Most of the coverage of the Costa Concordia disaster at the moment seems to be focusing on the Italian cruise ship’s captain and his douchey behavior, which involved not only running the ship aground but also abandoning ship prestissimo while passengers remained trapped on board.
MRAs, by contrast, are using the tragedy as an excuse to rail against the notion of “women and children first” and, of course, to make jokes about women drowning.
Now, the Titanic aside, “women and children first” isn’t now, and hasn’t ever really been, the standard way to evacuate those on a sinking ship, though many in the public — including some of those who were on board the Costa Concordia – seem to believe that it is. (See here for more details on how evacuations are typically handled these days; generally only those with mobility problems are given special treatment.)
In the case of this particular evacuation, some on board apparently tried to enforce an informal “women and children” policy, but many men weren’t willing to wait.
What’s got some MRAs in a snit is that some people, in the media and online, are calling these dudes cowards. In The Daily Mail, a right-wing British tabloid, A N Wilson wrote:
[I]n our day, with the advent of feminism and the professional woman, chivalry and manners are considered stuffy and old-fashioned.
As the father of three daughters, I do not, with a single fibre of my being, wish to go back to a time when women could not have the vote or get a university degree. Nor do I, surrounded by extremely strong-charactered and intelligent women in my family and among my friends, feel tempted to regard women as the frail sex.
But the fact remains that there is a longing among most men to protect women and children, and chivalry is simply a manifestation of that longing.
And whatever transpires about the reason for the Costa Concordia disaster, the disappearance of a chivalric code is a sorry reflection on society today.
This is not what you’d call a feminist argument; it’s a traditionalist argument, published in a tabloid rag that’s generally quite hostile to feminism.
Nonetheless, some MRAs are using the Costa Concordia disaster as an opportunity to deliver a big “told you so!” to the … imaginary feminists who live in their head.
Over on The Spearhead, where one familiar commenter actually described Wilson’s Daily Mail article as “feminist,” guest poster Lyn87 wrote:
The MRM is getting more vocal, and a lot of guys are now saying, “You wanted equality. This is what it looks like.” And they are saying it aloud and in public. Even a few women chimed in, saying that men have no obligation to die for women if women want equality. (Somehow I suspect there wasn’t much, “I am woman, hear me roar, watch me drown” on the Costa Concordia itself, but hey, it’s a start.)
MRAs: Always up-to-the-minute with their pop culture references!
This post was helpfully illustrated with a stock photo of a woman drowning.
Commenters got in their digs as well.
Keyster riffed on Lyn87’s incredibly au courant Helen Reddy reference:
I am woman hear me…blurp….rah…gurgle…raha…ffftt…orr…roar…gurgle…help me…somebody…fffft…please…blurp…help…help me please!
Aharon told both ladies and fish what’s what:
I eat fish. Fish don’t eat me. My life is too precious to sacrifice it so some spoiled bitch can have a pussy pass into the life boats.
Anti Idiocy got all hypothetical-cruise-ship tough guy on us:
Anyone who attempts to keep me on a sinking ship because of the genitals with which I was born is attempting to murder me. I have the right to respond accordingly.
And Thomas Tell-truth kicked chivalry – not to mention basic human decency — to the ocean floor:
Equality means that when the ship is going down and you are a woman, you had better get out of my way or you are going to drown with my footprints on your back.
Apparently Thomas Tell-truth is actually George Costanza:
Jeb, meanwhile, offered a more scientific rationalization for being a complete douchenozzle:
As far as I’ve heard, the one and only sport in which women naturally out-do men is endurance swimming. Women are also more bouyant, and as survivalists will explain, women float easiest on their backs (making it easy to breathe while expending minimal energy) whereas men float easiest in “the dead man’s float” (ie. face down, head in the water) and must expend more energy to stay alive. Furthermore, women have more body-fat than men which insulates them better against aquatic dangers such as hypothermia.
Given all these factors it is quite rational for men to pick women up by the seat of their pants and toss them overboard to make way for men and children to safely be rowed ashore on the lifeboats.
It’s all about doing the right thing and saving lives, after all.
MRA humor is very sophisticated indeed.
EDITED TO ADD: The Spearhead has put up a followup post, once again taking aim at imaginary “lifeboat feminists,” though the only person the post cites lamenting the end of “women and children” is Rich Lowry from the National Review (not a feminist publication).
@ Gateman
MRAs are defined by their incoherant and ridiculous anger.
They have some the potential for some valid points but lose all right to be taken seriously by their conduct, words, beliefs and paranoia.
For example;
Men *do|* have societal expectations placed on them to be physically strong, financially successful, to live up to ideal types of masculinity – WOMEN DON’T DEMAND THIS OF THEM, SOCIETY (50/50 MALE & FEMALE) DOES. Feminists took the lead in objecting to the negative consequences of these unrealistic expectations years ago. But still, MRAs blame feminism/women.
You see? Valid point potential, ruined by misogyny.
