Is Chivalry Dead?

Lately I have had this subtle feeling that chivalry is dead. The feeling could have started when I slipped on ice a few years back, skidded 10 feet on my chin, tears salting the ice beneath me, and an entire slew of young, able bodied men watched, mouths agape, not only neglecting to help me up or ask if I was okay, but the only thing I heard from this useless crowd was one guy yell, "did you see THAT?"

Or maybe it was last month when trying to get off the bus in a civilized morning commute, wait your turn to step off the M34 manner, when I was pushed by a middle aged man who either had to go really badly, or was just over the 45 minute sluggish ride that had him lacking patience. Either way, with my coffee splattered on my new coat, purse items strewn on the dirty street, I helped myself gather my things, helped myself wipe off my hazelnut mess and searched for what was left of my dignity for the day. The man walked quickly away, knowing quite well that he had left me on the street to fend for myself, and with no explanation for what the hell men were thinking.

The definition of chivalry is this: "The sum of the eideal qualification of a knight, including courtesy, generosity, valor and dexterity in arms." It is a term that goes back to the medieval institution of knighthood and is now been somehow worked into modern day to describe couteous acts, especially men towards women. So techincally, unless their occupation, on Facebook or otherise, announces that they are in fact a "Knight," what have we been expecting?

How the word even came to be used today, as it is so freely and loosely, is beyond me. Considering the dwindling job title of Knight, I guess the answer to my question is in its origin; Chivalry is dead and has been dead since 10th century France.

It seems to me that we have been using the wrong word, and a powerful one at that, in building our expectations for the male sex. One that has made feminists fight to kill the story of Cinderella for instilling false hope in young girls that a Knight will and should rescue you from, well, yourself. And one that has made men struggle to walk the thin line between being a total doting push over and gentlemanly-enough so as not to insult women by making them feel that they are in fact "helpless."

I can't help but wonder that if we used a more appropriate, less loaded, less dated, more gender-mutual word such as respect, would we still feel as let down by the opposite sex?

So I propose this: If chivalry is somehow, anywhere, lurking in the shadows of our Knight-less society, and not already dead, let's kill it. I have had it with the pressure it subjects both men and women to, especially on a first date (it is the main ingredient in that bit of awkwardness), and I refuse to use a word that attempts to over-indulge a basic human and necessary code of conduct. Respect is all I ask, and all you should ask as well, regardless of gender...

If I was looking for respect that day face-first on the ice, or that awkward tumble off the bus, and I wasn't looking for "chivalry," maybe I would have seen her hand reaching to help me up, and I would know that morality lives.