It wasn't that small of a point, to my thinking.

The guy DID believe he was being chivalrous. No kidding. He literally believed he was doing right and inwas being a jackass.

That's part of what I'm saying about making room for people to be different. We all have different interpretations, perceptions, and views on things. Different likes and dislikes that need to be respected. I can respect the fact that he probably meant well, but uphold a biundary of my right to refuse and protect my child. Get it?

That's why there can't be hard and fast, 100% always one way, unequivocal social rules on things. It's a potshot as to how it is genuinely given and received in the end.

That doesn't mean you have no common rules of basic civility. You do. Certain things are far more often than not preferred by a large segment of the population and certain other things are more or less definite no gos.

I'm not trying to give rules. Quite the contrary, I'm trying to get 'men' to see beyond such rigid black and white thinking, and think more in terms of situational awareness, to borrow a military term.

I'm doing that, because y'all asked. The men side of the public conversation is that men feel like they're being unfairly maligned as creeps for being socially awkward and they don't know what the rules are anymore and women won't tell them.

Okay.

Again, I can't speak for all women. What I can do, is take you through certain things that have happened, in detail, pointing out where this is went well and where they did not and the whys.

All with the understanding that that's how it applies to me, it's context to get you thinking but not the full story by any stretch of the imagination. As you said in a previous comment, you will have to speak with other women doing the same for you so you can get a broader view. Like I said, the flirty coffee stirrer would have been an unwanted nuisance to someone else. To me, he was fun, harmless, and playful.

Some women will agree with you on chivalry. They miss it. Personally, I don't. It was more of a pain in the ass and awkward as all get out.

Ita fairly common knowledge that the knofhts of old, who established the rules of chivalry, were abusive to the peasantry, half of whom were women. So it's not like those rules applies to all women.


I've had dresses ruined by men shutting car doors on them thanks to chivalry, had a car door shut on my thumb once, been unnecessarily rushed, ended up dropping stuff because the guy who insisted on openinf the door for me was in the way of walking through said door, had my ass smacked by a 'chivalrous' door holder, been denied opportunity to physically test myself when I wanted to, been pushed/pressured to over drink, had my plans for fun upended over someone's designs to 'chivalrously' take care of something like planning a date for me, had to wait on coffee because so e guy assumed I'd need help fixing the machine.

None of that is existential drama type stuff.....it's just nuisance stuff. I found the rules of chivalry to be more of a nuisance than anything. Being pressured by the conventions of "polite society" to sweetly smile and fawn over some guy bungling around doing something I can much easier do myself without ruining my clothes, making a mess everywhere, causing more work or time, or breaking my fingers.

So no, I don't really miss it.

But apparently, some women do. Supposedly, it makes them feel special. But .aybe they haven't had their fingers broken yet.

You had some other good points in that last comment, but you pick apart everything I say and it was just too much this morning.

I'll go back at lunch and review.