STEVE AUSTIN
Perhaps it is just me. Or maybe it is the high level of stress throughout the service since 9-11, but I sense that things that shouldn't set us off seem to have become major issues. That extra and unnecessary adrenaline in our veins isn't healthy for people that are trying to come to grips with the most horrible disaster we have ever faced. Our reaction to minutia used to be, "so what" or a few choice four letter words and then we moved on. Now it seems there is a new response. It looks like a political correctness movement. PC has invaded other institutions such as college campuses. Universities who once were bastions of free speech now routinely muster "thought police" who control unpopular opinion by limiting opposing viewpoints. Is the fire service next?
For instance the selection of a keynote speaker, a New York Police Commissioner, at the NFPA Annual Meeting this year seems to have brought out an unusually vitriol response that borders on hysteria in some quarters. Sure, folks have the right to disagree with the selection of a speaker, but is it worth making a big issue about it? Let's examine how significant the keynote speaker is at an NFPA meeting. It is not very important in my book. Entertaining? Maybe. Educational? I hope so. Memorable? Probably not. A few of my very credible friends in the fire service press are treating this topic with the same amount of ink usually reserved for substantive matters like health and safety and staffing issues. Some have suggested that the speaker not deliver his address. I'll be the first to admit the guy wouldn't have been my choice. I won't be there to hear him but I support the NFPA's right to select their speaker and his right to speak and I'm sure not going to loose any sleep over anything he says.
Then there's the flap about the photo in Motorola's Annual Report to its stockholders showing a firefighter using a radio. Outrageous some say. But is it really worth getting angry about a corporate report?
No one denies that there are issues with radio systems. Motorola manufactures lots of them and most of them work as intended. The company gave a full review of several of their problems at the most recent IAFF Redmond Health and Safety Symposium. But why should anyone care about a photo on Motorola's Annual Corporate Report? For the record, Motorola doesn't need me to carry their water bucket. As a large multinational concern they often receive criticism about many of the things they do or don't do. Motorola will be the first to tell you that they make mistakes. They also do a lot of things right. What you probably don't know about was the unprecedented response that the Motorola made to supply communications equipment to public safety agencies beginning only a few hours after the attacks on September 11th. They did it to support their customers and the American public yet few gave them any credit.
Rather than worrying about a photo, a more substantive response would be to make contact with Motorola people if you are dissatisfied with their products. The company has people who make their living gathering comments good and bad from end users on how to improve their products. They know that no company can survive without satisfied customers.
I don't discount for a minute these incidents and others like them are troublesome to some people in our service. Often the only real substance of these matters is people's feelings. While feelings are important, taking action to identify and correct the real problems in the fire service is much more central than what is on the cover of an annual report or who speaks at a conference.
Firefighters should reserve our feelings for our families and our brothers and sisters in the service. Upon arriving home safely after a particularly bad job a hug makes all the difference in the world. Meanwhile back at the firehouse we should spend our time addressing the real problems we face not the politically correct ones.
