Chivalry can be taken a bit too far

[CelticRose]

Okay, so I'm waiting at the bus stop in the pouring down rain with a bunch of other people. I've just been grocery shopping, but I've got most of my stuff in my backpack and another waterproof bag with the rest wrapped in several layers of plastic grocery bags (yes, I will recycle them), so none of my stuff is getting wet. I'm wearing a full-length coat, a hat, gloves, boots, and I'm carrying an umbrella. I'm as dry as one can reasonably be in a steady downpour.

When the bus comes, several guys, none of whom are carrying an umbrella and most of whose raingear consists of only a hoodie or a jacket, try to motion me ahead of them in the line to get on the bus.

Now, to me this is just plain silly. I mean, I generally like chivalry, and I appreciate it when guys make those polite gestures and I always thank them nicely. However, it makes no sense for a guy to stand in the pouring down rain for my sake when I'm not even getting wet.

I did manage to convince all but one of them that it really made more sense for them to go ahead of me since they were getting wet and I wasn't.

So, guys, what do you think about this? Should common sense or politeness prevail in such situations?

 

[MG1962]

Always treat a lady like a lady. Aside from getting wet they are allowing you a better choice of seat on the bus

 

[AvalonXQ]

It may not have been strictly a gender thing. I will generally let someone with their hands full on the bus/train in front of me, so they have time to get on and arrange their stuff on the seat before we leave.

 

[Carnivore]

I would have done the same thing. I'll generally offer to let anyone go ahead of me if several people are waiting together at a bus stop, especially if it's raining or the bus looks full. I don't mind getting wet. I'll fight all comers for my tram seat though.

 

[myowninvention]

Huh. Send those people up to Montreal please- I've had a hard time getting a seat on the bus when 8 months pregnant. We could use a bit of chivalry.

 

[truethat]

You could have just gotten on the bus in the amount of time it took you to convince them that they were getting wet, dude they were getting wet while you were explaining it. Just get on the damn bus. LOL

 

[TragicMonkey]

They were being literally chivalrous. Your umbrella was spooking their horses and they needed you to furl it and get aboard before they could persuade their horses on there.

 

[caniswalensis]

I don't know if there is a difinitive answer.

I do not think the relative inconvenience to the two parties has ever been considered important, though.

It is about old-fashioned gallantry more than practicality. "The smallest hair on your head is more important to me that my own person."

Think of Sir Walter Raleigh, famously said to have laid down his cloak over a puddle for Queen Elizabeth I to walk on. He suffered much greater harm than she would have had he not done what he did. Her shoes would have been wetted, maybe muddied, but he ended up with a soaking, muddy cloak. It was far worse for him.

However, that is not the point. He was saying to her "Even a great inconvenience to myself is less painful to me than the smallest one to you." That is the principle at the heart of chivalous behavior towards a lady.

It is not that we think you are not capable of enduring hardship. It is that we cannot bear to see you have to.

I think it is grand that you care enough about strangers to worry that you are taking advantage. I also acknowledge that this is a very old way of looking at things, and it is now a different day and age. I admire when a lady wants to indulge in the same gallantry towards men, as equals. It gives me some hope that human nature is not all bad.

So I do not say you are wrong for assessing the situation and letting the less protected men go first. It was very gallant of you.

I think as our culture continues to evolve, we shall all have to be ready to be treated gallantly at times.

 

[JamesDillon]

"Chivalry" seems to me like the velvet glove of patriarchy. If sex discrimination is bad, why is it less bad when the woman gets some small-scale benefit out of it? The long-term effect is still the entrenchment of the idea that women are weaker and more fragile and should be held to a lower standard. So hold the door for them, but don't expect their pretty little heads to handle math or science like boys can.

(Obviously it's a different calculation when you're talking about someone with their hands full or pregnant women, but I took the OP to be speaking more generally than that.)

