No ‘Women And Children First’: Study Shows Men Save Themselves On Shipwrecks

Women and children first? Apparently not. Turns out women aren’t the first ones on the life raft.

In a report that undermines one of the last assumed aquatic advantages we had over men, researchers found that while the old “women and children first” mantra is famous, it’s rarely executed in real life, according to the Boston Herald. The report examined 18 different ship wrecks since the 1850s and found these to be the average survival rates for passengers:

– 61 percent of crew members

– 44 percent of captains (yes, “go down with the ship” is also out the window now)

– 37 percent for male passengers

– 27 percent for women

– 15 percent for children

Seriously, are all ship passengers secretly super callous toward kids?

But before you fire off an angry letter to James Cameron for historical inaccuracy, consider this: Researchers found that the Titantic was an anomaly (in terms of women’s survival) compared to the other ship disasters covered in the study. On that voyage, the survival of the female passengers was three times higher than the men’s. With this in mind, it’s likely that the end of “women and children first” could be a modern phenomenon. Three cheers for equality?

(Titantic screencap via NBCNews)

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