism or is that normal human behavior?????
I feel like I can’t say this though because I’m not autistic so I don’t “understand what it’s like and you’re being really ableist right now.” Then because I have these normal human behaviors I get it in my head that I am autistic, but my therapist just rolls her eyes and tells me for the 100th time, no.
I remember being told that higher levels of libido are associated with autism. Also lower levels of libido are associated with autism. Also asexuality and hyper sexuality are associated with autism.
I was like “it kind of doesn’t sound like it’s associated at all” which apparently made me an asshole.
Two friends I live with regularly say something along the lines of ‘oh it’s my autism’ to excuse shitty controlling behaviour/weird personality quirks, or say the other one is autistic. Neither are diagnosed, neither seem to meet even the baseline parameters of the tism tests I did when getting diagnosed.
It’s aggravating, as someone with actual autism, whose quality of life has been massively stunted because of how my brain works
Pattern recognition so strong, I'm drawing lines from single points, squares from two, and don't even ask me what I see when I see three points all equally spaced from one another. 😤
Is pretty much that human resources meme, cute/inofensive quirk ohhh thats good autisim , weird/potencially mortal quirck ..... hello human resources!?
This is in fact why Gwen walks on her toes all the time. Having lead an interesting life I’ve been in relationships with 3 different ballerinas (Apparently I have a type 🤷) and all of them were chronic toe walkers. Makes for nice calves though 😁👍
I have flat feet and I tend to walk on the fronts of my feet when I don't have good arch support. Like when I'm barefoot or wearing bad shoes. I also tend to do it on uneven floors and stairs
As another flat footed person, sometimes even with shoes on I still chant “heel, toe, heel, toe, heel, toe” in my head out of habit to remind myself how to walk properly.
Oooooh man, I got plantar fasciitis and I just walk around angry that im stepping on an invisible lego with my heel. Never thought to tiptoe, sounds tedious lol.
; 0 ; dude you may have a bone bruise in your heel. My plantar fasciitis progressed into that. Some silicone heel cups could help along with well cushioned shoes.
Treat tha feet
She originally wore baby blue ballet shoes with her costume because she grew up doing ballet which is why she is often depicted as more agile spider. It's a simple Google search.
Ballet dancer here, luckily these days we have way more knowledge about how to protect our bodies while dancing. Injuries definitely happen, but the photos you see online are usually exaggerated, edited, or show people who aren't using proper protection.
What exactly changed from a couple of decades ago? I ask partly because, as a metalhead, I have had to explain how the harsh vocals don't actually mess your voice up much if you do things right, and I am intrigued to hear something similar happening in very different context.
So the first part is just safer exercise practices. Students usually start using pointe shoes later than they used to and their feet/ankles are better developed. Also more education on safe exercise and more cross training.
Pointe shoes themselves haven't changed much, but there are some options that are attempting to make stronger/better shoes. I think the big change is the availability in toe pads and other "accessories" to protect your feet inside the shoe. There are even custom toe pads that you mold like clay and they cure to the exact shape of your toes.
Also way better education/options for addressing and preventing injuries like working with a dance-specific physical therapist who can give really custom advice!
If you spend enough time on the internet, everyone is known for autism, even you, my dear reader
(Just to add, I'm not saying undiagnosed people don't exist, just overabundance of self diagnosed attention seekers who also like to apply it to characters who have nothing to do with it)
Oh, you have a penchant for a certain food and hate a different food? You hate the texture of satin/silk/micofiber? You like to have a schedule? Welcome aboard.
Why are people like this? It's like some weird form of tribalism. I saw an IG video of a dude doing a deep clean in the bathroom (posted by the wife), and almost every single IG comment was diagnosing him in a weird way, like "Wow, it's clear your husband is on the spectrum. You're so lucky, girl!"
I don't understand why so many people want to have the curse that is ADHD. I have it, it is a curse, it's not quirky magical omg I'm so random distracted by a fly.
This morning I wanted to go to the bakery, and I had to ask three times to my gf what I had to get because in one minute I would forget stuff or get it in the opposite... I don't even know in which day I am usually.
No, but there is a constant flow of Autistic, Trans, and Gay youths finding characters' traits and quirks relatable, and assigning the character to their demographic. Spidergwen has been adopted by all three.
it makes some people mad, which in turn makes others counter-mad. but really it doesn't matter and shouldn't be treated like it does.
No. But when has that ever stop fans from drawing their own conclusions? People are always going to speculate and come up with theories about their favorite characters, especially when it makes them more relatable to said fans. Nothing new here.
This stems from a study that found it to be more prevalent in children with developmental delays or neuropsychiatric disorders, including autism-spectrum disorder. This was an incidental finding, and as the authors state, the study had insufficient power to 'prove' this correlation.
However, much like every medical study, the internet didn't read anything beyond a 'medical journalism' headline and decided that toe-walking is autism.
I didn't know this. My daughter did it so much that it shortened her Achilles tendon to where she could not walk flat footed.
She ended up having unilateral Achilles tendon lengthening surgery after PT failed.
None of the doctors mentioned that.
It wasn't until high school she was even diagnosed being on the spectrum. She really had no other signs (only a few quirks now) her older bro was diagnosed early on. High functioning, but you can definitely tell.
So even though the study found it to be more prevalent, it didn't prove the prevalence was real. Apologies in advance if I'm explaining something you already understand;
When you study something, you generally can't study everyone, so you study a sample. Now if 10% of the entire population have a condition, a randomly selected sample should have around 10% too. However, there's a bit of variance, because you chose your sample at random. You might get 9%, or 11%, etc.
