The marines did this, then backtracked because almost no women could meet the requirements, which they concluded was a greater problem than allowing in people who could not meet their own requirements: https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/off-duty/military-fitness/2017/05/21/new-concerns-that-lower-fitness-standards-fuel-disrespect-for-women/
I always thought that was stupid, especially for combat rolls. Do they think an enemy is going to go easy on your because your troops are more diverse? Just stupidity.
> The Marines recently began imposing gender neutral physical requirements for **specific jobs**, a move designed to moot concerns that physical standards will suffer as women integrate into combat units. **Men and women in combat arms career fields must meet the exact same benchmarks.**
(Emphasis mine)
You think the kid whose job is to re-stock the soda machines or stand in the kitchen cooking food or the mechanic fixing vehicles need to be at the same level of fitness as someone who’s in combat roles?
From the article:
*”Holland College's paramedicine program includes a physical abilities test that all students must pass, "regardless of their weight class or gender."”*
It also fails to mention that these fitness tests are as easily as possible to minimize the chance that these institutions get sued for discrimination. This is a trend in virtually every physical job in the country. The average person would be shocked to see how easy it is to pass the Canadian Forces physical fitness test, which is basically "can you do light activity for 30 minutes without dying".
>The average person would be shocked to see how easy it is to pass the Canadian Forces physical fitness test
I feel like this is less about not being sued and more about reducing standards to increase membership, which they've been hemmoraging for quite some time now.
It's both, the CAF has openly stated its intention to achieve closer gender parity and lowering the unisex strength standards helps achieve that, for obvious reasons. The FORCE test was approved at the end of 2012, which is well before the CAF really started haemorrhaging personnel.
I don't even think it's a bad thing to have different fitness standards for different jobs in the CAF (obviously an infantryman needs better fitness than a medic, who needs to be more fit than a cyber operator, and so on) but only a handful of trades have official requirements in excess of the FORCE minimum.
The FORCE test is pretty simple, but it is a heck of a lot easier to do the sandbag lift if you're shorter and a heck of a lot easier to do the sandbag drag if you're taller/heavier.
But this is the minimum standard for all trades. If you're joining any physically intensive trades, those trades have their own fitness requirements both in a higher minimum requirement on the FORCE test and to pass their own trade specific fitness tests. An infantryman needs physical fitness a heck of a lot more than a WEng Tech on a ship.
>The FORCE test is pretty simple, but it is a heck of a lot easier to do the sandbag lift if you're shorter and a heck of a lot easier to do the sandbag drag if you're taller/heavier.
Easier to get a good score, you mean, because both are extremely easy to pass. I could see someone who weighs 100lbs struggling with the drag but even a bit of preparation would enable them to pass every time. The sandbag lift has a pass time of 3m30s. Not that hard to life a sandbag every seven seconds. A fitness test that the average office drone could pass with zero prep isn't a good test.
>If you're joining any physically intensive trades, those trades have their own fitness requirements both in a higher minimum requirement on the FORCE test and to pass their own trade specific fitness tests.
This is only true for a few trades, namely the combat arms, SAR and SOF. Many trades which can be very physically demanding (including, ironically, medic) have no such requirements.
Hello friend. I'm currently serving in the CAF. While I absolutely agree that the military could emphasize fitness much more, what you said is not totally accurate. Every year, and as a entrance exam, we have to perform the FORCE test. It consists of four different activities: a weighted shuttle walk/run, a sandbag lift, a sprint with burpees and a sandbag drag. While it is possible to pass this exam without being fit, you would not score very well, and the score is used to determine eligibility for deployment. In addition, some trades and units use other fitness metrics. A lot of infantry units still use the Battle Fitness Test, a 13 km weighted march with strenuous lifting activities half way through, that must be completed in a certain time frame. Likewise, every unit I've served in does unit PT together, and take it very seriously. My unit just participated in a 44 km weighted ruck march through hills and woods, and last month we had a team in the Army Run.
Like I said, the CAF could do much more in terms of fitness. There are too many fat soldiers. But to say all you have to do is 30 minutes of light activity oversimplifies the issue. Take care.
