Column Chronicles: Rage of the female-named hurricanes

Rage of the female-named hurricanes

Frank Cotolo
April 9, 2015

Men best be warned if they are against total equality between the sexes because a new study shows that there is a serious reason for using the term Mother Nature.

A team of researchers have just spent a load of money and a wealth of time studying hurricanes and have found out that female-named hurricanes have been deadlier than those named after males.

"We were shocked," said Mercy Faith, one of the scientists involved in the study. "If I believed in god I would tell you that there is something more than science behind the remarkable results found in this study."

The conclusion of the study revealed that female-named hurricanes have killed more people than male-named hurricanes. Six decades of hurricanes were studied, covering the 1950s to the new millennium years thus far.

Of the 47 storms involved in that span of time, female-named hurricanes averaged a death rate of 45 people compared to an average of 23 for storms named after men. That is about double the death rate.

Not only that, but the more masculine the name pitted against any female name, the less deaths a male-named hurricane produced.

Mr. Faith said, "We took a hurricane they named Charlie—and I have no idea what compelled them to use Charlie instead of Charles because let's face it, Charlie is a fun guy type of name and Charles is at least a male name with a ring of dignity to it, which is why there is a Prince Charles and not a Prince Charlie, though they call him 'bonnie prince Charlie' but never during a formal engagement - and we figured through the data we have from the study that if we changed Hurricane Charlie to Hurricane Eloise, there would be triple the death count."

Dr. Evan Lee Soel, who is a pastor with a doctorate in Theology from the University of Saints and Everlasting Souls, said. "The good book, which I feel should be called the great book, would not condone the findings of this study because woman came from man and man from God and that pecking order shows the strength and weakness of names. Woman means 'from man' and God made man in God's image, so power comes from masculinity and not femininity."

Dr. Soel said that using the term Mother Nature comes from atheists and vegetarians.

Sharon Drillcaptain, a member of Feminists For Freedom, an organization that is non-profit but pays its members for cleaning its offices, said, "It's sexism, pure and simple. But it shows that no wrath has a wrath as wrathy [sic] as feminine wrath, which should tell you that Mother Nature exists as a feminine force and she is pissed at how women are treated in this world."

Relvart Situation, the study's secretary, said that he thinks the female-named hurricanes are taken as less threatening. "What should settle all this crazy talk about sexism is to start naming hurricanes more deadly, based, of course, on their ranks of intensity. For instance, we could call a hurricane that just made it to hurricane status something like 'The Danger Monger', while a major hurricane could be called, 'Killer If You Are In It.'"

Frank Cotolo can be found hosting the talk and interview programme Cotolo Chronicles. You can send him an e-mail at this address: frank@148.ca.