005 - The Death of Chivalry

Two friends discuss the concept of chivalry and how it has changed over time. They talk about the expectations placed on men to be chivalrous towards women and how societal trends have shifted those expectations. They also discuss the potential differences in how chivalry is perceived based on age, location, and the type of establishment they are in. The conversation ends with a personal anecdote about a recent experience with chivalry and the positive response it received. All right, John, how are you doing? I'm doing well, man. I'm doing well. How are you? You know, you know how I'm doing. I'm doing okay. The same as I've been doing for a while. But, but, you know, we're here, which is really there's nowhere I'd rather be. And well, that's not true. I mean, there's like vacations, or there's a long list of places I'd rather be, frankly, John, but don't take it personally. Yeah, no, I don't. I mean, I mean, I've been doing reading a lot of philosophy books, right, recently. And I, I think that, you know, as long as we're under the light of God, we are where we need to be. You know, the religion is way too deep of a topic to get into, that is not on my list of topics. But you know, what is, you know, what is on my list, John, you know, we're talking about today? No, go on, go on. The death of chivalry. The death of chivalry. And I got to say, this is your unpopular opinion. This is, this is, yeah, I mean, I've been, I've been sitting on this one for a while. And yeah, it's something that's been sitting with me for quite a bit. So very chivalrous of you, you know, yeah, like, you know, I was, I was raised in that way. Get right into it. Yeah. I was raised in a household where, where my mom encouraged me to, you know, pull out seats and open doors and, you know, do all these things that, that are, are required of, of, you know, men, men are supposed to do this for women. You know, you don't get in the car, you don't get in the car before your partner, if you're going on a date, you open the door for the lady, yeah. And then you get in the seat and then, then, then that's how it sort of runs. But you know, that was, that was when I was a kid and now as an adult, having gone through all the, the sort of, I call it wokeness because it's not really wokeness, it's just, just, just the, the trends of society. Yeah. Well, the woke, the woke thing is maybe a little more recent, but this is probably been dying for longer than we've been woke. Yeah, yeah. It's, it's, I haven't, I just, fair warning. I'm not woke yet. I hadn't woke up yet. Yeah. All right. However you say it. But anyway, go ahead. But under the light of the Lord. No, but yeah, so the, so yeah, so like I'm raised this way to sort of take care of females. But you know, as, as society has progressed, it's like, you know, women, women, you can't do that. You can't do that as a guy. You can't assume, you can't, you can't, don't, don't, don't stick your neck out, you know, if they want you to open the door, they want you to pay the bill, you do it, but you don't stick your neck out. And how do you know? I mean, does a woman just stand there and stare at the door waiting for a man to walk up? How do you know that they want you to open the door, John? I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't wait for them to have an opinion because, uh, you know, the way that I was, the way that I was, I was brought up is that, you know, I, I need to sort of, you tell, you tell the women what their, that's the way you were brought up. Yeah. Yeah. Come on. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no People of different generations. You announced this woman as being in the older category. Do you think maybe it might have been safer for somebody like that for you to say like, hey, your sweater looks really nice today, ma'am. Versus if you'd said that to say, I don't know, a 21 year old or something like that? Do you think it might have been received differently? I mean, possibly, possibly, you know, possibly, you know, we're so out of practice these days. I mean, I don't even know how to voice that to this woman. You know, after I do the analytics in my head, it's like, oh, okay. And then it's, it's my son's there. You're walking out the door and you just shout back in, looking good, lady, on the way out. Yeah, different. Just get catcall. Yeah, that's probably not the way to do it. Slap her ass and just feel really bad about it after. I didn't mean to do that. No, I just, you know, it just feels weird. So the other day, this is kind of it. So the other day, I took a step and I attempted to be chivalrous. So I was at the Starbucks, you know, I was grabbing a coffee. There was a guy. Yeah, a guy coming out with his coffee. I was going in to get a coffee. A guy coming out with his coffee and he like just sort of pushes open the door, blast past me. Women, women behind him, people, just regular manners, but women behind him, you know, carrying things, they had their hands full. And so, you know, I just tried to hold the door. So is it chivalrous? I don't know. Is it manners? I don't know. But I felt that there was a lack of awareness, a lack of care. And, you know, and the response I got from the people coming out, they were very, yeah, they were happy. They said thank you. There was a smile, smiled back. It was, it felt good. It felt