MRAs are idiotic, pathetic fools who enjoy being angry. They shout to get attention.
“Men *do|* have societal expectations placed on them to be physically strong, financially successful, to live up to ideal types of masculinity “
And then there’s guys that complain that traditional masculinity is being shunned in today’s society. Go! Be a big burly manly man if you like. We don’t care. Go completely metro, we don’t care. Nobody cares! You’re the only ones making a big deal out of nothing here!
Gateman, some of the Spearhead commenters were even arguing against giving priority to children in disasters.
Traveller said
Lyn87 said
Darn it, blockquote fail, but you get what I’m saying.
Depends on the cruise ship I guess because of the three I have taken: two Alaska, one Mexico-all three had, prior to leaving the dock, drills on how to evacuate.
I am taking a fourth one soon so I will see if this will be the one that does not do it.
gateman: Wow, I read about 100 posts and so far NOT ONE has actually offered any logical argument as to why a woman should be given priority over a man when evacuating a sinking ship. It seems that it all comes down to female entitlement and male disposability.
Have you seen anyone here (not an MRM member/sympathiser) actually arguing FOR women, as a class, being given preferential treatement? By “as a class” I mean all women, not women with specific needs, or justifications, for being given a seat (caretaker for someone otherwise too infirm to manage for themselves, personally infirm, etc.).
Because if you haven’t, the implication that it’s going on is a lie.
Then why is everyone at this website attacking AVFM when the consensus there is THE EXACT SAME THING – that all people should be treated equally.
Because that’s not what they are doing. They are crowing about how evil the women are who think they should get special treatment, and how great it is that some women died. They are braying about how, now that they are asking for “equal treatment” that means the men (who are rougher, tougher and more aggressive) will get to the lifeboats and the women can just drown.
But you choose to ignore that aspect of the AV4M posts, because that’s not making your case look good.
“Then why is everyone at this website attacking AVFM when the consensus there is THE EXACT SAME THING – that all people should be treated equally. ”
Actually their points seem to be as follows.
1. Women suck
2. This is why we should throw them overboard in the event of a maritime disaster.
3. LOL isn’t it funny thinking about women drowning?
Rather than, for example, trying to make sure that children and the elderly are saved, they seem to be all about making sure that women die rather than men. The idea of sorting evacuations by something other than gender doesn’t seem to have occurred to them (nor does trying to make sure that nobody dies by having enough lifeboats and preventing idiot captains from crashing their ships by showing off, and then trying to cover it up).
“Why is it that because some of the dead are women the MRA seem to think it’s some kind of victory?”
Because the goal of the MRM is to hurt women, not to help men.
MRAL wins the prize for being a horrible human being this time around for the comment that this disaster was a miracle of God (because obviously maritime disasters are awesome and God created one to do disposable men a favor?), but he has a lot of competition from the general MRA commentariat, and the dude who wanted to throw women overboard is putting up a strong challenge.*
*Although I suspect that part of the issue there is these dudes being too stupid to realize that a. cruise ships are about 12 stories high, and therefore falling from one onto water is like hitting concrete from the same height, so the impact will probably kill you, and b. if the impact doesn’t kill you the coldness of the water probably will in many locations. That’s part of what made the death toll on the Titanic so high – the water was too cold for anyone to survive in it for long. If you’re on a boat that sinks and the water is cold, and you end up in that water, you’re dead within less than 10 minutes, less than 5 if it’s the North Sea.
Actually, we were mainly discussing what was said on The Spearhead, not AVFM. I don’t recall anyone on AVFM going “ha ha women drowning is funny.” It’s more like TITANIC MAKE AVFM MAD! CHIVALRY GRRRRR! FUCK THEIR SHIT UP!!!
gateman, could you answer any of my questions?
So if you pulled quotes from The Spearhead, why is this dude having kittens about AVFM?
(I make it a policy never to read actual MRA sites, only quotes from them, since reading the concentrated original versions would put me off my lunch.)
I have no idea. Was there a discussion about AVFM here that I missed? My post was about the spearhead. I don’t recall any AVFM posts specifically about the costa concordia, though they go on about the Titanic all the time, and were going to go to DC to, uh, protest the Titanic, I guess.
CassandraSays:
“Because the goal of the MRM is to hurt women, not to help men.”
I think this is certainly the centre of the issue. The resentment and malice is so great that I don’t think they can have even seen that this kind of comment makes them look like total and complete arseholes.
“MRAL wins the prize for being a horrible human being this time around for the comment that this disaster was a miracle of God (because obviously maritime disasters are awesome and God created one to do disposable men a favor?), but he has a lot of competition from the general MRA commentariat, and the dude who wanted to throw women overboard is putting up a strong challenge.*”
I agree. Both of those remarks were pretty special. Also the one where one of them said that if he was evacuating women would drown with his bootprint on their backs. They seem to think that if you don’t have a “women and children” first policy then you’re saying that starting a stampede is the only option. How about nice orderly queues where everyone gets to leave and nobody drowns?
