Why modern chivalry is dead

In Greek mythology and Roman mythology, Hector (left) was a Trojan prince and the greatest fighter for Troy in the Trojan War. During the European Middle Ages, Hector figures as one of the Nine Worthies noted by Jacques de Longuyon, known not only for his courage but also for his noble and courtly nature. (Picture: Warner Bros Pictures)

Ladies had their own rules to follow, and it was only through the adherence to those rules that they could qualify for the receipt of chivalry from a gentleman. Chivalric codes of conduct traveled on a two way street: the gentleman cannot exist without the lady, and vice-versa. Both genders were required to adhere to certain standards in order to engage in the chivalric exchange. The gentleman and the lady are like the yin and the yang.

Ms. Rodriguez is probably right to note that an ideal chivalrous gentleman would be more measured and restrained in his observation of an attractive female that he had not yet been acquainted with. He probably wouldn’t be too forward with her to begin with, and would remain exceedingly polite during his first interactions with her while avoiding overt sexualization.

In order to get that treatment, however, a woman would need to be the ideal lady. Ladies in the age of chivalry were modest in their conduct. They were not particularly sexually suggestive in their speech, dress or dance, and this made it relatively easy for a gentleman to approach and engage them in a more polite, less overtly sexual manner.

Many modern millennial western women do not adhere to the codes of conduct inherent to the lady. Their dress is often highly sexually suggestive, designed to invite overtly sexual approaches and draw the very suggestive gazes that Ms. Rodriguez scolds millennial men for wielding. Their dance is often even more sexually suggestive, roughly approximating the act of intercourse itself.

Modern millenial females express their sexuality more openly and freely than any lady of a bygone age would have been expected to. A lady expecting to keep that label and thus benefit from the chivalrous conduct of a gentleman could not engage freely and openly in casual sexual relationships with multiple men while unmarried. She could not engage in simulated sex on dance floors with men she didn’t even know well (or even men she did know somewhat well). She could not walk around in clothing designed specifically to expose and draw attention to the more sexually alluring portions of her body. The modern woman can do all of this, however, and very often does. Why?

Because she wants to, and that’s alright. Women have spent generations fighting for the ability to remove social limitations on their sexuality, and they now enjoy the fruits of that effort. Don’t get anything twisted here: I have no problem with this and neither do most millennial men. Women are free to dress as they like, dance as they like and enter relationship as they like. I’m certainly not going to stop them, but there’s a price to pay for all of this.

As noted before, the gentleman and the lady come together. One cannot exist without the other—the code of chivalry was designed with this understanding in mind, and it dealt with that understanding by creating standards of conduct for each gender seeking to participate in the chivalric exchange. When we freed women from the obligation to adhere to those standards of conduct, we necessarily freed men as well.

How can we change this and bring back the missing gentleman Ms. Rodriguez so desperately desires to interact with? Well, gentlemen require ladies. If you want more gentlemen in the traditional sense, you’ll need to create more ladies in the traditional sense, and that would require a re-imposition of the same social and legal restrictions on female sexuality and expression that women have fought so hard to eliminate during the last few generations. There would need to be a rescission of the legal progress females in our society have made toward true equality.

To further illustrate just why this is, consider the way in Ms. Rodriguez’s suggestion that men give up seats and hold doors (among other preferential and somewhat deferential things) specifically for women solely because they are women. Such behavior was once common, but why was this?

Because women were seen as the weaker sex. This notion of the inherently “weak” female governed the discriminatory legal and social landscape in which the code of chivalry was born and practiced. Men did all they did for women because of the implicit understanding in society that women, by virtue of their being women, were not equal to them. They were weaker and needed assistance and men, by virtue of their being men, were stronger and therefore obligated to provide that assistance.

Men are no longer behaving this way because they have been raised to understand that their female counterparts are not weak, but strong. They’re not dependent, but independent. They’re not inferiors, they’re equals. Our modern legal system takes these statements as fundamental, unassailable truths and uses the force of law to ensure that they are treated accordingly. This will, in turn, prevent men from doing many of the things Ms. Rodriguez would like them to, as they have become increasingly unable to see women as their true inferiors.

If Ms. Rodriguez wants the chivalric code to make its way back into the mainstream, she’ll need to bring back the old view on gender relations that gave rise to it. Modern notions of gender equality will need to go out the window.

That is unlikely to happen, however. For all of her yearning for the “chivalry” of yesteryear, I doubt that Hope Rodriguez or any other modern woman would like to see the return of the social mores necessary to sustain it. Millennial women live in what is undoubtedly the best time to be a female in the history of humanity. At no point in human history have women been as wealthy, as free, as respected and as influential as they are today. The return of the social norms necessary to sustain chivalry in the traditional sense could only inhibit their enjoyment of all that, and they know it. Women have made their voices heard loudly and clearly: they will not tolerate this.

Hope Rodriguez seems like a nice woman and I’m sure she’ll find a man to treat her well sometime soon (if she hasn’t already), but she’ll not succeed in bringing back the ways of a bygone age. Chivalry is dead and, at the end of the day, that’s just the way that most millennial women want it.

About the Contributor

Athlone McGinnis

Athlone is a young man whose background gives him unique insight on sociological and cultural changes that are happening today.