 

[CelticRose]

It may not have been strictly a gender thing. I will generally let someone with their hands full on the bus/train in front of me, so they have time to get on and arrange their stuff on the seat before we leave.

That could be.

Huh. Send those people up to Montreal please- I've had a hard time getting a seat on the bus when 8 months pregnant. We could use a bit of chivalry.

I recall a similar situation several years ago when one of my neighbors was very visibly pregnant. There was standing room only on the bus and no one would give up their seat for her. They would make her stand the whole way. I and the other people at that stop always made her get on the bus first (she was very shy) so that she would at least have some chance of getting a seat.

You could have just gotten on the bus in the amount of time it took you to convince them that they were getting wet, dude they were getting wet while you were explaining it. Just get on the damn bus. LOL

We were at the very end of a long line of people who were more than happy to go ahead of me when I stepped back and motioned them forward. No one had to stand in the rain longer because we were doing the "after you" "no, after you" routine.

They were being literally chivalrous. Your umbrella was spooking their horses and they needed you to furl it and get aboard before they could persuade their horses on there.

LOL!!

 

[caniswalensis]

"Chivalry" seems to me like the velvet glove of patriarchy. If sex discrimination is bad, why is it less bad when the woman gets some small-scale benefit out of it? The long-term effect is still the entrenchment of the idea that women are weaker and more fragile and should be held to a lower standard. So hold the door for them, but don't expect their pretty little heads to handle math or science like boys can.

(Obviously it's a different calculation when you're talking about someone with their hands full or pregnant women, but I took the OP to be speaking more generally than that.)

Yes, I open doors for my math professor wife because she can't handle it like us boys.

I don't deny that there is some association between chivalry towards women and the idea that they are fragile. It is not always that way, though.

 

[JamesDillon]

Yes, I open doors for my math professor wife because she can't handle it like us boys.

I don't deny that there is some association between chivalry towards women and the idea that they are fragile. It is not always that way, though.

I think treatment toward spouses is sort of a special case-- presumably you're treating her that way out of personal affection rather than her gender per se. I don't see how that's a counterexample to the point that the idea that women as women deserve preferential treatment in some situations is just the flip side of a sexist coin.

ETA: To make a slightly broader point, I'm certainly not saying that any individual person who holds the door for a woman is doing so for sexist reasons. Most of the time he's probably doing it simply because of the prevailing social norm that it's polite to do so. My point is that that social norm itself has implications detrimental to gender equality even where its observance seems to benefit women in particular situations like door-holding and bus-seat-giving.

 

[CelticRose]

"Chivalry" seems to me like the velvet glove of patriarchy. If sex discrimination is bad, why is it less bad when the woman gets some small-scale benefit out of it? The long-term effect is still the entrenchment of the idea that women are weaker and more fragile and should be held to a lower standard. So hold the door for them, but don't expect their pretty little heads to handle math or science like boys can.

(Obviously it's a different calculation when you're talking about someone with their hands full or pregnant women, but I took the OP to be speaking more generally than that.)

I don't feel discriminated against when someone is trying to be nice to me.

When most men hold the door for a women, let her go first, etc., they're not doing it because they think she's weak or stupid, they're just doing what they've been taught is a courteous gesture. They're just trying to be nice.

I just like to be nice in return, if they'll let me.

 

[truethat]

People have way too much time on their hands. When someone opens a door for me I say thank you and walk through it. Maybe because out of Brooklyn life runs at a faster pace so we don't have time to ponder the "issue." I hold door for people all the time. The other day I actually carried a little Chinese lady into her house because she fell and her son (a grown man) was too weak to pick her up. So my amazon butt swept in and scooped her up and we got her inside while he balanced her on the other side of me, because I have very weak arms but strong legs.

At the end of it he didn't get embarrassed, he THANKED ME and I left. People need to get a hobby if someone being polite pisses them off.

