Is chivalry worth sacrificing all the gains women have made over the past 50 years?

Question

Occasionally (including today) someone will ask if women would like to see a return to the norms of the 50's, when men treated them like princesses. Chivalry and rights are by no means mutually exclusive, but the way these sentiments are expressed, you'd think all was lost as soon as a woman entered a corporate suite and said, "Hey, this isn't so bad."

If we were to go back to that era, what would it mean giving up for you? Would you be willing to go through with it?

Answer 1

What gains?  At one time, a single income could buy a home and two cars.  No more.  Now it takes two -- and the woman can't choose to stay at home, she has to work to pay the mortgage.

You've come a long way, baby.  Welcome to wage slavery.

Answer 2

Imagine having the same rights as today but living in a more romantic era?  :)  Having the option to either live in the past or live in the now?  

Answer 3

you mean you don't like chivalry?  

Answer 4

Too many people see the past through rose-colored glasses. The truth of the matter is a lot of married couples came through the 50s and 60s detesting the sight of one another, but never divorced because it wasn't "the thing" to do. Alcoholism, sedatives, verbal and physical abuse, sexual abuse, marital misery, stultifying lives spent in pigeonholes one didn't WANT to be in...all happened.

It's just that nobody talked about it.

Anybody looking to idealized 1950s and 60s lifestyles by watching Leave it To Beaver is as gullible as anyone watching CSI and imagining that all crimes get solved by really attractive people neatly in "ta-da!" moments in a couple of days, with the bad guy ending up behind bars.

It's not real. It seldom was real. And the good parts of it certainly weren't worth enslaving half the human race once again.

Answer 5

Doesn't matter.

We can't make things go back to the way they were.

Answer 6

Keep it simple, let feminists open their own doors.  The rest of us will stay in 2008 and be polite.

Answer 7

Oh, this is easy....

h**l no.  

Answer 8

A man opening a door for me sets no one back. When a man does this, he's thinking "Gee, I'll be nice and open the door for this lady", not "Stupid female, can't even open the door for herself!"

Answer 9

I will gladly open my own door so that I don't have to endure marital rape and a futureless, low-paying job as a secretary.  You can't throw a few crumbs my way and tell me I've got it good.  I can see the other side.  Women were only treated like princesses in public.  In private thew were beaten and raped by their husbands, and since they didn't have a second car, they were imprisoned in a house all day long.  What a horrible existence.  

Answer 10

I would be giving up my freedom to do what I want when I want. I wouldn't have the options of going to school or even having a job. I like learning, I like going to school, and I like working for my own paycheck. I  won't be willing to go through with it. F- that!

I like being treated with respect and dignity and I do the same for every man in my life. Just because I'm a feminist doesn't mean I dislike men. I like being treated like a human being and I like treating others the same way I expect to be treated.

I also like having doors opened for me, I do the same for the hubby.

Answer 11

Men can be chivalrous, they choose not to be.  Women can be moms and work.  I have been treated both as an equal and as a lady by men.  I don't see how giving up equal rights means I get to be treated well by men.  

Answer 12

It doesn't mean going back 50 years at all. Why can't women be treated with respect for just being women? Really, it won't hurt a fly. Also, we(women) need to begin to treat men with respect and stop trying to prove ourselves to them. They already know that we are capable of so many things!

Answer 13

Chivalry has never meant much to me.  Most of the gestures considered chivalrous are just forms of superficial courtesy which have nothing to do with how men really feel about women.

However, one aspect of life of 50 years ago that I do regret is that not all women were work-obsessed like they are now, nor were housewives refered to as 'brain dead robots'.  for women who like corporate suites, I suppose today's world is preferable, but for those of us who aren't so thrilled by it, there is something to be said for the fifties.