female rarity

Why is it that we live in a world where the population is evenly spilt when it comes to gender, yet somehow women are rare?

How is it futher that more men are in jail, live shorter lives, operate in harsher conditions etc thus resulting in less men being in circulation than women, yet women are rare?

I say this as when I grew up everyone I met understood this, yet progressively all I come across are people who believe in fairy tails.

There is talk about trying to get men to understand thier role as a father, yet we live in a society in which every tv, advert and movie portrays men in an unquestionable opposite light.