This is what it looks like when you inflate a small 4-person six-person life raft.

What's important here is that it's (a) small and (b) small. While it clearly looks like it might remain upright, there are issues.

In horrifying, scary weather, this may not be terribly useful. The line could be stripped out of your hand in a big wind. It might flip over, making it nearly useless. Clambering into it in confused seas may be difficult.

It's only "better than nothing" when there is — indeed — nothing left to do. Any alternative strategy to survival looks better than messing around with this.

We've heard of Whitby folks who hit something in the water, stove in the side of their boat, couldn't staunch the flow of water, climbed into their dinghy and floated from from the Whitby as it sank. The dinghy proved every bit as useful as a liferaft.

Since a dinghy (to an extent) can be rowed, it's possible that a dinghy might have been better than a difficult-to-maneuver liferaft.

Seeing this was helpful as a way to reinforce how small a liferaft is.

Update: changed the size from four-person to six-person.