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).
Have I ever been in fights? 😀 And how’d I do? o:
Have i played sports? And how’d I do? 😀
Like looking at some women could mean rape. Hey ever expanding definitions are great.
What world DO you live in? xD I’m trying to pin it down. So far it’s not Earth-1, Earth-2 or Earth-3.. I’m pretty sure it’s not in the 100s actually… xD
Ami – We’re in Earth-1218, technically.
/neeerd
He’s posting TOO SLOW for a guy who’s trying to be rapid fire mercenary dude XD Hurry up, you’re my entertainment until I have to go do things xD
If you’re not going to “rest your case” then pick it up. I thought you were a MAN! xD TYPE LIKE A MAN!!! FASTER FASTER!!!!
You are. I’m on Earth-Ami 😀
You should visit. We have kittens.
OH you’re talking Marvel xD I was talking DC…
TOO SLOW
I wonder if he rested his case again xD
If he’s that fearful and hateful of other ppl, you’d wonder why he’d even ever get on a cruise ship? o_O
Or does he get on them and hope for crashes so he can show everybody how much he can bench press as the ship is sinking and people are helping each other on the lifeboats and he’s still in the GYM, 299, 300, 301… 399, 400! THERE HAH! BEAT THAT! I GET FIRST DIBS ON.. wait… where is everybody?
xD
Ami – Either that or they have a lifeboat drill while they’re still docked right on a pier and his response is to go into a Berserker Rage and start throwing old women and small children overboard, because it’s lord of the flies survival of the fittest 24/7 when you’re a MAN.
Wouldn’t the logical thing for him to do be to shiv all the adult men and women (esp those more athletic and bigger than him) before they can get the jump on him? xD Then he can casually clean out the elderly and children at the end and be the sole survivor xD
@ Ami Angelwings
I need learn how to quote here. So quotations will have to do. Sorry if it is confusing. But you do write a lot.
“Suck it up like a man” is a term I despise, but apparently you like? o_O”
Yes. Because life is hard. Men who don’t learn how to protect themselves and their emotions become wrecked ships.
“Has this ever actually happened to you? -_- You do know that Lord of the Flies is a work of fiction right?”
Yes. People can get very instinctual when their lives are on the line. However I’m old fashion at least to an extent to want to help women who respect the old school way of doing things. However people decided to maintain a certain calm. Of course Lord of the Flies is fiction but draws upon realism.
“Is it possible that you’re just talking about how YOU’D react and you’re trying to project this on all men to hide that it’s just you? xD As I said, in an ACTUAL emergency situation, you’d have terrible survivability b/c you’d try to sacrifice everybody to save yourself, so just by doing simple math people would have to subdue you to save as many people as possible. The math works like this, if they are calm and working together, let’s say in this hypothetical situation, 80 out of 100 people live, so yeah 20 still need to sacrifice… if they let YOU run rampant, you’d lock the door on them and run off screaming and stabbing people in the face for fun… you might survive, 99 people die. xD Therefore, for the sake of everybody, you need to be stopped.”
Well actually if my women (not feminist) and I were in a dangerous position (MRA hate me for this). Then yes I would put my life on the line because I love her. However for those who insist on equal treatment, this is part of the package. Panic would ensue and many wouldn’t make due to that but that doesn’t mean no one would survive. It would be up to natural selection. The strongest, smartest, and most fit would survive.
I could go on exactly why in the case like the Titanic it was different, but I wouldn’t want to bore such smart progressives with such backward thinking.
I can’t quote your biggest paragraph.
In fact I can assume a lot. Not only on knowing physiology and anatomy but on other evidence. You feminist are disingenuous. First you say you want equal opportunity. Then you claim if there is unequal representation that is due to discrimination. So then you lower the standards like in firefighting, police, etc, so institutions can meet diversity quotes. (http://www.laweekly.com/2008-01-24/news/the-gender-boondoggle/4/). So yes if we opened up to gender neutral sports (pros, schools, etc), men would dominate. However you would whine it is due to discrimination.
If men and women are as equal as you say then you would have no problem would disbanding gender based sports. As it doesn’t allow for individual competition but rather it is based on gender; period.
