Gender Inequality In Workplace
(Firefighters)
Emma Watson made a speech about gender inequality, she mentioned female get labelled since they were born, the female cannot be “muscly” but the boy can. Also, the female is more easily being sexualized by certain elements of the media.
According to the speech, feminism is the belief that men and women should have equal rights opportunities. It is the theory of the political, economic and social equality of the sexes. But feminism is becoming a bad word nowadays, people even think that it is anti-male. People have the right to treat equally, why the female is being labelled to be weak and do not have the same power as the male in the workplace.
“Firefighters”
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, only 4 per cent of firefighters are women. The first female firefighters in their fire stations are in 2018 that is Joliet, Ill. She is being announced that she is the first female recruit in the 165-year history of their fire stations. She mentioned that many departments started hiring women so many years ago, but some still have only one or some have none woman firefighter. It is really a big change in their fire station history and to show that it is having big gender inequality in the firefighter’s workplace. People think that women can not do the same job or be as strong as the male firefighters, in fact, women really can do the same level or much better than the others.
Lauren Howard is the first female firefighter at Chicago Fire Department and also the first woman to become a captain, she is the role models of all the female who have the same goal. Lauren wants to let people see the potential of women, if people see she can do it, maybe more female will try to apply for the job and not give up just because of all the labelled that women can not be a firefighter.
“Prove everything to others because I am a woman”
“Everybody gets a little harassment hazing kind of stuff, but I don’t think I got it any worse than the guys.”
– Alicia McCoy
Alicia McCoy is the acting fire chief who worked with Winthrop Harbor Fire Department. In the early days, people doubted to see her hop off the fire engine at the scene of an emergency, people do not believe she is a firefighter, even her colleagues. She needs to do a lot of things to prove that she is capable of this job because she is a woman. She even needs to spend more time to train herself to let her colleagues know that she can do whatever a male firefighter can do. She needs to prove that female and male is no different, they are equal and no need to think that female will slow down or increase their workload.
“Reach More Female Firefighters”
As time goes by, people changed, the attitudes and get more acceptance to see a female being a firefighter or more female want to enter the career. “Sometimes you think this is never changing; attitudes are the same. Maybe there are pockets throughout the country like that, but in my experience, there’s been a lot of change,” said McCoy. The attitude of doubt the women in this industry has gone away, surprisingly people want more female firefighter nowadays. It is a really great career and it should not only be a career for male, everyone deserves a chance to help the community. It is not just for being diversity but wants to maintain different perspectives and help most of the people who are in need. It is very hard to change a traditional career with the only male to both male and female, we can see the gap is narrowing, but still have a very long way to go and need to deal with a solution to retain the female firefighters.
For those girls who want to become a firefighter, do not be afraid, although it is an industry that has large gender inequality in the stereotype that girl should not be trained to save human life and find a safe job. Time changed and the industry is also trying to make a better place for women, if you really want to do it, just go for it and give it a try.
Reference
1.R. M. (2018, April 25). Female Firefighters Still Fight for Equality: ‘We’re Assumed Incompetent’. Retrieved from https://www.govtech.com/em/disaster/Female-Firefighter-Still-Fight-for-Equality-Were-assumed-Incompetent.html
2.Chua, J. (2018, March 19). Recruiting female firefighters: Closing the gender gap. Retrieved from https://www.firerescue1.com/recruitment/articles/378107018-Recruiting-female-firefighters-Closing-the-gender-gap/
3.Watson, E. (2017, June 22). ENGLISH SPEECH | EMMA WATSON: Gender Equality (English Subtitles). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIwU-9ZTTJc
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