Posted on 12/14/2012 5:29:50 AM PST by Kaslin
Chivalry is back in the news. The always-alert Charles Murray of the American Enterprise Institute draws our attention to an item in the Psychology of Women Quarterly. A new study on what the authors are pleased to call "benevolent sexism" (which, as Murray translates, seems to mean gentlemanly behavior) found that both women and men are happier when men behave like gentlemen.
This being a sociological publication, though, the findings are not written in English, but rather in academic argot. It's full of sentences like this: "A structural equation model revealed that benevolent sexism was positively associated with diffuse system justification within a sample of 274 college women and 111 college men."
If you spend more than $100,000 on an undergraduate and graduate education in women's studies, you can learn to be this impenetrable, too.
The authors of the study were quick to warn readers about what they'd discovered. "Our findings reinforce the dangerous nature of benevolent sexism and emphasize the need for interventions to reduce its prevalence." Right. Though it seems to increase the life satisfaction of both sexes, it must still be eradicated.
When feminists set out to remake the sexes back in the 1970s, they seemed to choose all the wrong traits to emulate and/or eliminate. Women were encouraged to match the promiscuity, aggressiveness, and irresponsibility of men. In other words, women were to model themselves on the worst men. Meanwhile, the best traits of traditional men -- specifically their most chivalrous and protective impulses -- were to be maligned, mocked, and resented.
Still dancing on Mitt Romney's political grave, feminist writer Gina Barreca told the Washington Post's Gene Weingarten that Romney would be a "terrible, terrible date." (Leave it to a feminist who wants women to be taken seriously to evaluate a presidential candidate as a potential date.) Why? Because he'd be chivalrous. "Chivalry is the opposite of good manners. It's infantilizing. It's contempt masquerading as politeness. The chivalrous guy is establishing roles; he is the protector, you are Limoges. Your job is to let him be masterful. In my experience, when you are standing on a pedestal, there's not much room to move around. That's by design."
Emily Esfahani Smith isn't buying the chivalry as disguised power grab line. Writing in the Atlantic, she notes (as Rich Lowry has highlighted) the contrast between the Titanic and the Costa Concordia -- two sinkings 100 years apart. Three quarters of the women on the Titanic survived, while three quarters of the men died. In 1912, men would have been ashamed of themselves if they failed to protect women -- even at the cost of their lives. Was that just "contempt masquerading as politeness"? On the Costa Concordia, early in 2012, men shoved women aside to get into the lifeboats. Oh well, at least the women had more room to move around than on that darn pedestal.
Smith reminds us that chivalry arose in response to the violence and barbarism of the Middle Ages. "It cautioned men to temper their aggression, deploying it only in appropriate circumstances -- like to protect the physically weak and defenseless members of society." Obviously many men failed to fulfill the ideal. We've always had boorish behavior. But wasn't it preferable to label boorish behavior as such, rather than celebrate it as a victory for sexual equality?
The chivalric code persists to this day, despite the best efforts of the feminists. When a shooter opened fire at an Aurora, Colo. movie theater, no fewer than three young men protected their girlfriends from bullets with their own bodies -- and died in the process.
Smith includes an anecdote that sums up the case for chivalry. Samuel Proctor, pastor of Harlem's Abyssinian Baptist Church, tipped his hat to a lady. She was offended and demanded, "What is that supposed to mean?"
He replied: "Madame, by tipping my hat I was telling you several things. That I would not harm you in any way. That if someone came into this elevator and threatened you, I would defend you. That if you fell ill, I would tend to you and if necessary carry you to safety. I was telling you that even though I am a man and physically stronger than you, I will treat you with both respect and solicitude. But frankly, Madame, it would have taken too much time to tell you all of that; so, instead, I just tipped my hat."
Bravo for you!!! Nice!!!
Hey, we gotta do what we gotta do, right?
They don’t care, why should we? I don’t anymore.
I find that it helps to look them straight in the eye just before you hold the door.
Give them the look that says, “I’m being polite, the way I was raised. I expect a thank you, but I’ll be fine if you weren’t raised that way. But if you are rude, don’t think I’m going to apologize. I’m going to rip you a new a$$hole and I’m going to enjoy doing it.”
This is funny.
