Women are but flowers, requiring tender care and kindest words. They are a separate species, without which we men might perish, but for which we must be strong and deferential, the proverbial knight in shining armour. This belief system is chivalry and it is the most dangerous type of sexism because the behavior pretends to be benign.
Where do you think this behavior comes from? From the belief that women are physically and emotionally inferior and require extra attention and protection. That they are incapable of fending for themselves (and incidentally that other men are deserving of little or no consideration). I’ve got no contention with basic politeness, but when it singles out a single gender as more deserving, then it’s plain discrimination. Worse, because it sets up gender role expectations that have ripples throughout our society.
For example, if men are the breadwinners, the ones who pay for everything on the dates, then why is it surprising that a woman will get paid less for doing the same job as a man? Why is it surprising that though women make up a little more than half of the population and have had the right to vote for nearly 100 years, that far less than half of politicians are women and that we’ve never once had a female president? Why do you think men get the right to decide on reproductive rights for women?
I say, Fuck Chivalry. I’d stake its still beating heart to the earth if I could, set it afire and spit in the ashes afterwards. It’s a vampire carrying undeath to the idea that men and women are so vastly different and inequal that they merit completely different behavior (at least from men, what women do amongst themselves is of no import). That’s right, I say women can open their own doors, pay for their own dinner and buy their own flowers (while earning an equal wage and the same opportunities and respect as men). Nothing wrong with some equal exchange or common courtesy within heterosexual dating, but basing it on a gender expectation is absurd.
A friend of mine responded: Story — I have a male friend who is BEYOND chivalrous. It’s just
his thing and he feels sincerely, physically uncomfortable not to do so. He gets jackets, holds doors, etc. I once had a mini-argument with him when I refused to take his jacket when I was cold. (I often have an acidic reaction to chivalry that goes beyond some door holding and the like. I like it to go both ways.)