Women and children first - Page 3

I generally give in to ladies but it is not for chivalry or superiority. I get greater mental peace this way and my conscience does not bother me. Perhaps it is mental conditioning or even superstition that bad luck follows us for upsetting women. Edited by Summer3 - 12 years ago

Originally posted by: angie.4u

Frankly speaking one doesn't get to see these so called privilege or moral right of "women-child first " being practiced -at least not in India.

Let's see. Reserved compartments in every train and in some cases even the whole train. Reserved seats in every bus, metro. These reflect that there is an existing mindset in the society that women need special treatment.

Most of the time there is only panic and no established order and its each one for oneself. The various stampede cases in crowded places/ religious processions/ panic due to rumours are some instances. In these cases there is no order - we dont see anyone giving a thought to any woman, child, handicapped or elderly. Instead what we have is total bedlam and panic.

I am not talking about individual person, cos natural instinct will lead every person to try and save himself/ herself. I was talking about when there is a scenario of someone (a person or society) establishing some order, then usually the order gives least priority to young men. In a stampede everyone gets to think for himself/ herself, someone is not giving the order at that time.

In case of hostage taking say during a hijack we usually see the abductors release the women and children and also the infirm instead of the men. This makes practical sense from the POV of the abductors. It would be much more troublesome to have a female/toddler/sick person/elderly person on their hands as a hostage.

Common sense will say that it will be just the opposite of what you wrote. Out of the four choices, a physically strong man weighing 80 Kg, a woman weighing 55 Kg, a child weighing 15 Kg and an infirm person, who do you think is easiest to control? The infirm will require care otherwise s/he might die, which is an unwanted circumstance for the abductors. But among the others it's the child and the women who are easiest to control as the abductor will be physically larger. It's not because of convenience that they release women, children and elderly first, it's because the negotiators give priority to them. Once again young men comes last in the list of priority of the negotiators.

In the case of Titanic the women and children were to be saved first as per the captains order while the captain himself preferred to go down  with his ship.

One of the male protagonist tried to break that order on the sly,  by picking up a crying child and posing as her guardian/parent in order to escape. Once in the boat the child was left to herself. So its not that the captains order was being followed by all those present on that ship. In fact  one of the crew member had to fire at the crowd of men that was getting unruly as they learnt about the impending danger and wanted to rush and grab the boats that were being lowered with the women and children in it. Moreover, we did see women as well as children of the working class locked up behind doors! They had been left behind along with their men , without any opportunity to save themselves! So its not just about women and children. Its a lot more complex. There is class distinction, some feigned morality,  as well as some practicality involved.

 The only reason the women or children were being allowed to get away first was because the captain desired it and many of his crew was used to or willing to follow his orders. We must not forget that while the boats were being lowered, very few people on board knew that the ship had insufficient boats to save all of them! And some were oblivious to the imminent danger. When we take note of the female/ kid first out policy in Titanic, we should not lose sight of these circumstances that were clearly depicted in the movie!

True they didn't know that there was not enough lifeboats on the ship, but at the same time they didn't know how much time they have got before the ship sinks altogether. Even if someone knows that there is enough lifeboats on the ship to save everyone, s/he would still want to get off the sinking ship as fast as s/he can cos s/he won't be sure when the ship will go under and whether there will be enough time to lower all lifeboats or not.

So coming to the question of why have an order (that is , if at all there is or was any )-

As rightly pointed out earlier in a post above, first come first basis or no order could result in chaos. Making a conscious decision to select atleast some, brings down the panic level that could otherwise occur and thus provides a chance for some plan of action to salvage the situation however slim that might be. In such a case it would be better to get the infirm out of the way and retain men and women that are capable of handling the situation well. But if its a hopeless case such as that  of evacuation then most would act as per their innate nature. Eg the Titanic situation- Those who are used to placing others before themselves (eg the captain, some crew members, Kate, Leo) would continue to do so and so  would those who place themselves first on priority (eg the sly protagonist, many other passengers, workers on the ship) In a moment of crisis people would act as per their instincts. Morality, order, law wouldnt matter much in a desperate situation.  There would be many , if they could have it their way , who would prefer an order of "ME and only ME" first why s/he ! Action would depend  on an individual's nature shaped by his/her belief system during life. The captain and the chief engineer both must have known this and  hence their decision to withhold the information regarding shortage of boats to the people (both men AND women) on board.

