Rule of the Sea: "women and children first." Do you agree with it?

Maybe boats should have enough lifeboats in them to accommodate the number of people that can fill said boat. Might solve some problems. Either way, I’m definitely agreeing with children first.

Well, children first should not be even up for debate. Children don’t have the judgment or flexibility to save themselves in an emergency. And mothers of the children should go to comfort the children and to be there to guide them to safety.

So as a general rule, Women and Children first works well. What works better is having adequate lifeboats for all.

By the way, there is no such “Rule of the Sea”. It is a myth, and while the survival rate for women on the titanic was three times that of men, it is usually every man for himself.

I think the children should definately be saved before the adults. Hands down. Their lives have so much more potential. Maybe the idea of women going on the rescue boats is just a product of patriarchal society. Perhaps people assumed that women were weaker and therefore not strong enough to keep swimming until rescued. Or perhaps the idea was that the men would be chivalrous to the women and die with honor. Whether this tradition is still honored or not I have no idea. It’s not every day that I find myself on a sinking ship.

Certainly children first. Then their mothers (who must raise them after all). Then I think it should be equal.

So long as it means first to go after me.

If I were a guy that rule would only apply to my wife and children, everyone else is fucked.

Children first, adults are free-for-all. :P

Plus, with my masculine strength it’ll be easy to push women out of the way. Haha.

It’s a rule that’s intended to honor – and promote – civilization itself. Correctly applied, in fact, the rule is “Passengers first, women and children at the head of the line”. That is, the crew are supposed to be experienced and professional seamen, who accept the hazards of their duty and recognize that as a rule, passengers are ill-equipped to save themselves on board a stricken vessel, and children least of all. Mothers accompany children, of course, and other females, especially those who may be of child-bearing age, aren’t going to be given an ad hoc pregnancy test, but are going to be among the first saved because honorable men want their own women saved before being saved themselves, and simply apply the rule to “all women”.

It also takes a certain amount of strength and stamina to lower lifeboats by hand from the davits of a ship, especially if they’re being lowered from an upper deck. The process can take awhile, and must be done with some care. The strongest and ablest men should be among the last to leave the ship, presumably because only they will have the strength to lower all of the necessary lifeboats if electric winches fail.

If it was “every man for himself”, then the men would simply evacuate themselves first, and leave the women and children on deck to fend for themselves. This would be an abomination of the worst kind; an honorable man would not assist or permit cowardly men to take the place of women and children waiting to be evacuated.

Obviously “there should be enough lifeboats for all”, but sometimes some get wrecked or the launching davits jam; sometimes the ship lists so badly to one side that the boats on the high side cannot be deployed, and sometimes manpower itself is in short supply to launch the boats. So “women and children first” is just a shorthand way of saying what I’ve just said; it’s instinctive among decent and brave men, and it’s not something to be debated as the ship sinks.

Obviously, this “rule” has been abrogated many times in recent memory. I don’t understand how crew members and officers can live with the shame they must feel after abandoning passengers to their fate before properly assisting them to evacuate.

Women and children first; male passengers next, and then the crew can – and will – save themselves.

Yes ^^. The problem isn’t about adequate lifeboats as it is about time. It’s children first, the injured and handicapped, women, then men. If they can be spared, one crewman or officer may be assigned to a lifeboat. Crew goes after men, then officers. Captain last. The crew and captain need to stay aboard to supervise evacuation. Today the rule still stands and it is expected to be followed.

All commercial vessels that pass annual and semi-annual inspections are supposed to have adequate lifeboats and other safety equipment, including life vests, flares, EPIRB, etc., or they will be denied insurance, business licenses, or the privilge to take passangers of any kind for money. The Coast Guard requires a minimum of safety equipment even for private vessels that take unpaid passengers and the fines are high. But there has been corruption. And there will always be cowards like Francesco Schettino, captain of the Costa Concordia.

It’s women and children first, the injured and handicapped (Both groups often treated as one), then men, then crew. Sorry ran out of edit time above.

For the same graciously detailed reasons listed above, yes I agree.

I asked a similar question a couple of years ago regarding the sinking of the Titanic & my answer remains unchanged, i’d save my wife & kids to the exclusion of everyone else.
I’m pretty confident they’d want me to survive too, regardless of any perceived etiquette.