natural. Yeah, that's good. So I guess my follow-up question. So first question was like, does it, does maybe the generation or age of the recipient make a difference? Two, is there a difference on, I don't know, let's call it micro location or what, like, you know, like the store that you're at or the type of event that you're at? I guess I'm stereotyping places or people who may be in a place, but the audience at a Starbucks might be different than the audience at a hardware store. Do you feel like it makes a difference there? And the hardware store I go to has power doors, so I don't have to open the door for anybody there. You just stand there and just take credit. Yeah, you're welcome. Yeah. Glad you liked it. Step on the mat, let the door open. I mean, well, let me ask you the question. So, you know, obviously I'm northeast. You are, you're in a different part of the country. I'm wondering also, could it be in addition to the place that we're visiting? We're calling it micro locations. I made that word. Micro locations, I like it, I like it. Yeah, so I'm asking the questions here, not you, John. No, but you're right, you stumbled on my third point, right, which is geographically, right? I think we all know stereotypically, like, oh, people in the South are very friendly or, you know, yee-haw, welcome to my, I don't know, that was terrible. I'm from the South, so that was a terrible impression. But I don't say yee-haw a whole lot. Versus, I don't know, those mean northeastern people. Yeah, cold outside. Yeah, which is where you, it's your neck of the woods. You know, you're up in that New English area. Excuse me. But, yes, I think it matters, right? Like, you're in the South. So, a few weeks ago, not too long ago, for work, I had to travel to a state that starts with a C and rhymes with Alifornia. But I won't out it, because I don't want to make those people feel bad. Yeah. Maybe we do a contest. Do a contest. Do a contest, you know. Call in. If you can guess that state. And I, I walked up to my hotel, my motel. It was not a high-class hotel at all. And I realized there was someone come behind me. It was a gentleman, another male of business attire or whatever. That covers it, yeah. And I heard him coming and I, I opened the door and I sort of stepped aside and gestured for him to go ahead. You know, we didn't have to talk. Just go ahead, sir. And boy, he looked at me really strangely. And I don't really know why. I mean, it wasn't a security issue. We're going into the main lobby of the hotel. It was, you know, the doors are unlocked or whatever. Anyway, it's like I was letting into some, you know, letting him get in somewhere he shouldn't have been. And boy, he just looked really confused that I would open the door for him. And, you know, I happen to be a straight guy personally. So it wasn't, I can say with full, careful, I don't know. Yeah. But no, it's not, I'm not judging. I'm just saying, like, I had no other interest. I had no ulterior motive. I was just trying to be nice. I had, you know, I went in a big hurry, opened the door, let him in. Then I followed him in. We're going to the free breakfast buffet or something. I don't know. And, yeah, he seemed really confused. When I open the, when I do that same sort of thing where I live, which is not the state starting with a C that rhymes with the Alifornia, I don't tend to get that strange look. I either get like a head nod of the quiet thank you, or I get a, oh, thank you very much, you know. Yeah. So, yeah, I think it, I think it matters. I'm, I'm on the same. I mean, I'm not going to argue with that because I'm on the same page. I've got kids. You've got kids. I'm teaching my kids to hold the door, you know, to open the door for people to try to be helpful. And I don't necessarily say, I guess I have said, like, oh, it's important to open the door for, for women. I generally try to set the example that it's just like a nice thing to do for, for anybody, you know, especially if they got their hands full or got a coffee in their hand or whatever it is, you know. I think, I think it also sort of offers that, that opportunity of awareness, you know, it's not, you know, looking down at your phone or doing something else that that occupy your mind. You're aware of other people around you. And, yeah, like you said, it doesn't necessarily need to be, you know, gender related. But it's just that, that level of care and kindness and awareness. And I feel that, at least where I live, you know, the, maybe, again, maybe it's my excuse. You know, I should, I should, I should really seek therapy around this. But maybe, maybe, maybe it is that, yeah, that, that, that it's kind of, we have that lack of care or consideration or a depth of that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Took a turn, took a turn here, took a turn. Well, what, what else? So chivalry, opening the door is a good example. What is another, what's another example? Chivalry. So, so paying the bills. I mean, obviously, I think that a lot of, a lot of things, I mean, I have not experienced, I'm not out there dating, so I really have no comment around that. Yeah. I mean, I just opened the doors. Like, I noticed a guy, what did he do? He was, he was with a woman who I presume, presume or assume is, was his, his, his partner. He went around, and this is in my neck of wood, neck of the woods. He