If you think of the typical protagonist in your favourite Rom Com (Romantic Comedy for those of you who still live under a rock), then you have met the perpetually single girl who insists she is single because she wants to be and that independence rocks… Yeah that is me.

Except it’s not always like that, because as the story is told on repeat she wants to be single, wants to further something in her life and that’s usually her career and she doesn’t have time for men who have time for her, only the ones that don’t.

THAT right there is why so many women believe that chivalry is dead.

Rewind a hot minute, a couple things to cover seeing as how I’m sure there’s plenty of women who are going to read this and say “this girl doesn’t speak for the entire female population, she doesn’t speak for me,” okay lady go sit in the corner and sulk to your 12 cats, this clearly does not apply to you.

The second thing is what is chivalry? To me it’s all the little things, like opening my door, walking me home, giving me your coat when I’ve inevitably underdressed and become cold, giving a sincere compliment that isn’t creepy or about sleeping with me and just overall being kind.

Side note: These are not hard tasks, if you think they are we have a completely different issue on our hands.

DOUBLE side note: If you think that these shouldn’t be done because you think that it takes away from a woman’s power or whatever you think. I want you to know that I think you’re wrong and I don’t care because I think these are sweet gestures and I do them for other people too, except the coat thing because TRUST ME if I had a coat to give to a guy I was on a date with I probably would give it to him but I’m never that prepared.

So now that I’ve gotten rid of the cat ladies and over masculine men, those who are still reading this is for you.

When I say “if chivalry is dead it’s because you killed it,” you should know that I’m also a part of this mass murder. I have taken a liking to countless attractive and emotionally unavailable or uninterested men and not because they tricked me into talking to them or because I thought I could change them, LOL that’s garbage. I did it because that’s who I wanted to associate myself with.

That sounds really dumb, I know, but bear with me these men were usually the “cool kids” and I’m still living the childhood horrors of being the ugly outcast from kindergarten to potentially grade 10 (sophomore year).

Then when I wanted attention longer than five minutes and didn’t get it, I’d listen to sad songs and complain to myself about how I’ll be single for the rest of my life and I hate cats so I’d have to adopt 12 dogs instead, but really I am the issue.

On the flip side when I am treated with respect, kindness and dignity I’m floored at the gestures to the point of being speechless… that’s probably me in my rarest form, without a word to say. So how do I continually get this jaw-dropping attention? Let it in.

There are men out there that are waiting to spoil the right girl with attention and affection and they’re so often looked past for the immature boys, because these kinds of boys don’t require anything but your physical presence and that’s easy to provide whereas someone who’s willing to provide more to you requires more in return. ISN’T THAT JUST SO UNFAIR… GIVING SOMEONE EQUAL ATTENTION YOU DESIRE?

(If I rolled my eyes any further back, you’d need to call a priest.)

Don’t tell me you didn’t learn as a kid to treat others the way you’d like to be treated, just because you’re an adult doesn’t mean this has changed. If there is something that also rings SO true today is that “nice guys finish last” and it’s because they’re being overlooked and they’re competing in an unfair competition. It’s only reasonable that so many of these good men are just changing to keep up with what girls are looking for, but the problem is that women may have converted a man to a be the douchebag but only the douchebag can decide when he wants to change his ways.

HERE’S AN IDEA, let’s stop giving the douchebags the power to take whatever they’d like, make people feel bad and then reign over all… because that’s what’s happening and it sucks.

So here’s my suggestions:

• go on dates and let someone give their attention to you and only you for a while,
• appreciate the genuine compliments and reciprocate because it won’t take away from your value to appreciate someone else’s
• find someone that makes you happy for more time than when they make you sad because if you’re scales isn’t tipping in the happy direction maybe you should re-evaluate

So let’s stop digging a grave for chivalry because we’re quickly running out of time and space to hide the bodies of all the good men we’ve killed.