The medical condition of chivalry is something you hear discussed quite frequently in modern times. Is it living and well? Deceased? Flitting in an out of some sort of extremely gentlemanly coma? If I may put in my two cents, I would say that my answer to the question is yes, it does yet have some breath left in it, but this is a qualified answer. The most apparent problem to me is not the disagreement over whether it still exists, but that so few people seem to understand what it actually is, and have their own rather distorted ideas of what the word means. So, let’s clear a few things up.

Chivalry is the code of knights, and it is a code, first and foremost, of honor and valor in combat. Its primary focus is not the behavior of men towards women in romantic scenarios, but that of warriors towards one another on the field of battle. You do not poison your enemy in his sleep, you do not creep up and stab him in the back, and when you have him wounded and disarmed on the ground, you offer him mercy, which he may accept or refuse.

I say this not because the invocation of chivalry as the practice of wooing is entirely made up, because it is not. Chivalry, in its most elemental essence, means treating all those around you with respect, dignity and courtesy. It is from this principle that the whole door-holding, puddle-covering idea of what chivalry means evolved out of, and the reason that the concept still has merit and value in an era when its true origins are shrouded. There is some truth to the notion that people are becoming increasingly unkind and impolite to one another in modern times, but only some. The whole truth is that obsolete social restrictions are increasingly disappearing as society becomes more advanced and egalitarian. It is true that some people take this change as an opportunity to drop all pretext of manners and be coarse and inconsiderate, and this is an unfortunate trend.

There is another idea that should be thrown away in these, our modern times. Yes, chivalry was the code of knights, and knights were all men. This has translated into the misguided modern notion that chivalry is exclusively about the behavior of men, that romantic effort and courtesy are exclusively the domain of the male in a heterosexual relationship, and that it is the man’s job to do things for the woman, solely. Let us swiftly behead this notion that chivalry is, first, solely about romantic frivolity and second, solely about how the man behaves towards the woman, and return to its proper place chivalry as a code of mutual respect, consideration and dignity for all persons involved. Men, if you treat a woman like a statuette of blown glass who needs everything to be done for her and can scarcely move about without your assistance, you are committing well-intentioned, benevolent misogyny, but it is still misogyny. Women, if you consider things like love tokens, romantic planning, holding doors, and particularly, paying for outings, to be things that the man should always do for the woman and never the other way around, might I kindly ask you to return to 1940 or some earlier year and enjoy all the other lovely benefits of a committedly sexist society.

Chivalry’s true purpose is to establish mutual respect and dignity between equals. In olden times, those equals were enemies. Now, they can be lovers. Respect for all, kindness for all, courtesy for all. This is chivalry.