went around, opened the door for her, let her in. And I took a moment to celebrate that. I was like, hey, man, you know, good job. And he's like, you know, that's why we're together for X amount of years. Like he, you know, like it was, it was a, it was a little bit of a fist bump, which was nice. You know, a gentleman, you know, during the summer, he was carrying all of the, all of the beach gear for his family. They were at the beach, they were carrying all the beach gear back for his family that the wife and the child had, you know, went off to the car and this guy's like carrying like all these chairs and bags. But he was, you know, he didn't complain. He did it. And he was, he was very, very aware of it. He's like, no, honey, I got it. And it was, it was nice. You know, it was, and yeah, I don't know if that sort of falls within the context of chivalry. But it's very rare. It's so rare that I find myself afraid to be chivalrous. And then at the other side of it, that I also feel compelled to celebrate those individuals who hold on to that culture of being chivalrous. I like it. I like it. Now is the point in the episode, John, where we, where we admit, where we own up to our deepest, darkest secrets. So I'm gonna ask, I'm gonna ask you, I'm gonna ask you to admit where, where you are not as chivalrous as you, as you should be in your life or in your relationship. You know, be as, be as open and honest as you want, but be completely open and honest. Tell all of your, no, don't tell me all your deepest, darkest secrets. But, you know, what do you think? Do you, do you find yourself falling short of your expectations sometimes? I find myself sweating at the moment. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, this is, this is, you got me on the hot seat. Ouch. So, I mean, I think, I think it's, I think it's just opening the door for my wife, you know, days here in the Northeast, you know, it snows, it's chilly. We have auto locks. So I'm like, Hey, get to your side of the car. I'm gonna run over here. I'll see you later. Get inside. I feel, I feel like I could do a bit better, a little bit better. Yeah. But I could, I could do, you know, I mean, don't feel, don't feel bad. Oh, the same. I'm on a general day-to-day basis. Like, you know, it's like I had a car, a big truck or whatever, and it's a long way to the other side, you know? And so I tend to, especially if it's like, if you're both approaching from the passenger side, sure, I'm going to open the door. But if we're coming in from the other direction, it seems a little strange for me to walk all the way around there and open it up. Yeah. Like, let's say we're on a date or something, which we don't get to do as much as we'd like to as, as married parents of young kids, you know, we don't get a lot of time for that. But when we do, yeah, I probably go out of my way to open the door. And the other thing, this is the bad ones that I'll admit to, is, uh, I can be a little passive aggressive. Don't tell anybody. Uh, but, um, my wife, uh, recently acquired, acquired isn't the right word. And she spent a lot of money on this, uh, acquired a dog for our house, uh, against my will. It's a cute dog, but still, anyway. So I'm not great at doing the chivalrous thing of like, you know, I'm getting up earlier than she is. I don't let the dog out. I sort of like try to sneak out when I realized the dog is quiet, sneak out to not, knowing that like in five minutes, the dog's going to start whining. And then she's going to have to get up, open the door, let the dog outside and to go do its thing and, and come back in. Uh, that would be very chivalrous of me, but my wife and I are in a good place right now. We're doing quite well, but boy, I'm being a little passive aggressive about that. I gotta tell you. Yeah. Like, I mean, as you're, as you're using the word passive aggressive and chivalrous, like I'm wondering what, what that is. Cause I have a similar situation, um, where, where, you know, in the morning I'm tired and my, my kids just annoying in the morning and he's, he's like, you know, Oh, make me breakfast. And I'm like, Oh, you're old enough to figure it out yourself. Um, but anyway, you know, it's two of us and my wife and I, and so my wife's getting ready. She's going to go to do something and I'm tired, but I noticed that she's going downstairs. And so I'm just like, Oh yeah, you know, mom's coming downstairs. She'll take care of you. And I go back to bed and go to sleep. Yeah. She called me out on it saying that, you know, she was doing something and, and it was a bit, yeah. I mean, passive aggressive, a little aggressive need to suggest that she was going to take care of the homemaking duties and take care of the child. Yeah. Well, I know, you know, chivalry and passive aggressiveness. I mean, we're not, you know, you're not throwing your jacket on the ground for somebody to walk through a puddle these days. You're not, I don't know, taking off your, your knight's helmet before you enter the castle or what, you know what I mean? Like chivalry is we sort of think about those, those days. So, you know, we're modern chivalry is opening the door and just doing things for others, for the people you care about. I, you know, so I don't know. I think you can, you can lump in our passive aggressive, terrible husband behaviors as part of that. I don't know. You