The New Criterion’s Emily Esfahani Smith re-examines chivalry in modern society in her latest piece for The Atlantic. In the article she contends that in their campaign for gender equality, modern feminists have unfairly targeted chivalry as “benevolent sexism.” She suggests that celebrating chivalrous behavior could help restore civility to relations between the sexes:
If women today—feminists and non-feminists alike—encouraged both men and women to adopt the principles of civil and chivalrous conduct, then the standards of behavior for the two sexes would be the same, fostering the equality that feminists desire. Moreover, the relations between the sexes would be once again based on mutual respect, as the traditionalists want. Men and women may end up being civil and well-mannered in different ways, but at least they would be civil and well-mannered, an improvement on the current situation.
Read this provocative piece at The Atlantic.