Better save the women and children first. The men that don’t, are truly lost.

I started thinking children first, but then what would those children do without somekind of parental guidance? So maybe the rule should be more about an adult and not just women. Not always nowadays are children just accompanied by women, I think it is unfair to seperate if a child came with his or her father. Do you know what I mean?

All I’ve read thus far are emotional appeals and mere assertions that the rule should be applied. Absolutely nothing approaching a rational reason.

And how can there be?

One must believe that the lives of women and children are somehow intrinsically more valuable than that of men, and that men are disposable and obliged to sacrifice themselves—an obnoxious and delusional belief—to think this rule has any validity.

I can appreciate people helping each other during the course of an evacuation, regardless of gender or status. But to wilfully move to the back of a queue, or to not take a lifeboat at all for some stranger who happens to be swinging different genitals, is utter madness.

Remind me not to travel by sea.

@Kropotkin Mine clearly doesn’t assign to those principles, maybe you didn’t read it yet, or didn’t catch my drift somehow.

What you say is undoubtedly true, @ucme, but that quickly devolves into “every man for himself”, since some men will be traveling without families (or may just pretend to!) and they can’t be penalized for that, can they? Either that, or some may – and would – pretend to families that they didn’t have. In the confusion and panic of a ship being abandoned at sea, civilization is a thin veneer.

That’s why “the rule” evolves, because in contradistinction to what @nofurbelowsbatgirl says (and exactly as @Espiritus_Corvus has pointed out) “time” is a huge factor. There simply isn’t time for parliamentary procedure and a debate society. And unless the thing is going to devolved into mob rule and “me first”, resulting in a lot of unnecessary death, then rules have to be ingrained.

Also, @Kropotkin, women and children are intrinsically more important than men. They represent the future of civilization, which I didn’t think I needed to point out so explicitly. Everyone on the ship is going to die eventually, anyway. An honorable man would choose an honorable death, if that’s what had to happen to save someone who might not otherwise be saved. That’s also civilization.

@CWOTUS Agreed, but I guess it all boils down to instinct, die a noble death saving random strangers & leave your surviving family devastated at your loss, or survive at all costs to maintain the family unit…I choose the latter all day long.

Yes, @Kropotkin, only man male needs to survive for humanity to survive. A single ejaculating penis can fertilize countless women. Learn to reason!

Anything that systematic would get you hated.
It’s not a deal nor a test nor a love of something fated.
(death)

@ucme I didn’t actually intend to direct my response to yours. I think your example is more reasonable, since it’s a sacrifice for those with which one has strong emotional ties. It’s also something of a topic in itself.

@CWOTUS Doubling down on the assertion and defending it with further appeals to emotion and further rhetorical appeals to honour, civilization, etc, does not make an argument. You’ve not pointed anything out at all, let alone explicitly. I await your argument as to how women and children are intrinsically more valuable than men.

Just to give you a bit more credit than you deserve, I’ll offer a preemptive counter-argument against one of your assertions. Adult men are worth more than children because men have had decades of development and nurturing, have accumulated decades more knowledge and social ties and are likely to have an established social role with varying degrees of responsibility. Children have had merely a few years of development and are easier to replace.

I apologise for seeming a little curt. I just find your view genuinely offensive and obnoxious.

Children have their future before them, and they should have someone with them. So I guess women and children first makes sense.

I completely agree. They do have the most tender meat.

@Adirondackwannabe that was my initial thought.

But then I thought what about the single fathers who brought their children on a vacation, or the widowers, or just the fathers without their wives for various reasons. Don’t they too deserve a chance to be with their children? So the “women and children first” rule doesn’t make sense I guess to me at least not in this day. I thought we weren’t “on stranger tides” (pun intended) and we were all for equality?

We have made that change so maybe it’s time to change that idea now too?

I always picture this life boat adrift in a raging sea with kids who don’t have a clue what to do. I personally don’t think that my life or the life of any random child is any more valuable than any other life. So no, I don’t think women and children first should be an absolute. I think it makes more sense to leave family units intact so that there is someone to do the heavy lifting when there is no fulcrum and lever available. Practicality should override chivalry. I thought chivalry was dead anyhow????

