# Chivalry isn't dead...unfortunately **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 6, 2021, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305 "2021-03-06T04:09:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/1 "2021-03-06T04:09:17Z")
From here: [Comic Sands - News](https://www.comicsands.com/texas-chivalry-assignment-please-men-2650926538.html) Shallowater High School in Lubbock County decided to have a “Chivalry Day” at their high school, and one student came home and surprised their mother, Brandi D. Addison, with their assignment for the day. “On Chivalry Day, most notably female students had to perform and complete tasks that would “please” and “serve” their male counterparts, including male students, male teachers and other officials, and even the males that they live with. The students were expected to perform as a part of Chivalry Day at the school and at home.” I think this is an asinine school assignment. How did the school think this would pass muster? ---
**Author:** ![Didi44](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47c2d/32.png) [@Didi44](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Didi44)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/2 "2021-03-06T04:25:12Z")
In the early 70’s we used to have slave day in middle school. One for girls and another for boys. It was promoted with flyers posted on walls, so everyone knew including the teachers knew. Edit: They were tame. Mostly carrying books and have the “slave” sit down in front of you or get your lunch. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/3 "2021-03-06T04:28:26Z")
Unfortunately there is no switching of roles on this “Chivalry Day”, and the females definitely have the short end of the stick. ---
**Author:** ![Didi44](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47c2d/32.png) [@Didi44](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Didi44)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/4 "2021-03-06T04:30:32Z")
Don’t get me wrong. We all knew it was wrong back then, it was just something we did. Don’t know the origin, ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/5 "2021-03-06T04:30:51Z")
As I’ve seen pointed out elsewhere, none of this is anything like what the chivalric code actually was. It was entirely a limit on the knights to keep them from harming the peasant women. It had nothing to do with making the women subservient to the men. So it’s not even a valid history lesson. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/6 "2021-03-06T04:43:21Z")
Sounds like the opposite of chivalry. I was expecting some school day where all the guys had to open doors for the girls, or something like that. ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/7 "2021-03-06T04:53:09Z")
This. We had “Sadie Hawkins” dances, where the girls had to ask the boys, arrange transportation, pay for the date…but the boys had to wait to be ask, passively (?) encourage girls to notice them, etc. Love the idea of each gender seeing what the other had to deal with—but it presupposes people are straight, binary. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/8 "2021-03-06T05:10:03Z")
(From the picture in the link): “Ladies must dress in a feminine manner to please the men.” This is getting into Poe’s Law territory here. Wait, wait … delving further this one: > _“Ladies must walk behind men or walk daintily, as if their feet were bound.”_ I mean … I really don’t want to believe this is real. ETA: Reading all the way down, it looks like it was real, and they did cancel it. Like you said, WTF were they thinking? ---
**Author:** ![mikecurtis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mikecurtis/32/3284_2.png) [@mikecurtis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mikecurtis)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 7:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/9 "2021-03-06T07:28:33Z")
> **[Texas school scraps assignment that had girls 'obey any reasonable request of...](https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/texas-school-scraps-chivalry-assignment-had-girls-obey-any-reasonable-n1259730)** > > “Outside the classroom, ladies cannot show intellectual superiority if it would offend the men around them," one prompt in the assignment said. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/10 "2021-03-06T07:39:05Z")
“Lain noted the teacher received criticism last year for the same lesson.” WTFFF? Are there any articles about this from last year? ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 7:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/11 "2021-03-06T07:52:01Z")
Remember, we can’t blame Texans, Texans have no responsibility for what happens in Texas. ---
**Author:** ![GreenWyvern](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/greenwyvern/32/2834_2.png) [@GreenWyvern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreenWyvern)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 8:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/12 "2021-03-06T08:14:38Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > It was entirely a limit on the knights to keep them from harming the peasant women. I don’t know where you got that from. Medieval chivalry was a complex and wide-ranging code comprising religious piety, warrior ethos and military training, loyal service, courtly manners, courtly love, generosity, truthfulness, and honourable behaviour in general. ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 8:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/13 "2021-03-06T08:25:10Z")
You left out the boys’ Chivalry Day activities at the school. It was mentioned in an image in your article and described in a link to a larger Huff post piece in the 3rd paragraph of your article: [Texas School 'Chivalry' Assignment Tells Girls To Obey And Dress To Please Men | HuffPost Latest News](https://www.huffpost.com/entry/texas-school-chivalry-assignment_n_6041bfc6c5b660a0f387697e) > [@](#): > > Addison also shared an image of the assignment given to male students. Boys were also told to follow a set of rules, including to dress in jackets and ties or suits, show “courtly courtesy as they assist ladies who may have dropped an article by picking it up for them,” help girls seat themselves, address women as “milady,” “create a yummy treat of friendship,” bow when greeting women and rise when they enter the room. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 9:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/14 "2021-03-06T09:35:27Z")
