Wed 4/10/2024 8:07 AM
112 years ago today, April 10, 1912, the RMS Titanic embarked on her maiden voyage. Four days later, she hit an iceberg and sank. There were not enough lifeboats on board to save everyone, and so Second Officer Charles Lightoller suggested to the captain that they get the women and children into the boats first.
The “women and children first” rule is known as the Birkenhead drill, named after the practice employed during the sinking of the navy ship, the HMS Birkenhead in 1852.
There’s no maritime law that requires women and children to be saved first. And at least in its current form, the Birkenhead drill appears to be a relatively modern invention. Some people say it is a relic of Victorian era chivalry. Others think it is worse than that—an example of old-fashioned chauvinism that suggests only men are capable of real virtue. They say we should save the weak and infirm first, even if they are men. Few people think it ought to be every man for himself—but there are even those as well.
But perhaps the Birkenhead drill is something else entirely. Maybe its roots are not in the natural order of things, but in the supernatural order. Paul, in Ephesians, says husbands ought to lay down their lives for their wives as Christ did for the church. He doesn’t say only the healthy and strong men should do that—maybe the Birkenhead drill has its roots all the way back in creation itself.
My question for you is this: Is “women and children first” really just about putting “weaker people first”; is it an arbitrary 19th century invention that we should do away with completely; or is there something about the responsibility of being a man in the world such that virtue requires him to put the safety and lives of women and children ahead of his own, even if it doesn’t seem to make practical sense?
Give it some thought, and have a wonderful day.
