EXERPT
What is it about climate change that brings out the nuts and fruitcake theories? Now we learn that bestowing feminine names, or merely feminine-sounding ones, on hurricanes makes them so much more deadly
“Another storm in the gender tea-cup is also wreaking havoc. It began in mid-2014, when this paper – “Female Hurricanes Are Deadlier Than Male Hurricanes” – appeared here in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. Sharon Shavitt, Walter H. Stellner Professor of Marketing at the University of Illinois, and her three co-authors, claim that an ‘unexplored social factor’ – namely ‘gender-based expectations’ – has a measurable ‘influence on the human toll of hurricanes that are assigned gendered names’.
“Feminine-named hurricanes (vs. masculine-named hurricanes) cause significantly more deaths, apparently because they lead to lower perceived risk and consequently less preparedness. Using names such as Eloise or Charlie for referencing hurricanes….taps into well-developed and widely held gender stereotypes, with potentially deadly consequences.