So what order and what preferential treatment are we talking about ?

Originally posted by: souro

Let's see. Reserved compartments in every train and in some cases even the whole train. Reserved seats in every bus, metro. These reflect that there is an existing mindset in the society that women need special treatment.

[A]

Women do need special treatment in the form of reserved seats/compartments  in crowded trains, metros and buses thanks to the existing mindset that prevents people from offering seats to the ladies having toddlers with them, the elderly or the ill and also due to some perverts who take disadvantage of crowded places to eve tease and harass.

I m not saying that every woman needs special treatment but its deplorable that the only way to ensure that those among them who needed  it  was through "reservation". Inspite of so called reserved seats and reserved compartments women have a tough time availing it as some 'gentlemen" refuse to vacate seats or compartments and get into nasty arguments. Some even feign illness and usually get away with it. If people in general were sensitive to these issues there wouldn't be a need to form rules and reserve seats for the women, elderly, or handicapped. Men who appeal that   they are feeling unwell do manage to continue holding on to the ladies seats 😆

My preference:

1. Rescue families with most children (all family members have to be present on the scene for the count to take precedence)
2. Rescue families with children
3. Rescue couples
4. Rescue single men and women. Alternate between one single man and one single woman. Whether it should be a man or woman as a starting point could be decided by a toss.
5. Rescue pets

Note 1: Some preferences might have more than one group that qualifies. If that is the case, a quick raffle would decide the order of rescue within that group. Same goes for the single men/women line. A quick raffle would decide the order in the line.

Note 2: The above "preferential" rescue effort would eliminate bias based on gender, age, special needs, color of skin, citizenship etc., by striving to group people according to the relationship they share. It also makes sure that families stay together and not lose even one member. Families either live together or die together in my scenario.

Assumption #1: there is a passenger list available that identifies families and couples, as well as each individual's age
Assumption #2: no child is traveling alone
Assumption #3: there is sufficient time to conduct a raffle
Assumption #4: none of the people to be rescued are from these forums. Otherwise I would have to change my preferences, think long and hard about who said what in the past, down a peg or two, order them up according to who I like and who I don't, count to twenty, re-order with a clearer mind, explain my position, tell them it's for their own good, tell them that life is overrated, and... a final handshake / kiss good-bye!!!

Originally posted by: K.Resurrected.

My preference:

1. Rescue families with most children (all family members have to be present on the scene for the count to take precedence)
2. Rescue families with children
3. Rescue couples
4. Rescue single men and women. Alternate between one single man and one single woman. Whether it should be a man or woman as a starting point could be decided by a toss.
5. Rescue pets

Note 1: Some preferences might have more than one group that qualifies. If that is the case, a quick raffle would decide the order of rescue within that group. Same goes for the single men/women line. A quick raffle would decide the order in the line.

Note 2: The above "preferential" rescue effort would eliminate bias based on gender, age, special needs, color of skin, citizenship etc., by striving to group people according to the relationship they share. It also makes sure that families stay together and not lose even one member. Families either live together or die together in my scenario.

Assumption #1: there is a passenger list available that identifies families and couples, as well as each individual's age
Assumption #2: no child is traveling alone
Assumption #3: there is sufficient time to conduct a raffle
Assumption #4: none of the people to be rescued are from these forums. Otherwise I would have to change my preferences, think long and hard about who said what in the past, down a peg or two, order them up according to who I like and who I don't, count to twenty, re-order with a clearer mind, explain my position, tell them it's for their own good, tell them that life is overrated, and... a final handshake / kiss good-bye!!!

Originally posted by: K.Resurrected.

Assumption #4: none of the people to be rescued are from these forums. Otherwise I would have to change my preferences, think long and hard about who said what in the past, down a peg or two, order them up according to who I like and who I don't, count to twenty, re-order with a clearer mind, explain my position, tell them it's for their own good, tell them that life is overrated, and... a final handshake / kiss good-bye!!!