I’m a member of DeMolay’s knighthood (aka _The Chivalric Knightsof the Holy Order of the Fellow Soldiers of Jacques DeMolay_) and I’m appalled at this assignment. As mentioned above, this stupid assignment is definitely not chivalric. ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/15 "2021-03-06T13:35:32Z")
> [@crowmanyclouds](#): > > Remember, we can’t blame Texans, Texans have no responsibility for what happens in Texas. Of course we can blame all Texans for what happened in this one school. It would be stupid, but nothing is stopping us from doing so, except the fear of looking like morons. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/16 "2021-03-06T15:44:05Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > I think this is an asinine school assignment. How did the school think this would pass muster? Your answer is in they cited article: Lubbock County (TX). > [@crowmanyclouds](#): > > Remember, we can’t blame Texans, Texans have no responsibility for what happens in Texas. On the contrary, Texans (for the most part) are quite proud of everything that happens in Texas; [mums](https://www.click2houston.com/news/2019/10/08/god-bless-texas-and-all-the-homecoming-mums-inside-a-texas-tradition-thats-more-texas-than-texas/), [Frito Chili Pie](https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/food-cooking/recipes/a10344/frito-chili-pie/), [Texas Sweet Tea](https://sortedfood.com/recipe/12552), [putting long horns on everything](https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2019/12/this-ram-3500-in-a-whataburger-parking-lot-is-the-most-texas-truck-ive-ever-seen/), [“poking”](https://abcnews.go.com/US/high-school-football-players-charged-allegedly-raping-teammates/story?id=59447772), [Chicken Shit Bingo](https://theculturetrip.com/north-america/usa/texas/austin/articles/chicken-sht-bingo-is-really-a-thing-and-heres-why/), [being the third-worst state for LGBTQ people behind only Mississippi and Alabama](https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/the-5-worst-states-for-lgbt-people-198931/), and worst of all, [Dr. Pepper](https://drpeppermuseum.com/history/), the fake prune juice of soft drinks. I guess when the vast majority of your state is arid wasteland and alluvial flood plain. Those Texans who oppose or criticize these things are not ‘true’ Texans; they are merely interlopers who don’t know how to Texan properly and should probably move to Austin where all the freakish, non-Dr. Pepper drinking commie-pinko radicals go. > [@GreenWyvern](#): > > Medieval chivalry was a complex and wide-ranging code comprising religious piety, warrior ethos and military training, loyal service, courtly manners, courtly love, generosity, truthfulness, and honourable behaviour in general. And it had essentially nothing to do with protecting “peasant women” who were considered at best baby factories and mostly a disposable commodity. This isn’t any kind of history lesson about medieval chivalry that grew from the _habitus_ into the _Knightly Piety_ that was largely a propaganda exercise to promote the Crusades. What the school is promoting here is the culture with a patina of overly formalized mannerism to cover deeply abusive and misogynistic traditions with a unique Texan spin on it; everybody says, “Yes, sir” and “No, ma’am”, and “God bless you!” while thinking themselves to be more exceptional than anyone who is not a _God-Fearing Texan_ who both believes in Trumpism and also can’t shut up about how Texas is really its own country that just plays along with being part of the United States out of politeness. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/17 "2021-03-06T16:38:17Z")
“…in conclusion, Texas is a land of contrast. Thank you.” ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/18 "2021-03-06T17:15:10Z")
I once received a letter from someone at the University of Texas. On the envelope was printed, “Don’t mess with Texas”. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/19 "2021-03-06T17:20:56Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > I once received a letter from someone at the University of Texas. On the envelope was printed, “Don’t mess with Texas” . To be fair, [that slogan was devised and copyrighted by the Texas Department of Transportation for their ongoing anti-litter campaign](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/trashy-beginnings-dont-mess-texas-180962490/). So if UT is using it on their official stationery then I’m guessing it’s promoting that campaign. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2021, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305/20 "2021-03-06T17:28:05Z")
I’ve mentioned this story elsewhere, but since Texas is being bashed I’ll tell it again. A high school friend of mine moved from Fairbanks, Alaska to Texas with her husband. He was a meteorologist in the Air Force. Friend went to the Texas DMV to get a new driver’s license. She was informed of all the documentation she would need, numerous tests, both written and driving she would have to take, plus all kinds of insurance. She asked why it would take so long, since most of the states she’d moved to during her husband’s career didin’t have NEAR so much rigamarole involved. The clerk told her “Well, we don’t take driver’s licenses from foreign countries.” and refused to believe Alaska was a US state. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chivalry-isnt-dead-unfortunately/937305.md?page=2)