“*Although I suspect that part of the issue there is these dudes being too stupid to realize that a. cruise ships are about 12 stories high, and therefore falling from one onto water is like hitting concrete from the same height, so the impact will probably kill you, and b. if the impact doesn’t kill you the coldness of the water probably will in many locations. That’s part of what made the death toll on the Titanic so high – the water was too cold for anyone to survive in it for long. If you’re on a boat that sinks and the water is cold, and you end up in that water, you’re dead within less than 10 minutes, less than 5 if it’s the North Sea.”
After all, you can’t expect idiots like this to actually think about what they say.
“Yeah, lots of women are sexist. It’s a goddamn shame. This is why we need feminism.
I am all on board with equal access to lifeboats. I am not so on board with 1equal access to lifeboats means drowning women and I find this hilarious and rather blatantly arousing.'”
Oh don’t be such a puss.
You wanted equality, now you got it.
Men don’t need to give up their lifeboats for you.
It IS hilarious based on the fact that now women (or feminist for the truth of the matter because not all women are feminist) can now enjoy the full extent of equality–not pick and choose when and where “equality” works for them.
I think we need to close the death gap as well. Women should join the arm forces and constitute all front line fighting to amend for the inequality of the past!
Progressives rejoice!
@ Pecunium
“Because that’s not what they are doing. They are crowing about how evil the women are who think they should get special treatment, and how great it is that some women died. They are braying about how, now that they are asking for “equal treatment” that means the men (who are rougher, tougher and more aggressive) will get to the lifeboats and the women can just drown.”
Oh how I love the slave-morality!
Men and women are “equal,” but men are too strong and aggressive!
Great case.
@ SaruGoku
“They’re whining about female privileges, as they are wont to do. They always fail to grasp the simple fact that those privileges were conceived in more sexist times, when women were treated like children and chattel.”
Oh?
Well women could have rebelled on the boats and demanded equality then and there. But let me guess, they were victims of a sexist age and could not see the light. That is what you’re thinking, am I right?
I love how Feminism proclaims “equality” but then goes on to make the argument that women were so fucking stupid to be (and still are by many schizophrenic fems) manipulated and coerced by the patriarchy. The notion that women are sooooo stupid as society/patriarchy/media has keep them down for thousands of years.
Because, that really helps any egalitarian case.
It is great to know that feminist are actually the biggest male supremacist and are too stupid to actually realize it.
Efasfas: You screech about “equality”, but stick to the assumption that in an “equal” world, the boats would by default go to men. I rest my case.
I’m amused you can’t read.
It depends on the context of which the bloated term “equality” is used.
If for historical inequality where men made up most of the loss then yes women should be first to make up for historical wrongs.
If by equality meaning that the boats should have equal amount of men and women then that means the proportion of women on the lifeboats in unequal to that of men.
But what I was talking about was equality of opportunity men and women both compete equally for the lifeboats and whoever gets there lives. After all you do want to be treated like men.
So if men are on the lifeboats because they got there first they don’t need to give up their lifeboats [seats] for you.
I rest my case.
At this point, being disappointed at the quality of new trolls is downright cliche.
efasfas, the boats should contain all the men and all the women. Period. That’s equality. Why does your version of equality need to include people dying unnecessarily?
But what I was talking about was equality of opportunity men and women both compete equally for the lifeboats and whoever gets there lives.
Like what… cage fights? xD Magic tournaments?
Do you think that men have cage fights with other men to decide who gets on lifeboats? o_O
Also… so if there’s an equal number of men and women on board a lifeboat but there’s an unequal number ratio wise on the boat… you think each lifeboat should be divided by ratio correct? Rather than 50/50 on the boat? :3
I rest my case.
Do you?
B/c I suspect you’re still going to be responding. So clearly you haven’t xD
Apparently MRAs want mortal combat tournaments for the lifeboats.
So if men are on the lifeboats because they got there first they don’t need to give up their lifeboats [seats] for you.
You live in a strange strange world…
besides, wouldn’t the feminist conspiracy just put men far away from the lifeboats then? xD We’re always one step ahead of you.
I also wasn’t aware that boats had 100m dash tracks to the lifeboats and that’s how things are seated… maybe we should have hurdles too? Cuz I’m faster than pretty much every man I know. Or weight lifting! 😀
I’m not defending “women and children” first btw (which isn’t even the policy xD so we’re arguing about a moot weird point) I just think your weird bloodsport “I CARE ABOUT NOBODY BUT MYSELF” idea of what happens in these situations is odd and I think says a lot more about you than what you’re trying to claim all men are like xD
FINISH HER!!!!!
I love finding out how MRAs think the world works (and should work) XD It’s always so bizarre and hilarious I can’t even make it up myself XD
I’m guessing that if he’s on a cruise ship with children and elderly, it’s SCREW YOU OLD MAN!! FUCK YOU SON!!! HAHAHAHAHA
or using visual aids:
efasfas is George Constanza XD