by Thea Voutiritsas
Standing between two barstools, I pushed myself up on my tiptoes to give the bartender my order. I’m 5″1′, and for some reason I believe that standing on my tiptoes helps people hear me. She took my order and walked away. Then my male friend came up and paid the tab before I had a chance to protest. I tried to argue that it was my turn to pay, but he said not to worry about it.
“Sure,” I gave up. “Next time.”
I spent the rest of the evening in, what felt like, the passenger’s seat. I never lit my own cigarette, or opened a door, or paid for a drink. Someone even walked in on me in the bathroom. He quickly left; it was an accident! No big deal. But he apologized to who he believed to be my boyfriend. Not me. I bumped into someone. I apologized. He told me that a “pretty lil’ thing never ought to apologize for anything.” All night, people asked who my boyfriend was, as if I wouldn’t have come there on my own accord.
I aired my frustrations the next day, and the only response I could get was,
“Why do you care that people are being nice to you?”
Because people are being nice to me in the way they are nice to children and babies. I may be small in stature. I may be a woman. I may even wear big pink dress, god forbid. At the end of the day, I’m an adult. What I hate is not being treated like one. I don’t need advice, I don’t need a chaperone, and I don’t need someone else’s money. I know how to use a lighter, and a door, and a toilet. I’m a woman, with a job, and a big fat loan, and an OBG/YN with whom I am on a first-name basis. I think I know my way around a half-size bic lighter.
The problem with chivalry is that it requires the chivalrous person to treat women differently, and in some cases, to treat women like they’re incapable of accomplishing simple tasks. I never felt so infantilized, outnumbered, and powerless. Maybe we should trade the world “chivalrous” in for “courteous,” and remind each other that the kindest thing to do is give the people around you a choice in how they are treated. Nice behavior isn’t so nice if it’s unwarranted.