Another case of people not bothering to read my admittedly lengthy posts. I'll try and summarize here. I don't think any of these statements are controversial but let me know if I'm wrong.
1. Holding the door for people is a nice thing to do. People should do it more often.
2. Some women feel uncomfortable or even unsafe when men hold the door for them. This is especially true if the man is a stranger, they are alone, it's at night, it's where they live, etc.
3. When members of a group with less social or political power tell members of a more politically and socially powerful group that certain things make them feel uncomfortable or unsafe, or that certain injustices are happening to them, the latter group should listen and take them at their word.
4. The source of the cultural difference in holding the door for women is, at least in parts of the South, tied directly to notions of patriarchal chivalry that grew out of, or was perpetuated by, the romanticism of the civil war and the antebellum south.
