"Be American"
This is an oldish, but haunting, item from Discovery Channel news:
“The Titanic was built in Great Britain, operated by British subjects, and manned by a British crew. It is to be expected that national ties were activated during the disaster and that the crew would give preference to British subjects, easily identified by their language,” the researchers said.
Savage and Frey realized that assumption was off after investigating passenger data.
They found that British passengers, who queued for a place in one of only 20 lifeboats provided for the 2,223 on board, had 10 percent lower chance of survival than any other nationality.
In contrast, Americans, who reportedly elbowed their way to the front of lines, had a 12 percent higher probability of survival than British subjects.
“Be British, boys, be British!” the captain, Edward John Smith, shouted out, according to witnesses.
“Being British” meant to forget mass panic behavior — everyone looking after themselves — and rather follow the social norm of “women and children first.”
Our problem with the British would be not that they stoically privileged the lives of females and kids, but that they needed nationalism to do so. Yet can we even imagine some authority figure — or random crowd member — shouting, in one of our own disasters, “Come on, people, be American!” — ? That’s hardly the American way.
One wonders what the response to yelling, “Be British,boys!” during a crisis would be nowadays. I imagine it would inspire a crowd of lads to down some pints and assault some random passersby while looking for exotic dancer for an impromptu stag party.
— Zak · Feb 11, 03:58 PM · #
“Be leaf cutter ants, boys!” doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, does it?
— Tony Comstock · Feb 11, 04:25 PM · #
“Be the Americans of our mythology, boys, not the Americans of our reality!”
— Freddie · Feb 11, 04:30 PM · #
Zak: don’t get me started. Tony: are you saying that humans have traffic obstacles ants lack, or that acting like ants, though uninspiring, is nonetheless adaptive? Freddie: much easier simply to buy American.
— James · Feb 11, 04:59 PM · #
James, are you saying that Americans today would generally have an issue with invoking nationalism to encourage a particular type of behavior, or that you personally have misgivings about it?
— Claskov · Feb 11, 06:37 PM · #
Most I’m just tipping my hat to AJ’s post.
Sort of related personal anecdote:
Last month my family went on a cruise on an ocean liner; a first for me in both the particulars and the general concept of a professionally managed vacation. Shortly after midnight on the third night out of NYC, and somewhere in the middle of the Sargasso Sea, the power flickered off, then flickered back on, then ship’s general alarm went off. It was only about 2 minutes before the captain came on the public address system and announced it was a false alarm, but in that five minutes all sorts of things went through my head. Nothing embarrassing or shameful, but certainly unexpected and unprecedented.
— Tony Comstock · Feb 11, 07:27 PM · #
My impression from James Cameron’s “Titanic” was that evil Anglo-Saxon toffs pulled out revolvers and shot all the oppressed Celts and Americans in their cowardly English rush to the lifeboats.
— Steve Sailer · Feb 12, 03:59 AM · #
I don’t understand what’s wrong about needing nationalism (or some other higher principle) to keep you from bad behavior. If the British took enough pride in their identity as Brits to die for strangers, why isn’t this something to be praised? Personally, I’d like it if “American” stood for something other than individualism, superiority, and a complete disregard for the social norms of other countries…
— Tienne · Feb 13, 12:02 AM · #
It’s hardly nationalism, that’s the wrong word. To suggest so is quite condescending, as if notions of fair play and chivalry could only be evoked by some selfish national one-upmanship in the chill of icy circumstance. You do have a few readers this side of the pond, Mr Poulos!
— Thomas Cahill · Feb 14, 03:02 AM · #
Thomas: I said “our problem” instead of “my problem” because I agree with you — although if you dropped the word “selfish”, your as-if might actually be correct. Which is where “our problem” comes in again.
— James · Feb 16, 02:38 PM · #