Imagine your family. A sister, a brother, two three? Now get them all jacked up on weights and make them Alpha Males and get rid of the girls. If your gonna have any girls in the family it is because they can tow the line with the Alpha Males in every way. They know every dirty joke, they pull the heaviest hose. they get in to the dirtiest fires as much and as equally as the men, or they leave the job.
A fire house consist of thirty six or so kids that never grow up. Thay beat out thousands and thousands of other people on a test to get the job. Mostly men that broke the rules as kids- almost every one was a rules breaker of some sort. Ask yourself, what kind of person runs into a building people are running out of? I will let you in on a little secret. firefighters love fires. I had a friend who on the 11th hour of the last day of a 30 plus year career got a call for a house on fire. He let out a whoop as they turned the corner because he was going to get one more fire in before he had to retire at midnight. He later felt bad because someone may have heard him who owned the home and he didn't want to hurt their feelings. Fighting a fire is much like hunting and killing a wild animal. the animal is free inside the building and you are in charge to go get it. It will hide in deep smoke and creep into the walls and try and take your air and cause floors and ceilings to collapse and you must go in there and get it. I could never kill an animal but killing a fire is a great expierience every time. We are the lowest paid fire department in our state and we have more fires than any state for six states across but no one will ever leave this job. Last week a guy showed up at the staion the night before he was supposed to work. I knew exactly why he was there so I asked him if he wanted to work for me. His wife and kids were out of town and he was bored so he came into work to see if anyone wanted to go home. When is the last time you went to work on your day off for no pay and just worked, for free? That is the second time I have seen him do that in a month. His father and three brothers are also firefighters.
In America we live this wonderful dream of equality of everyone. Which is nice until men want to have babies or women want to play in the NFL or be Firefighters. I know it is selfish of me to expect my fellow Firemen to be able to pull me out of a burning house, with a fifty pound tank on and twenty five pounds of thick clothing trapped under, into or on top of burning debris. I understand equality in every way. In fact I feel that if a woman can pull me out of a burning house I am all for her getting the job.
I just have a problem when I think of a situation where someone says to me "hey I would like to pull you out of that house and save your life but I was hired BASED ON race, gender,ethnicity,religion or age and you are going to die because there is no way in hell I am strong enough to get you out of there. sorry."
I would love to carry and have children too but it isn't meant to be and I can accept that. Some things are just the way they are. Hiring weak firefighters, either mentally or physically just because of their sex or race is not only irresponsible, it is dangerous. If the NFL had to hire a certain percentage of women what would happen? Well the game would not be as interesting. Well firefighting is not a spectator sport. If you hire weaker individuals over other individuals people die. Period. We don't just get a touchdown scored against us we get buried. This is the real reason civil service workers get all fired up about affirmative action.
Fortunately,for some, when a person is hired because of their race they understand that this is a burden more than a blessing. Most of the guys I know are the hardest workers, the most studious and the best firefighters. Sure the affirmative action ticket got them in the door but now they are going to prove they were worth the price of admission. Usually, those firefighters turn out better than the ones that did not have the benefit of affirmative action.
BUT, there are the others. A free ride got them in and a free ride they will take. All the way to the top. We have chiefs that were promoted because they were Irish and we have chiefs that were promoted because they were African American. I dream of a day that we are promoted because we scored the highest on a test. Imagine that!
In the end we are 36 brothers no matter the gender or the race and, at least for now, there isn't anyone on the job that cannot carry me out of a building.
End.
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