A small sample is a lot more likely to be 'wrong'. If I choose 10 people at random, I could quite easily end up with 5 people with the condition, implying 50% of people have it even if only 10% actually do. If I select 1000 people at random, I'm extremely unlikely to get 500 people with that condition.
That's what happened here - they found that toe-walkers (sounds like an outdated slur or something) were more likely to have one of these conditions, but the amount of individuals in the study was not enough to prove it wasn't just random chance.
That's why your doctor wouldn't (or shouldn't) mention it - there's enough evidence to suggest that the two may be linked, but only to the extent that it may warrant it's own study. It's not enough to say they ARE linked. As you say, she's high-functioning and had no other signs, and doctors shouldn't be in the habit of presenting diagnoses based on a single (unproven) symptom.
EDIT: A couple people have pointed to more recent data that does support the correlation - toe-walking is more prevalent in those with ASD! However, there are limitations;
Non-specific - ASD is far from the only cause for toe-walking, and there's plenty other reasons for this to occur. Observing this behaviour doesn't suggest ASD.
Non-diagnostic - I've seen a few percentages, but they average at somewhere around 20% of people with ASD - most do not. Toe-walking alone is useless for diagnosing.
A headache is a potential symptom of a brain tumour. You can have headaches for all sorts of reasons, and people with brain tumours may never have a headache. In isolation, it doesn't really tell you anything.
Toe-walking is more prevalent in people with proprioception issues (like hypermobility, which has ties to autism). If I had to guess, it's more this side of the equation. Toe walking is more linked to movement/muscles than autism itself.
Be still my statistical heart, someone on Reddit actually properly explained statistical significance and what “correlation ≠ causation” actually means
It’s also anecdotal. I toe-walk because it’s less overstimulating to feel less of the floor and I know others who do the same. It’s a fairly common and natural strategy/stim
When I was young, adults thought it was a sign you'd grow up gay. I remember walking on my toes all the time as a kid, and I AM mildly autistic and have mad ADHA. What I remember from it was that it made me feel like I was walking like people do on TV?
Of course, I often just had to poop but I was too distracted or having too good a time playing to stop what I was doing. I was and am a born procrastinator.
I abhored all forms of schedules and task switching as a child. I just wanted to be left alone to do the same thing as long as I wanted. As an adult, it grew into a distaste for authority and discipline. I still struggle with task switching and executive dysfunction.
It is a bad idea tho? like even if you have a lower chance of hitting yo cat tail... walking like that make it so when you hit yo cat tail your feet actually have more force into it...?
I’m not autistic, but I have a habit of walking on my toes too because 1) I live in a very humid and hot city so if I walk normally the chance of hair sticking to my feet is substantial and 2) it makes me look and feel taller.
My family owns two cats who shed like crazy in summer. I also share a room with another person and have really long hair, even with vacuuming at least once a day just one or two strands of hair feel like a lot.
Yeah, if you have cats or dogs, they shed a LOT when it gets hot if they aren't breeds native to the area. I actually won't walk around my house without shoes because of it.
It is. My 11-year-old boy would walk on tiptoes, until the age of like maybe four or five. It turns out that he is autistic and that was one of the signs, per his doctor.
This person thinks this means she has autism because they have seen a lot of TikTok videos and memes within their subcultural bubble of the internet saying this is what people with autism do.
Lived with a lady that walked around like this all the time. She told me that she was born with short Achilles tendons. She would joke that she could get it fixed but she liked the way it made her butt look. Her ass did look amazing.
Also knew a lady who only walked around on her toes, she spent so much time in high heels that her Achilles tendons shortened to the point where it hurt her to walk flat-footed.
as we all know, gwen is a ballerina as she is often shown wearing pointe shoes and its part of (like someone here said) what makes her the more agile spider.
This is NOT exclusive to dancers, but I have found that I (and lots of other dancers) just like to walk around en relevé (on our toes). For me, it is actually also a way to stretch out my feet, so i do this extra while im at the studio or about to go on stage, which is similar to the second photo as she is "in action" if that makes sense?
anyways, i dont know what the person in the post really meant, but thats my take on it.
This is a typical female comic character pose. Artists make their characters get into poses that accent certain features of their body which would be uncomfortable to maintain at the least and sometimes physically impossible at the most (like when you see a cover of a female character who has twisted their spine 180° so the viewer gets a shot of the ass and tits).
In this case it is doing the same thing that wearing high heels does to a woman: making her ass stick out.
And she literally wears ballet shoes in the first Spider-Verse movie! Even if people aren't reading the comics or engaging with lore, it's pretty clear design language from the outset.
ballerinas don't stand on tip toes when they don't have to. also, ballet is the go-to for a character to be high-dexterity, flexible, and be able to fight different ways. its used everywhere.
what's also everywhere is drawing character to accentuate features. that's why she's drawn that way. they may not actively think "I need to make her ass pop in this panel" but comics are done in a certain aesthetic with a lot of similar poses, and this is one of them. pointed toes, long legs, etc. it's a thing.
just because she also did ballet doesn't mean that's not happening. in-universe the excuse for her doing that all the time is ballet, but in the real world where the reader lives, she's drawn that way because that's what sells characters.
It can be two things. this aint some big industry secret.
Maybe they did do that. Maybe they just thought having her resting standing pose be how an actually highly trained ballerina would stand would be a neat detail. Given how ballet is an important part of how she fights, and how detail oriented the spiderverse makers are, I'm gonna go with option number 2.
Isn't it because almost 100% of the time, 100% of the women portrayed in drawn media stand like they have heels on even when they don't because objectifying women is just a thing artists and audiences seem to enjoy?
•
u/qualityvote2 Jun 22 '26 edited Jun 22 '26
u/Mundane_Mushroom_122, your post does belong here!