I am old school traditional. Women and children first. Without them safe, life has no hope.

No, it is a dangerous rule that creates complication during very stressful moments. A lot of Titanic’s lifeboats left (partially) empty while people where drowning minutes later.

I also fail to see the moral base.

@whitenoise: It creates order where there is a real threat of disorder, even chaos. It is structure where there will very quickly be none. It requires strong leadership and a well-trained, disciplined crew.

The reason why there were empty lifeboats off the Titanic is because White Star Lines were so confident their new ship was unsinkable that the crew had only two evacuation drills since boarding about two weeks before the passengers. One with passengers and one without. And these weren’t full drills, as full drills were impossible due to lack of boats for every passenger section and a full drill would’ve revealed that fact to the passengers. For the same reason, I don’t think many of the crew took these drills as seriously as those aboard other ships. Therefore the crew were under-trained and probably unsure of where to disembark some passenger sections. Also, as the vessel lists or pearls and the waterline rises, passengers will scramble in panic toward opposite of the list or pearl, and as yet unused boats will be set loose as well.

@Espiritus_Corvus there are other, better ways to create order, I feel.

In general, I would favor to help those that can’t help themselves, but why women?

@whitenoise: What I’ve been discussing here is Maritime Tradition, not Maritime Law. You will be happy to know that nowhere in Maritime Law does it actually say to evacuate women and children first. The International Maritime Organization has issued fairly extensive rules about the location and size of lifeboats a cruise ship must offer, and how quickly a company should be able to clear its ship. If an evacuation alarm sounds, cruise-ship passengers are supposed to proceed to the loading area and board a lifeboat that was assigned to them based on their cabin numbers. Some evacuations are far more chaotic than that, and the crew just loads whoever is ready to go. In those emergency situations, men sometimes step aside for the women to go first, but it’s not a matter of maritime law, nor is the tradition observed in many parts of the world.

If I found myself in a situation where there was inadequate space for all in a lifeboat, I would either find use as a nurse for the injured or I would give way to younger people due to my age. I’ve had a very good life. They should have the same opportunity.

But that ^^ concerns only cruise ships which often have 150–200 crew and officers, 1,000 – 1,500 other personnel, and 3,000 – 4,000 passengers. Veritable cities on the water. Smaller commercial vessels, such as ferries with 10 – 25 crew and up to 1,000 passengers, although still under the same maritime law, will often fall upon tradition for lack of cabin/lifeboat assignments. It’s a social contract and I wouldn’t debate it during an emergency.

I fear it is neither rule, nor tradition. Titanic was an exception.

Let’s focus on building safer boats.

It seems like the majority of this so-called progressive feminist gender isn’t important is showing where it truly stands on issues like these. Personally I’m for saving the least able first.

@Kropotkin I agree with your arguments about how it’s wrong to consider a women’s life more important than that of a man. Why not just randomly kidnap guys on the street and take their body organs out, expecially if it meant saving the life of a woman? How are we evolving as a society by coddling one group of people at the direct expense of another?

Let’s just draw straws and luck will determine who goes and who drowns. Just so we can find straws on the sinking ship!

George Carlin couldn’t have said it any better….
” I locate my nearest emergency exit, and then I plan my route. You have to plan your route. It’s not always a straight line, is it? Sometimes there’s a really big fat fuck sitting right in front of you. Well, you know you’ll never get over him. I look around for women and children, midgets and dwarves, cripples, war widows, paralyzed veterans, people with broken legs, anybody who looks like they can’t move too well; the emotionally disturbed come in VERY handy at a time like this. You might have to go out of your way to find these people, but you’ll get out of the plane a lot God damn quicker, believe me. I say, “Let’s see… I’ll go around the fat fuck… step on the widow’s head… push those children out of the way… knock down the paralyzed midget, and get out of the plane where I can help others.”
“I can be of no help to anyone if I’m lying unconscious in the aisle with some big cocksucker standing on my head. I must get out of the plane, go to a nearby farmhouse, have a Dr. Pepper, and call the police.”

No, it’s nonswimmers first, then children second – except when the water temperature is 50 F or lower, then it’s just children first.