Stop Talking About 'Chivalry Being Dead'

  "I carried a heavy box through the mall and no man or boy offered to help; chivalry is dead!"
   "I went on a date and he didn't open the car door for me; chivalry is dead!"
   "A study said women are more likely to give their seat to an elderly person; chivalry is dead!"
   Folks, I am tired of hearing this. Not because it is or is not true but because one has nothing to do with the other.
   Yes, really.
   Offering to help someone carry a heavy object? Not chivalry. Holding a door for a woman? Not chivalry. Giving up your seat for a pregnant woman.
   NOT. CHIVALRY.
   Those things are courtesy.

  "Courtesy: The showing of politeness in one's attitude and behavior toward others."

  Courtesy is derived from the Old French curteis which meant, roughly, 'acting like you are in the noble's court' or 'being on your best behavior'.
  Chivalry is derived from caballerius an Old French word that meant 'mounted warrior'.

Chivalry: Bravery in war; warfare as an art; a body of knights"

   Chivalry traditionally had three aspects; military, religious, and social, and those three aspects were based on the Seven Knightly Virtues which are;

• Courage
• Temperance
• Prudence
• Justice
• Hope
• Charity
• Faith

  The chansons de gest and the tales of Charlemagne's Paladins give us a very good idea of the focus of knights. The goals of knights, or the 'code of chivalry', if you will is;

• To defend the Holy, Catholic Church
• To defend the weak, the poor, the helpless, and women
• To profess your faith
• To be honest
• To be courageous
• To be temperate, just, and prudent
• To be obedient to your lord and your king
• To be chaste

  This was a code for warriors, a set of behaviors about protecting the innocent from violence. It is. bluntly, a code to channel the activities of highly-trained professional warriors to good ends. It has nothing to do with tipping your cap or wearing cologne.
  So what happened? Why do modern people associate chivalry with something other than burly warriors on horseback not killing people for profit?
  Wimps.
  No, really. See, back in the day chivalry was the exclusive realm of professional warriors, men who had been raised and trained from birth to be the toughest, strongest, best-equipped and best-trained fighters in a tough, violent world. Like samurai, but with better armor. Chivalry bound them to act justly, honorable, and to use their military prowess to protect the innocent, not exploit them. They remained privileged above others, however, and were held in an extremely high regard.
  Naturally, outsiders got jealous. Eventually some kings and other nobles created 'orders of knighthood' that weren't about warfare, or battle, or combat training; they were about rewarding people the king (or other noble) liked with the title of knight, not the substance of being a knight. The Order of the Garter, etc. all flourished and were about 'prestige within the court of the king' not 'skill on the field of battle'. It was less about channeling the violence of trained killers and all about rewarding courtiers.
  Courtier is from the Old French cortoiier which meant 'someone who lives at the king's or other noble's court'.

  "Courtier: A person who attends court as a friend or adviser to the king or queen"

  That is pretty far from 'mounted warrior'.
  Now, as you can imagine that to someone who 'lived at court' courtesy was a critical skill set while chivalry had almost nothing to do with you. But - knights are chivalrous! If a courtier is knighted, shouldn't he be chivalrous? What was a perfumed man in a doublet who didn't own a horse to do?
  Simple! Pretend that chivalry and courtesy are synonyms!
  They aren't, of course, and thus the development of courtly love was a welcome tool in the courtier's quiver.
  Courtly love was, really, a literary idea. What is now called 'courtly love' was the subject of poems, songs, and other written works for many years and really cast a strong focus on courtesy towards women as a element of courtly life. Begun in the 12th Century the ideas of courtly love were around for some time, then faded away until they were revived in the 19th Century, especially in fiction, especially in Arthurian fiction. And courtly love can be pretty gripping; lovers doomed to never be married; men wearing the colors of their lady; knights pining away because of their love for a princess they may never have; Courts of Love where women judged knights as to their adherence to the Laws of Love (similar to Courts of Honor where knights could be honored or disgraced for their adherence to the knightly code, or failure to live the knightly virtues).
  This imagery, revived about 150 years ago, was almost certainly never a "real life" thing; the poems, the songs, the books - they were, roughly, the equivalent of modern romance novels - women loved them so people made them to earn a living. Like modern romance novels their connection to reality was at best tenuous. There is no evidence from histories, court cases, other writings, etc. that courtly love was every anything other than the emo music of its day.
  On another, just as serious note, knighthood was a restricted class; you had to be born into the 'right class', or close enough, to be a knight. And being a knight was expensive, hideously so in today's money [imagine being expected to not only train to be a fighter pilot from the age of 9 but to provide your own fighter jet and missiles!]. Military knighthood was restricted to the upper classes. That means that chivalry, proper, virtuous chivalry, was likewise restricted to the upper classes. A peasant can't be chivalrous.
  This was another reason the poets and singers loved to pretend courtesy was a synonym for chivalry; while they couldn't be chivalrous they sure as Hell could be courteous. They naturally elevated courtesy over marital prowess and eventually even over honor and justice. To be courteous was to be 'the best of men'. Of course they would say that, it was all they had! But those poems, and songs, and stories were popular with women, of course, and the revival of courtly love literature likewise emphasized it because it sells well.
  But this is what we inherited - the conflation of 'courtesy' with 'chivalry', even though one has virtually nothing to do with the other.

