Save the women and children first, or er at least the children...

I think maybe we should forget the humans and save any cats on board first. Why? Because the internet if made of cats. If we start losing cats, the internet goes away!

xfreakazoidx said:

I got a good question.

Lets say someone on here had a parent that was wheelchair bound and maybe had some mental issues. If a member of a crew told you they would evacuate your first, but your parents would ahve to wait. Would you just accept it and "hope" your parents makes it off? I wouldn't. I'd fight through the lines to get them off. Their life is just as important as anyone elses. You know we've become an corrupt country when we put values on peoples worth.

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The problem with that stance is that you're actually arguing their life is more important than other people's.

And while you probably do feel that way, no one else does.

The problem with that stance is that you're actually arguing their life is more important than other people's.

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Nope, I'm stating their value is the same as everyone elses. Normally they are considered less valuable.

xfreakazoidx said:

Nope, I'm stating their value is the same as everyone elses. Normally they are considered less valuable.

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Sure, you're stating that.

Then you're going on to describe a framework in which they are more valuable than everyone else.

If you want twenty people to be put in danger to protect the life or your disabled relative you are making the demand your disabled relative be treated as more valuable than everyone else.

It's certainly understandable that they seem more valuable to you, but it's totally unreasonable to expect anyone else to apply the same standard. They've all got relatives, too.

CabVet said:

You seem to very often come up with these chauvinist posts. So, let's make a little mathematical exercise to figure out which sex really has the power:

Today, the earth is populated by about 7 billion people. Let's imagine (just for the sake of argument) that an extraterrestrial army arrived on earth and said they would eliminate all but 5 individuals of one of the genders. So, to be perfectly clear, they would, with a click of a button, kill all but 5 men, or all but 5 women. They said the decision of which gender was ours. From a species perpetuation (purely biological) point of view, if we wanted the human species to continue inhabiting this planet, which gender would you chose to be reduced to a population of 5?

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Another alien species comes and tells us that they will eliminate all but 1000 members of our species with our choice of two groups: 1000 fertile members, or 1000 infertile members of the human race. Which group would you choose if the population was reduced to only 1000?

Do you therefore recommend that on a sinking cruiser we save fertile people before those who are infertile by disease, accident, or other causes?

yasic said:

Another alien species comes and tells us that they will eliminate all but 1000 members of our species with our choice of two groups: 1000 fertile members, or 1000 infertile members of the human race. Which group would you choose if the population was reduced to only 1000?

Do you therefore recommend that on a sinking cruiser we save fertile people before those who are infertile by disease, accident, or other causes?

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Interesting reworking of the scenario. Very good.

DaisyDay said:

Are you young, fit and childless?

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Actually when I was young fit and childless I likely would heave been near the last off, at least in the situations that matter.

Why?

Because this latest and most of the real disasters always seem to involve problems deploying the lifeboats.

I'm still childless and strong. (Hardly fit anymore and rather slow as my knees are shot). I'd still likely be near the end as I still have the mechanical skills to be usefull getting boats away. Difference is now being less fit I'd be more likely to not make it off myself.

A large part of 'Women and Children first' is to create an environment where crew are going to keep doing their jobs deploying the boats and gettign everyone off. If it becomes every man for himself and the crew takes that stand few make it off.

So all the men who were crammed in with the surging crowd should stay behind? They would block everyone else from reaching the evacuation zone. If you are in front of the line, get the hell off the boat and allow the next group to make it to the lifeboat area. Blind, infirm, and the weak are the last to get rescued for obvious reasons.

Autumnleaf said:

You would be one of the last off because you have a selfless streak and a strong moral foundation that many other able bodied men don't have. That morality seems hard to find in this day and age and I think you take it for granted. My father is kind of like that.

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I like to think I am not that unusual.

Oh in the specifics of this, especially this most recent marine disaster, I am a bit different. I'm old and fat, but the water is still home. In this one where it does not seem cold was an issue I'd bet on myself to bail out at the last minute with no life vest and make it to shore just fine.

I thought the captain was one of the first off, 'falling' into the same lifeboat that his two officers also fell into. Slippy deck?