This very morning at work I was walking out to the lobby area. We have large, heavy doors (locked from the lobby) into our office area.
Two men were in front of me going out as well, and a man (Bob) was incoming. He held the door open for all 3 of us.
The 2 guys ahead of me made a big fuss (joking) says “Thanks Bob for holding the door!”
Bob just smirked and said “I was holding the door for the lady behind you”....
I try to go through life looking for people to help. I also know however that being old and female, it works better if I go first out of the elevator or through the door. Someone has to go first and age before beauty and ladies first both being social conventions I go first. Now if there is someone with a cane or walker no matter what the gender or age, he/she goes first. Oh, and I also have trained myself to always walk to the right. I’m left handed and I had to work at this and now I notice that a great many people go to the left (in a hall or narrow space). What’s with that?
“But men, once again, are supposed to smile when we are being kicked in the teeth and we are supposed to say, “Thank ma’amsir, may I have another?””
Only white, Christian men are supposed to smile. For the others, white, Judeo/Christian society is responsible for their plight in life.
I’m so sick of their smug, “I am extremely intelligent and so I always vote for the socialist” smiles that I just look for the opportunity to ruin their day.
Another favorite is when I see them on the road with an Obammie the Commie bumper sticker to pass by scratching my cheek with my middle finger, the same way Obammie the Commie did (isn’t he so hip, he saw that Seinfeld episode). And I do it long enough for them to know I know what I’m doing.
Having said that, I think I've been glared at once for holding a door for a 'lady'.
I live on the third floor of our building, and none of us here, men or women, have a problem holding a door for anyone, moving furniture or whatever.
I spend a lot of time on a bicycle, and occasionally someone holds the door for me when I get home. Whoever it is, I say thanks.
Looks like a slightly younger version of Mac’s mom on “Sunny in PHI”.
“Womens studies”. Huh. Is that where they learn how to wash dishes, iron and mop the floor?
The feminists are easy to spot; don’t bother being polite to them. The rest of us you can spot - we smile and are polite, and when you open doors for us, we let you know with a nice ‘thank you.’
I have noticed more and more men opening doors and being chivalrous in other ways; I think it is a sign that feminism is waning, even here in CA, and not a moment too soon. What a disgusting, man-hating way of acting.
I even got whistled at the other day; I thot it was very sweet. Made me laugh.
Those Marxists are ‘always winter, never Christmas’ in oh, so many ways.
It’s alright sweetie - I open the door for my dog as well but he doesn’t bite me when I do it!
Mel
The “scratch with the middle finger” move! YES!!!
I also do the “wiping something from my eyebrow with the middle finger” move.
F*** them and their smugness.
Not me. I enjoy being a girl!
My expectations for my own manners are not affected by what others do. My parents never accepted, “But look what he did!!!” as an excuse for not meeting their standards, and neither do I.
If other adults behave inappropriately, I consider that simply being that person is its own punishment.
A pilot I flew with years ago told me of opening a door for a woman when he was about 9 or 10. She angrily spewed, “Don’t you open the door for me because I am a lady!”
To which he replied, “I’m not. I’m opening it because I am a gentleman.”
Loved it!
I have opened doors for ladies and the elderly as long as I can remember and I won’t stop. I raised all my sons to do the same. I also always offer to assist ladies with anything heavy etc...
I have never been castigated for doing such but probably because I live in the south. Even then I would simply reply, “your welcome and move on” that IMO would do more to anger them but you have to remember as a Christian and gentleman example your are also being watched by others.
We have to wait a couple of minutes for my Son to get into Walmart half the time because he will open the door for his mother and and I. He will stand there until everyone in eyesight is in the building. (He is 11, and a boyscout)
I believe that a LARGE majority of the people in the world are decent folks (even some of the misguided ones that vote dem). The small minority of buttheads out there are the ones that make life harder on the rest of us.
I did the same exact thing a few weeks ago at a convenience store. She went and complained to the store manager that I was rude and slammed the door in her face.
When I explained to him, exactly what happened, he told her that he thought I was owed an apology. She went into a screaming tirade! He then threw her out of the store for upsetting his other customers.
Exactly, I grew up in a family of mostly boys, I open doors for men if I am in the position to do it and I gladly accept a man, a woman, or a child opening a door for me.
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