Told ya'

The King of the Geeks casts his vote for Best Conservative Super Hero

OK, time for a public confession.

I am a geek. Indeed, I am the King of the Geeks. I have played Dungeons and Dragons for more than 30 years and have had D&D books published.. I can speak a little Elvish from the Tolkien novels and was able to recognize the dialects in the movies. I am working on making my own language. I think micronations are fascinating. I got a degree in systematic theology because I thought it was the most fun thing I could study!

It should be no surprise that I once collected comic books. I started with the usual – Superman. I loved the old TV series and started getting the comics. Before too long I had learned to go to the local comic shop and troll through the quarter bin to find old issues I had missed. I moved on to Green Lantern and the Fantastic Four. In 1975 I discovered the X-Men (with about, oh, every other comic book reader on Earth) and began to read X-Men and Alpha Flight.

I enjoyed comic books for the same reasons I enjoy Edgar Rice Burroughs and the pulps – action, clear morality, heroics. If I want boring, I’ll re-read The Catcher in the Rye (I loathe that book), if I want moral ambiguity I’ll read crime novels, and if I want anti-heroes I’ll read Moorcock. Burroughs, pulps, and comics share in the simple joy of having fun. Bad guys are bad, good guys are good, there it is.

Don’t get me wrong – there is more complexity to comics and the stories than a 1930’s singing cowboy serial (which I also love). While critics complained that the movie The Hulk was ‘too cerebral and not enough like a comic book’, the comic book is actually pretty talky with the main theme being the anger and violence inside all men. The X-Men are used as a metaphor for race relations; Spider Man is about the transition from childhood to adulthood, etc. In the end, though, they all get to punch evil people in the face, which is fun fiction.

As young as I was, though, I started to realize that many comic books had a political and social agenda, too. This was the worst in the old Green Lantern/Green Arrow stories of the 1970’s. When your attempts to promote a liberal agenda is so transparent and ham-handed that a 7 year old tires of it, you’ve gone overboard! I eventually quit collecting comics entirely in 1988 – in addition to the more overt liberal bias in so many comics, the rush of dark, gritty comics in the ‘80’s sucked the fun out of them. I quit collecting about 15 years ago.

Anyway, this long exposition/rant leads up to this point – I am excited about the upcoming Iron Man movie. Despite the overwhelming majority position of liberals within comic book writers and artists, Iron Man has remained conservative. Sure, that means he is often portrayed as a jerk by his liberal editors and writers, but the character (like the Hal Jordan Green Lantern) remains a law and order type with a respect for society and tradition. Originally one of the “anti-commie” heroes of the Cold War early 1960’s Iron Man remains a successful business man and inventor. Iron Man has always been my favorite superhero character, though never for reasons of his politics. He is my favorite because, in the end, he is uniquely normal. Spiderman? Changed permanently by an accident. The Hulk? Just like a ton of others, altered by radiation. Batman? So obsessed he is off the deep end and so highly trained in everything he must be 90 years old. The X-Men? Mutant DNA. Superman? He’s not even human.

Iron Man is, in the end, a smart guy with a good education. He builds his super powers. He turns around and makes a ton of money and employs thousands of workers from the inventions he uses for his super powers. Superman might give hope to the world, but Iron Man gives thousands of working men their paychecks! Iron Man is, like almost every superhero, a metaphor. In his case, he symbolizes Mankind’s creativity and drive to build things. He is the stand-in for people who build and expand civilization by working with their hands and their minds.

Listen to the King of the Gooks – go see Iron Man next Spring.