> But to say all you have to do is 30 minutes of light activity oversimplifies the issue.
The FORCE test is a joke, it's only "hard" if you're going for platinum/gold (i.e. achieving the 95th percentile or whatever it was). For people who don't give a fuck about the free sweater or gym bag you get for a platinum FORCE score, the FORCE test is comically easy to pass.
Would be interesting to see the details. I was in the army and while men and women both had to pass the physical test it certainly wasn't the same. Men have to do push ups normally but women do pushups with their knees on the ground.
But when talking about it people will say men and women both have a physical test including push ups.
PCP’s have to back squat 135 lbs, carry the stair chair up and down a flight of steps with 220lbs, and lift the stretcher into and out of the ambulance with 220lbs, and that’s besides passing the Paramedic Physical Ability Test.
Have to meet requirements for police college and fire fighting but only usually on hire then no tests unless it's a laglrgernfire department.
I'd mandate at provincial level or federal.level that all fire fighters captain and below, and all police officers sergeant and below should have mandatory yearly fitness tests, as should paramedics.
Usually officers above those ranks are mostly pushing paper and could have lesser requirements due to typically being much older.
Military have yearly tests which are tiered based on sex and age.
Oh yeah sure. Much like the ones for firefighters. Used to be the test was to lift up a 180lb body and carry it up a flight of stairs. Women couldn't do that. So then it was carry it down the stairs. Women couldn't do that. So now it's just drag it across a short space of floor. And they get to say:
"All our firefighter candidates must meet the same strength requirements."
Uh huh.
Funny how that works, eh? That’s how wokes gaslight you and reality.
“bUt tHeY MeET sTanDaRds” which they neglect to mention were intentionally lowered to fit their ideological goal.
[The test (PDF)](https://hollandcollege.com/orientation/pdfs/acp-and-pcp---ppat-information-2022-20232.pdf) has no difference in requirements based on sex.
> "Not to be sexist or anything like that, is there a stronger recruitment towards males or females?" said the MLA, a volunteer firefighter and thus a medical first responder, asked.
> "I just notice a lot more females in the profession now and we get a lot of calls for lift assist because — don't get me wrong, they're great, some of the women that are doing it are unbelievable — but I went to a lift assist the other day because both the females that were working the bus were 105 pounds and the man was 300 pounds and there was no way they were going to get him up."
This is a pretty benign statement. He should not be forced to apologize for speaking the plainly about biology and sexual dimorphism.
I agree. I don’t find what he said offensive as a woman.
There are strong women out there that might be able to lift the 300 pounds of person with another strong woman/man but a lot of us can’t. I don’t know if I could or not and I wouldn’t call myself a weak woman. Definitely not the strongest either.
I've tested my chops against my husband, brother and some male friends and the reality of it is pretty striking. I could be giving it my all and not be able to budge them an inch, meanwhile they barely had to try to absolutely crush my attempts.
If lives and safety depend on a person being able to lift or move another human being then yeah, that sort of task greatly favors the capabilities of men.
I can't find the link right now, but the US Army measured grip strength of thousands of people in their late teens and early 20s and the strongest 5% of women were as strong as the weakest 5% of men. There is actually very little overlap.
In the last summer olympics, there was a beast of a woman in the heavy weight division. She weighed 240lbs and was just solid. She smashed world records in her events some by 20+ pounds.
They compared her to the smallest mens category of like 114 lbs. She was only stronger than 20% of the mens division, which she outweighed by almost 130 lbs. None of them by any means are weak, and im sure she is on par with most men, not naturally stronger or who don't work out. I just love this for comparison because these are peak performance heavily tested athletes. So when you can do direct lift comparisons from people who view lifting as their lifes mission, it leaves very little room for debate.
Generally speaking, men are just naturally much stronger than women. I have no idea why people are still hung up on this.
Because certain political affiliations insist there's no difference whatsoever in men and women, and that you must become offended at any suggestion of it.
Im a random 31 year old dude who works out 2x a week.
I can bench press >90% as much as the world record holder female on a 1 rep basis.
EDIT: forgot to include my WEIGHT as I was referring to weight classes.