Autumnleaf said:

Evidently when the Italian cruise ship ran aground some women were amazed that men weren't giving women the first seats on the life boats. I guess the guys figured men and wimin are equal so its every adult for themselves.

How do you feel about that?

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You know, the whole "women and children first" thing is called a Birkenhead Drill. Named after the HMS Birkenhead that was carrying British soldiers and some family members to South Africa to participate in fighting down there.

Needless to say it struck a rock and was flooding rapidly and there simply weren't adequate lifeboats for everybody aboard. Not even close. There were lifeboats for perhaps 160 people and the ship was carrying upwards of 600. Conveniently though, there were only 150 women and children on the ship. The senior British officer onboard ordered his men to assemble on the deck and stand there in formation as they watched their families board the lifeboats and leave. A handful of the youngest soldiers were allowed onto the lifeboats to fill the remaining space and row them to shore.

And the soldiers stood there in formation, silent and still, as the water crested over the deck of the ship and it sank beneath the waves. A handful were found by another ship several days later clinging to the mast and some swam to shore, but drownings and sharks took the vast majority.

That's where "women and children first" comes from. Prior to the Birkenhead's sinking in the 1850s the idea was unheard of and even afterwards a lot of cultures never really took to the idea. Plenty did, but it's a distinctly British thing.

Kipling wrote a poem about the affair:

To take your chance in the thick of a rush, with firing all about,
Is nothing so bad when you've cover to 'and, an' leave an' likin' to shout;
But to stand an' be still to the Birken'ead drill is a damn tough bullet to chew,
An' they done it, the Jollies -- 'Er Majesty's Jollies -- soldier an' sailor too!
Their work was done when it 'adn't begun; they was younger nor me an' you;
Their choice it was plain between drownin' in 'eaps an' bein' mopped by the screw,
So they stood an' was still to the Birken'ead drill, soldier an' sailor too

The say that the Kobayashi Maru was the ultimate test of a man's ability to deal with an unwinnable situation. But the Birkenhead Drill is even nastier, and people actually did it.

Paradoxum said:

Well I wouldn't blame a guy for doing that. I wouldn't die for traditions sake. If equality means equality then it should be equality. Of course I'm probably a hypocrite when I say this too

This only slightly makes sense morally if men are more likely to live because they can swim for longer.

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hahaha

Men can swim longer? If I had to bet I would bet my home that women could last longer. I think they are more mentally with it in times of trials. We can multi-task. We probably could swim longer and sing while doing it. LOL

I would gladly give my seat up to anyone. I have lived a wonderful life and I know from what I saw where the ship went down….I could have gotten to shore. It was not that far. I would have been afraid ……ya know for SHARKS…..lol….I would swim fast, real fast.

yasic said:

Another alien species comes and tells us that they will eliminate all but 1000 members of our species with our choice of two groups: 1000 fertile members, or 1000 infertile members of the human race. Which group would you choose if the population was reduced to only 1000?

Do you therefore recommend that on a sinking cruiser we save fertile people before those who are infertile by disease, accident, or other causes?

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I would certainly let someone younger than myself who had children stay with them. I would certainly help yes…the sick and blind and handicapped to get on.

Space aliens…..don't believe in them. I don't' know who should get on….but if there were not enough boats for everyone I certainly would give my seat up even if I were fertile.

I certainly think that if there were doctors in the infertile group…or engineers or pilots…with skills….they should be selected for all the obvious reasons. Fertility has nothing to do with anything if that group does not have the skills to survive.

mdancin4theLord said:

hahaha

Men can swim longer? If I had to bet I would bet my home that women could last longer. I think they are more mentally with it in times of trials. We can multi-task. We probably could swim longer and sing while doing it. LOL

I would gladly give my seat up to anyone. I have lived a wonderful life and I know from what I saw where the ship went down….I could have gotten to shore. It was not that far. I would have been afraid ……ya know for SHARKS…..lol….I would swim fast, real fast.

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And probably make a lot of splashing and commotion, which any shark worth the name would interpert as a wounded seal.

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