know, we're, we're early on, we're early on in our journey here with podcasts and then we're, we're, we're trying to find our footing. You know, I like, I like the idea of, of, you know, sort of admitting, you know, what, what, what I'm, I'm, I'm bad at. But I think one, one thing we didn't do, one thing we should do, because I'm sure, again, our listeners, they have different sort of definitions of chivalry. We should definitely sort of figure out what, what is chivalry, you know? And then you said, throwing a jacket on the ground. I think that's beautiful. One thing my mom always taught me is that a man should always have a handkerchief and I feel terrible. I never wear a handkerchief. I don't know. Is there any other sort of thing, I guess, that you were taught about chivalry that, that you, or how do you define chivalry? No, the handkerchief's an interesting thing because I'm at, I'm at like, I'm at like 15% handkerchief compliance these days. I've started carrying a handkerchief. Like, not for me, but just to have, this is a whole other, I like to be prepared. There's a whole other sort of rant on this sort of thing. But, but yeah, that's interesting you brought that up. But other things, no, I mean, the door opening. The door opening. Oh, this is not chivalry. Yes or yes, ma'am. You know, that, I don't know, that's chivalry. That's a different, that's a different thing. But I'm big, I'm big on that. And I don't know. What else? The door opening is the biggest thing you hear about. Right on the edge of my brain, there are some things that I can remember my parents being, you know, big, big on. My dad always talked to me about, but I can't, I can't come up with them. I don't remember. How about, how about this? Like, when you're at a restaurant and a woman stands up to go to the powder room, do you stand as well? Do you stand when she comes to sit down? Is that, I mean, that, that would be chivalrous? That would be chivalrous. No, I don't, I don't find myself, particularly if we're there, so I stand up to leave. I'm not sure I stand up to go to the bathroom. No, if people are getting ready to leave, I'm not going to stay seated. Thanks. Good to see you. I'm going to stand up to give them a goodbye, I think, which is a part of that. But, but yeah, no, I certainly don't get out of my chair if my wife decides to go to the, to the restroom or something while we're at dinner. If we're waiting for people and they arrive at the table, yes, I'm going to stand up to greet them. Yeah, I guess, I guess I'm partly compliant with that. But yeah, yeah, we're not paying the bills. I mean, I mean, you can't, you can't, I don't know if you can, yeah, you can't, we can't. Yeah, I mean, I don't know if that's chivalry, but yes, I mean, I handle the finances in my marriage, but I think that's just, I don't know, I just feel like that's something I, yeah, I guess it's chivalry. I do it. I mean, I, you know, I can explain what's going on to my wife if she's curious about it. I have a, I have a whole, we have a whole document that sort of takes, documents our finances and what goes on. Again, that's just part of being prepared for when I fall off a cliff or get eaten by a bear or whatever it is that happens. Or both. Or both, yeah. The bear and I tumble to our death. But, you know, then she's got a, you know, she's got a document she can, some, yeah, she's got a document she can consult to figure out what's going on. But, yeah. So you were getting at earlier, like, basically what we want to hear is we want to hear your thoughts, listeners, right, on what, what is chivalry? What is, what are we not chivalrous about anymore? We can readjust this to another, another episode down the road. I would love that. I mean, I think once we get the, the call lines set up, love to have callers call in, tell us about their experiences, their opinions. Love to hear from our female listeners, female listeners about what they, what they would like to see their, their bows do more of out in public. Yeah, dial in. Absolutely. And this is the part in the pockets where I'm going to break in with my, my studio voice and, and insert that information about how to, how to, how to contact us. Because it's out there, but I don't know. I don't know it off the cuff. So, so many phone numbers in my head, John, I don't even know. Do we have phones anymore? Do we still call people? Yeah. Yeah. Maybe we can get a, we can do a WhatsApp or something like that. What are the kids doing these days? Yeah. Something like an AI generated sort of caller to call in so that, that we could, we could, we could sort of have that, that element, but at the same time we have it controlled. That's true. That's true. All right, folks, there's a couple of ways you can reach out to us or give us a message. If you're listening on Spotify, you can visit our show in the Spotify podcasters app or follow the link in the episode description to send us a message. The link's going to go to podcasters.spotify.com slash pod slash show slash some unpopular opinions. Or the easier way might just be to give us a call or text us at 706-740-2174. Again, it's 706-740-2174. Hope to hear from you soon. Well, that's awesome, John. Thank you for the conversation today. I think it's fantastic. I can't wait to hear what our listeners have to tell us. Yeah. All right. Take care. See you later. All right. Bye. Bye. Bye.