To Act like a Lady and Think like a Man

Courtesy is wholly good when done with sincerity and perceived with tolerance. Sincerity and tolerance are the essence of courtesy to the doer and perceiver respectively. Without sincerity, the culture of courtesy will lose its purpose as means to promote kindness and will only be a meaningless act. Tolerance is needed so that suspicion, arrogance, and other negative attitudes will not emerge whether or not an act is courteous. I believe that the doer and perceiver need to cooperate to create a courteous situation.

Stereotype of a lady in classical society is the one who acts gently and virtuously, in other word, courteously. Their courtesy is complex, not only based on norms but also feelings so that their actions would be flawless in any situation. For examples, in Siti Nurbaya novel, we could see how a lady is constantly trained with rules and manners since their early days and there is “pingit” tradition in cultures of Indonesia. Unlike soldiers, a lady is not trained for the sake of discipline, inempathy and tough mentality. The purpose of the training is somewhat elusive and not a thing that could be explained briefly, but in broad outline, it is to give a lady an insight to paradoxically merge opposite ideas: courtesy which is purely restrained and feelings which came from heart, which is free-willed. It results in the true, proper act of courtesy which is not just a cold custom that bring inefficiency through fake interactions, but a refined action that is not as simple as it sounds.

Stereotype of a common man in our “friendly tropical islander” culture is someone who is merry as well as flexible who could accept with positive attitude. For example, most indigenous cultures in country, which have been dominated by men for centuries hence patriarchal, have developed variations of welcoming dances and welcoming parties which symbolize openness, trust, and tolerance to strangers. Men are also thought to be undemanding and not to be concerned with little things. For example, at modern party, when two women wear same outfit most likely that they will avoid each other and become foe. On the other hand, when two men stranger to each other wear the same outfit will most likely to instantly become buddies. At the party, men also tend not to think too much about other’s accessories and outfit. Men are simple and undemanding; making them easy to believe that courtesy have no ulterior motives and that there is always a reason behind every impoliteness. We should think like a man when perceiving everything in everyday life so that we could live merrily in warm and trusting society.

                In the end, to create a courteous situation is like the process of giving and receiving something as a birthday present. To the giver, courtesy is like the wrapping which could conceal and make someone happily accept the object; regardless its quality. In most situations a good packaging will raise the value of an item but sometimes, the packaging is more valuable than the item itself. To the receiver, trust and open-mindful is needed to accept any kind of gift and to maintain positive thought when the gift is not a sought after one or not wrapped good enough. To be more ideal, we could take the positive things from the two concepts of masculinity and femininity and merge them, always strive to be true and thoughtful when initiating a courteous act and to be tolerant when perceiving others.