All this talk about gender equality promotes areas in which female lives can be improved, in which females had it worse than males. What about an area in which being a female surpasses being a male: chivalry?

Most of us ladies are going to agree that we don’t want an end to all the door-opening, check-paying, drink-buying, sweatshirt-lending, bag-carrying efforts from others.

However, these are luxuries that women receive just because “we have boobs” or “we are dainty,” and therefore, we should not be accountable for physical or financial responsibilities. While it’s convenient and fortunate that there are people willing to take some extra burden off of women's natural gift/curse of being child-bearers, it is not for the right reasons. No news here: Chivalry is splendidly lavish for women on the surface but inconspicuously detrimental beneath the façade, instilling the idea that we are unable to handle responsibility and that we must rely on men; or worse, that we automatically owe men for their honorary deeds by means of sexual favors and completing chores — since that’s all we’re good for.

To maintain integrity and equality, then, do women have to give up the perks of chivalry from men?

No. We can use our boobs and flaunt them, too (as we should). Instead of eradicating chivalry entirely, women can reciprocate it; who said we have to be the object all the time? This way, no one has to sacrifice the luxuries of being treated well for the sake of equality.

Indeed, at its core and without all its implications, chivalry is simply fulfilling honor in treating someone well: having empathy, dismissing selfishness, and increasing the quality of life for another person, one small act at a time.

Disregarding sexist thought, it makes absolutely no sense that act of chivalry should be confined to only men being chivalrous toward women. I think we’re all capable of compassion and a giving spirit toward another human, no matter what gender we are or what gender they are.

When’s the last time you saw a guy pulling out the chair for a girl, or driving and opening the car door for her? Maybe it doesn’t happen so often anymore because it’s too “old-fashioned” — but then again, the “new fashion” could consequently be these acts happening with all genders giving and receiving at the same ratio.

It should be a more common occurrence for the girlfriend to treat the boyfriend to dinner at an equal frequency in a heterosexual relationship, and it should be more acceptable for grooms to get just as much attention in weddings as brides.

I want to see more people of all sexual orientations holding doors for each other, offering to buy drinks for someone, and making the first move — not just men.

I want to see both partners in a couple fighting for or splitting the check, surprising each other with flowers, fixing toilets together, buying each other chocolate, paying the bills, and planning romantic dates — not just men.

Bridging the gap in gender roles and fusing the differences into equality by means of laws and affirmative action quota is not enough to achieve gender equality. Like most issues, we must start from the fundamentals, which in this case is how we view each other as humans. When we can accept the idea of treating each other with respect and selflessness regardless of our borne characteristics on an individual level, the conglomeration of individual acceptance will yield mass equality — de jure and de facto.

Males, females, and agenders alike: we can’t let chivalry die. Perhaps we can let the older, restrictive ideology and logic die, but we must replace it with new, improved, progressive ideology and logic.

The only possible thing in the way of doing so is our individual self — whether it is because of pride, selfishness, or passivity. Luckily, however, some of us are doing so already. Praise in time for Easter: Chivalry has risen!