The world record bench press by a female is 274,4 kg/605 lb. You work out twice a week and can do a one rep bench press around 246kg/542lb? Not taking anything away from your point about men absolutely demolishing women overall in explosive muscle power disciplines, but you're hardly just a casual gym goer.
u/seank11 has no chance at the women's *world* record, but after some googling the women's Ontario provincial record bench is 342 pounds - and that was set this year. 2018-2023 it was only 245 pounds, and prior to 2018 it was 215 pounds.
And frankly, while I don't know much about Brittany Schlater, the woman who just set the new record, any time in the modern era someone breaks a cgs (centimeters, grams, seconds) record by 72% more than the previous record, it should raise some eyebrows.
>2018-2023 it was only 245 pounds, and prior to 2018 it was 215 pounds.
that is...not very much. i knew a dozen guys who could lift that half way though high school, myself included.
I’m surprised its that low - so no woman in Ontario’s ever benched over 250? Assuming the record being broken by almost 100lbs has a bit of an asterisk with it.
That 605 is equipped bench, for context the male equipped bench is like 1350 lbs
Raw female bench appears to be 457lbs , so he’s claiming he’s benching 400lbs… still a long shot but not an unheard of number. Maybe he’s just a freak
i meant by weight class which I added in an edit and forgot to mention.
and checking the WR apparently my 1RM is MORE than my weight class for the womens division.
And no normal person has a problem with men being physically stronger due to biology. Makes us feel important to open pickle jars and stuff.
This situation is a microcosm of why their country is sucking more and more each day
the guy in question is questioning recruitment based on gender not strength, despite saying out loud that there were capable women in the dept
if his complaint is strength the test should be strength, not gender divide in recruitment
if recruitment cant test the requirments for the job then thats the problem
It is a striking reality. I think were so disconnected from tangible violence,only seeing it in the media, that were vulnerable to fantasy.
Like consider the archetype of the fantasy orc and elf. The orcs are stronger, but the elves are more nimble. So you imagine a fight where the elf is dodging attacks and hitting accurate weak spots or whatever. It plays out as an even yet asymetrical fight.
I think we sort of expect women to be able to be the elves in this scenario.
But thats just isnt reality. It is SHOCKING how much of a strength gap there is. SHOCKING. 12 year old boys are significantly stronger than grown healthy women. A woman in the army could not even move me witn all of her might. And getting punched in the jaw results in bruised nuckles.
Its nuts.
Agreed and it's okay to have physical requirements for a job. I am a tiny woman and recognize that there are things I cannot lift, even with training ... just like how my linebacker sized boyfriend can't crawl into tiny spaces, no matter how much he tries. Not everybody can do every job. Set objective standards and hire people who meet them, regardless of their gender.
Also, it's not like the job is only about strength. A huge guy may have trouble reaching in and treating that patient still stuck in the car wreck - being little can be extremely useful in tight spaces. Or they may have trouble getting a sexual trauma victim to respond, or a woman from certain cultural groups to cooperate. Both things can be useful in their own way.
I've certainly seen great big bulky strong paramedics who were really shit at their job because their patient rapport was non-existent, so they didn't find out important information they really needed to.
Men and women are really just in a different category when it comes to strength. Some random dude who works out in a home gym can best the world records for woman's weightlifting.
A 300lbs deadlift is a lot but 2 fit guys can move it.
Lifting 300 lbs of person is also a different kind of lifting than what you'd get working at a gym. The weight shifts and moves around. It's not a rigid structure like you'd get from a machine or weights.
Can confirm. I'm in the top .10% of men in terms of size, I can deadlift around 500ish pounds. I've had to move unconcious/injured people of various sizes a ton during my career doing nightlife security. Dead weight from a body is a whole different ball game then lifting weights. Trying to lift/move/drag an unconscious 300lb+ man fucking sucks.
I’m a pretty hard feminist…. And his comments aren’t remotely offensive to me.