 

[CelticRose]

I think treatment toward spouses is sort of a special case-- presumably you're treating her that way out of personal affection rather than her gender per se. I don't see how that's a counterexample to the point that the idea that women as women deserve preferential treatment in some situations is just the flip side of a sexist coin.

Now, I agree with you there. I don't think that women deserve preferential treatment just because of their gender -- that is a sexist notion. It's nice to receive the preferential treatment, and like I've said I always thank the guy nicely, but I don't feel that it's my due. If a guy doesn't open the door for me or motion me ahead of him, I'm certainly not offended. Heck, I usually don't even notice.

 

[JamesDillon]

People have way too much time on their hands. When someone opens a door for me I say thank you and walk through it. Maybe because out of Brooklyn life runs at a faster pace so we don't have time to ponder the "issue." I hold door for people all the time. The other day I actually carried a little Chinese lady into her house because she fell and her son (a grown man) was too weak to pick her up. So my amazon butt swept in and scooped her up and we got her inside while he balanced her on the other side of me, because I have very weak arms but strong legs.

At the end of it he didn't get embarrassed, he THANKED ME and I left. People need to get a hobby if someone being polite pisses them off.

Guessing that's directed at me (as I'm sitting here in my Park Slope apartment pondering the issue), I haven't said anything against a gender-neutral norm of politeness. I'm all in favor of that. What I'm talking about is the notion of "chivalry" that means something like the OP was talking about-- women, simply by virtue of being women, are entitled to social courtesies that carry a pretty clear implication of frailty. I don't see how it isn't obvious that that view carries with it the assumption that women, by definition of their gender, need special treatment (from men, of course) to make it through the day.

 

[CelticRose]

deleted

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

Okay, so I'm waiting at the bus stop in the pouring down rain with a bunch of other people. I've just been grocery shopping, but I've got most of my stuff in my backpack and another waterproof bag with the rest wrapped in several layers of plastic grocery bags (yes, I will recycle them), so none of my stuff is getting wet. I'm wearing a full-length coat, a hat, gloves, boots, and I'm carrying an umbrella. I'm as dry as one can reasonably be in a steady downpour.

When the bus comes, several guys, none of whom are carrying an umbrella and most of whose raingear consists of only a hoodie or a jacket, try to motion me ahead of them in the line to get on the bus.

Now, to me this is just plain silly. I mean, I generally like chivalry, and I appreciate it when guys make those polite gestures and I always thank them nicely. However, it makes no sense for a guy to stand in the pouring down rain for my sake when I'm not even getting wet.

I did manage to convince all but one of them that it really made more sense for them to go ahead of me since they were getting wet and I wasn't.

So, guys, what do you think about this? Should common sense or politeness prevail in such situations?

Had you went first and not wasted time negotiating with them, they wouldn't have gotten as wet.

 

[caniswalensis]

I think treatment toward spouses is sort of a special case-- presumably you're treating her that way out of personal affection rather than her gender per se. I don't see how that's a counterexample to the point that the idea that women as women deserve preferential treatment in some situations is just the flip side of a sexist coin.

Well yes, it is sexist ina fashion. That does not mean it has to be a bad thing.

There is a certain assumption made that any random female is a lady and so deserves to be treated politely. I do not think this requires any sort of affection for them.

You are seeing this as a judgement issue. Men are judging women by being chivalous towards them. I disagree. I see it as an esteem issue. By acting defferentially towards them we are saying "I place you before myself."

And in fact, the sexism starts to fade if you also look at how gentlemen are expected to treat each other in polite society. It then becomes less about gender, as the guiding princible between men is often also "I place you before myself."

I open/hold as many doors for men as I do for women, truth be told. Even giant bruisers that could hammer me into the ground. (if I weren't a ninja that is) It is more about kindness than anything else.

..and if my wife were a different gender, I would not be married to her.

 

[CelticRose]

Had you went first and not wasted time negotiating with them, they wouldn't have gotten as wet.

See post #10.