The sexist reason you’re not as scared of Storm Eunice as you should be
Tempted to dismiss Eunice because it sounds like a kindly old lady offering you a cup of tea and a biscuit? There’s a reason for that
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Your support makes all the difference.UPDATE, 21 February 2022: Following the publication of this article we were made aware of subsequent research that raised issues with the 2014 academic study referenced in this piece. The 2016 paper, published in journal Weather and Climate Extremes, found there was no difference in the death tolls between male- and female-named storms.
Storm Eunice is poised to descend upon us, bringing with it a rare Met Office “red” alert in south Wales and southwest England – but you may not have noticed.
For even though the government is poised to hold an emergency Cobra meeting to discuss the potential impact and risk to life of 100mph winds, and warnings that Storm Eunice could be among the UK’s worst in 30 years, over on social media it’s memes and jokes about its name that are being blown around.
“I'm sorry but calling a storm Eunice does not make me fearful or aware,” said one tweet. “It makes me think of a kindly old lady offering me a slice of Battenburg and a cup of tea.”
David Baddiel also said: “I'm not convinced that a storm called Dudley, or indeed one called Eunice, presage a sense of devastation. I think they presage a sense that these storms might offer you a nice cup of tea.”
And others agreed: “My mum’s name is Eunice so I just can’t take this storm seriously!”; “Storm Eunice has toilet seat covers and toilet roll covers in her bathroom”; “They should have more fearsome names like ‘Storm Insanity’ or ‘Storm This May Rip Your Roof Off’, I’d take notice then”. Other responses were more questionable, suggesting that we should be scared of Eunice, but not for the right reasons: “She is 56 and been menopausal once!” one person quipped.
And while some people rightly pointed out that there really isn’t much to be intimidated about by the naming of Storm Dudley, either (which has already seen winds and rain sweep Scotland, northern England and Northern Ireland, bringing down power lines, trees and railway cables, causing widespread travel disruption), there’s a bank of fascinating psychological research to back up the fact that overall, female-titled storms and hurricanes are in fact far more deadly.
Why? Because people don’t take them as seriously; so don’t take as many precautions to protect themselves, and there are consequently more deaths. That’s right: storms are sexist.
If you don’t believe me, believe the research: scientists used more than six decades of death rates from US-based hurricanes to show that feminine-named hurricanes cause significantly more deaths than masculine-named hurricanes. They put this down to a key element – gender-based expectations.
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“Feminine-named hurricanes (vs masculine-named hurricanes) cause significantly more deaths, apparently because they lead to lower perceived risk and consequently less preparedness,” the study authors state. “Using names such as Eloise or Charlie for referencing hurricanes has been thought by meteorologists to enhance the clarity and recall of storm information. We show that this practice also taps into well-developed and widely-held gender stereotypes, with potentially deadly consequences.”
Kiju Jung, lead author on the study, which was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in 2014, said: “The problem is that a hurricane’s name has nothing to do with its severity. Names are assigned arbitrarily, based on a predetermined list of alternating male and female names. If people in the path of a severe storm are judging the risk based on the storm’s name, then this is potentially very dangerous.”
It’s clear that Storm Eunice certainly has the potential to be deadly: forecasters fear 100mph winds in some parts of the country may endanger lives, tear roofs from houses and bring down power lines. When it hits on Friday, it is also expected to bring snow and rain, with some meteorologists likening the anticipated wind spread and power to what was seen during the infamous Burns Day Storm in 1990.
It’s fascinating to see how we translate our own implicit biases into wider weather events, and Storm Eunice offers an opportunity: both to look at ourselves, to do some rigorous self-analysis – and, most importantly, to stay indoors.