“Also while you’re at it, why not open up the old boys club of executives, coaches, etc too? (or are men superior in intelligence now too? xD )
I thought you rested your case? xD I told you you’d be back xD”
Well ain’t that funny. Because if men and women are of equal intelligence why women be oppressed in the first place? Why would feminism need to exist? Wouldn’t institutions reflects a reality based upon egalitarianism?
If women are as intelligent as you say, how come women were barred for so long (according to feminist theory)? Wouldn’t women themselves to be manipulated? Because manipulation implies some intellectual deficiency. And the person manipulating is so smart to circumvent and alter someone’s else’s thinking. It sounds like your a big male supremacist.
I mean how do you reconcile that men and women are equal but men have oppressed women since the dawn of man and still are?
If men and women are as equal as you say then you would have no problem would disbanding gender based sports.
I’m unsure why you think feminists have any control over this xD
And many feminists are. We don’t have the power you think we do xD
As I said, private companies. Why don’t YOU change it? 😀
Well ain’t that funny. Because if men and women are of equal intelligence why women be oppressed in the first place? Why would feminism need to exist? Wouldn’t institutions reflects a reality based upon egalitarianism?
So every oppression proves that the oppressed group is inferior and the oppressors are superior? xD
I like how he ignored the paragraph I explained why his future isn’t what he thinks it’d be, and that I am all for disbanding and then accuses me of being against disbanding XD
It’s fun when you DON’T READ XD
I mean how do you reconcile that men and women are equal but men have oppressed women since the dawn of man and still are?
How do you? o:
You’re the one who set up that straw question, you should answer it 😀
SEE HOW EASY IT IS TO RESPOND TO PEOPLE QUICKLY? xD
I SERIOUSLY FEEL LIKE I’M IN THE SPEEDFORCE TALKING TO YOU XD
@ Ami Angelwings
“Are you talking about nature or nurture?”
That is the problem with “‘social’ science” *cultural marxist bullshit* people like yourself.
You seperate nature vs nuture however, nurture is a part of nature. Nuture is just one part of nature not two opposing forces.
Society reinforces in different ways what is inherent.
The best way to put it is is biology manifest itself through society.
If women are as intelligent as you say, how come women were barred for so long (according to feminist theory)? Wouldn’t women themselves to be manipulated? Because manipulation implies some intellectual deficiency. And the person manipulating is so smart to circumvent and alter someone’s else’s thinking. It sounds like your a big male supremacist.
So torture and abuse victims are intellectually deficient? o_O
efasfas | January 31, 2012 at 4:22 pm
@ Ami Angelwings
“Are you talking about nature or nurture?”
That is the problem with “‘social’ science” *cultural marxist bullshit* people like yourself.
You seperate nature vs nuture however, nurture is a part of nature. Nuture is just one part of nature not two opposing forces.
Society reinforces in different ways what is inherent.
The best way to put it is is biology manifest itself through society.
That doesn’t clarify a thing you said. xD
My question is.. .this whole idea of men you have… is it just something ppl with XY chromosomes have or is it a reaction to society? is it how ppl with XY chromosomes react to society? Can ppl with XX chromosomes react that way, etc etc etc
I want to know exactly what you mean and you’re being dodgy and vague xD
If you’re so smart can you answer any questions on a topic of my choosing I ask you without checking facebook and wikipedia? xD
o_O
Apparently lifeboats will be decided after a 100m dash, weight lifting competition AND a round of trivial pursuit xD
Well I don’t know if I could because I didn’t major in women’s studies. Wailing about evil men. So no.
Checking facebook? Ha hahah ahahaha. Yes because facebook is where I go for inFOmation.
He’s going to be posting well into tomorrow at this rate if he’s responding 10x slower than I am xD
Checking facebook? Ha hahah ahahaha. Yes because facebook is where I go for inFOmation.
With you? I assume nothing xD
Well I don’t know if I could because I didn’t major in women’s studies. Wailing about evil men. So no.
I haven’t even gone to college. So you should beat me easily xD
If you didn’t major in women’s studies how do you know that it’s about wailing about evil men? o_O Perhaps you are incorrect about what’s taught in it o: