"Women And Children First"

The statement "women and children first" could be heard in situations as diverse as letting women and children partake in something like getting food before men or in unjustly giving them access to survival equipment before men in a dangerous situation like the sinking of a boat.  It is clear that a great deal of American society can be built around the false, sexist idea that men have lesser value or deserve lesser protection, care, or general treatment than women and children.  There are particular reasons why men and women ensnared by the myths of stereotypes might be motivated to continue to give the ideas behind "women and children first" power over the culture, albeit a power rooted in the stupidity and inconsistency of their adherents and not in the immutable nature of necessary truths.

Some men like to feel appreciated even if it comes at the cost of being demeaned in ways that are hypocritical and otherwise irrational just because they are that desperate for attention, themselves victims of sexism against men that in some of its most trivial forms conditions men to feel worthless apart from some utilitarian ability to perform acts of service for others, especially, despite the idiocy in prioritizing some people over others due to their gender or age, women and children.  Just as the various kinds of sexism against women do not make it rational or just for them to partake in their own exploitation as women, the sexism against men does not legitimize men blindly or eagerly participating in their own exploitation, but some men might truly feel so trapped in these asinine expectations that they are willing to passively go along with them just to hopefully get some sort of appreciation in the end, no matter how insincere and unjust that appreciation is.

Yes, someone who appreciates using men as anything from a fountain of money to a human pack mule to merely a sexual object (while ignoring or trivializing how sexual objectification is not some gender-specific sin) does not appreciate men that help them satisfy these financial or sexual or other desires while they do nothing to help; they appreciate what the predominant stereotypes allow them to get out of or through men.  The type of man described in the previous paragraph is either too irrational to recognize the difference or too desperate to care despite their own wellbeing and, more foundationally, the truth about gender stereotypes being inherently false getting denied.  This man is enslaved to the sexism that binds men as well as women and has forsaken reason enough as a result to hope to keep submitting to its erroneous ideas and degrading demands, lest he not feel appreciated for the sometimes small range of things American culture "allows" men to feel appreciation for.

What about when the opposite gender supports these oppressive, hypocritical norms that pressure men to act in certain ways just because of their gender?  Some women like to be treated as if they should have everything done for them without putting any effort in themselves, again because of either cultural conditioning (most people are too stupid to ever see past whatever traditions or biases are popular in their society) or because of individual personality traits.  The sexist idea that women and children should be given priority over men in matters of safety treats men as expendable, inferior beings, and of course a certain kind of woman would love to take advantage of this.  No sexist societal beliefs and practices could survive without the approval or submission of at least some people of both genders, after all.  Whether all women see it or not, American norms do oppress women, but American norms also oppress men, and it is not and could not only be men who are supposedly "responsible" for general sexism in America.

The popular kinds of misandry and misogyny encourage women to be lazy and helpless, all while they encourage men to seek to at least appear powerful at the expense of their own wellbeing and sometimes that of those around them.  "Women and children first" is an expression of this kind of sexism.  Ironically, the typically conservative irrationalists who believe this notion might pretend like it is not sexist at all, all as they knowingly hold to beliefs, live out behaviors, and support social norms that actively toss men aside or only acknowledge them as a means to some pragmatic end when they can be useful to women or children, all as conservatives hypocritically stereotype men as inherently or especially dangerous to the women and children they are supposedly morally obligated to show special care to.  "Women and children first" is one of many ways conservatives disregard sexism against men while complaining that American society hates or trivializes men.