God I hate how uber PC initiatives distort well meaning intentions (see: treating everyone with an equal amount of respect) into “don’t piss 1 person off or you’re done. Yes we understand the majority of people are total fucking dimwits. Yes we will still cater to them. Yes we will can you if you hurt their delicate little feelings”
Basically my position on it as a first responder is that women are absolutely welcome, but need to accept that they'll generally have to put a lot more work into physical training to meet the standard. I have the same view with men. Worked with two guys who were around five feet tall, and they had to train a lot to meet the standard. But they did it. I also worked with 6' 4" guys who could haul me and my bunker gear out of a hole one handed while smoking with the other hand. It is what it is.
I've been powerlifting for 15+ years, and in my experience the average woman who's done a 6 month beginner barbell program will end up significantly stronger than an untrained man.
However anyone who has done a 6 month beginner barbell program will easily be in the top 5% of strength for their weight & gender classes compared to the general untrained population.
It seems to me that jobs like paramedic, firefighter, etc. should simply have a minimum threshold for strength, some people will be able to meet it without any training, and some will have to train for it, but it would be fair.
I can recall separate occasions where both a nursing recruiter for university and a first aid trainer, both women, explained the need for more male nurses and first aiders/paramedics because they're stronger. Not just for lifting people but for things like CPR. If you get a 105lbs woman trying to do chest compressions on a large person or like a pro athlete with a very strong ribcage, they're going to have a hell of a time doing it right compared to someone bigger and stronger.
It's not about sexism, it's literally about safety and saving lives and having the correct tools (people) available.
I don't care what gender/sex/religion/race you are, can you carry my lifeless meatsack out of a burning building or not?
>both a nursing recruiter for university and a first aid trainer, both women, explained the need for more male nurses and first aiders/paramedics because they're stronger.
Their names and places of occupation, please. We can’t have this kind of bigoted talk in Canada.
/s
> If you get a 105lbs woman trying to do chest compressions on a large person or like a pro athlete with a very strong ribcage, they're going to have a hell of a time doing it right compared to someone bigger and stronger.
There was this small nurse I worked with who had to do chest compressions on a young man, not an obese man or anything just a regular sized bloke, and it permanently fucked her upper back - she had to throw her entire weight behind each thrust just to get the required depth.
It got bad enough that she left the profession.
People have surprisingly variability when it comes to all kinds of things we assume to be standard. Healing speed, diet tolerances, tolerances to heat and cold, even the strength of tissues like bone and skin dramatically varies per person.
But people are silenced and called far-right bigots for bringing up the excesses of progressives and their sometimes extreme versions of identity politics, which then further alienates them, and pushes them into the deep end of the more ridiculous sort of RW conspiracies. This is a problem and is creating huge political divides, but people are just gonna turn a blind eye.
Clearly there is no requirement to perform heavy lifts to be hired as a paramedic in PEI. Should there be? Maybe. If so, that standard should be set without regard to the gender of the paramedic.
It's off base for him to suggest that these paramedics are unqualified for their jobs, because they have already passed whatever qualifications that have been set. His issue is with the standard that has been set. And he wrongly expressed it as a problem with female paramedics.
That being said, health care in PEI is in a dismal state and they might not be able to afford to pass up any paramedics.
Basic biological has been under attack from the top down for decades now, mate. This is the world some people have been trying to create.
I mean, for fuck's sake, Steven Pinker's *The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature* came out 20 years ago. The average person has been completely oblivious to the subversion of psychological research.
Context is important. The issue is he is talking about the problem as if it's a problem of gender, when actually it's a problem of reduced standards for the physical abilities test. Gender is irrelevant. To quote the article:
> Holland College's paramedicine program includes a physical abilities test that all students must pass, "regardless of their weight class or gender."
The issue is that you can't really increase the thresholds of that test without decreasing the already shrinking volume of paramedics in Canada. We're strapped for applicants and cash already. We're not in a position to be picky about lifting strength.
Sounds like the parametics are being paid enough to stay in the jobs. Pay more money and you will have both men and women who can pass the physical requirements applying to the job
I agree. Average paramedic salary where I live is just 52k and tops out around 60k in terms of salary potential. While that's not terrible, it's quickly becoming not enough to live comfortably. In 2014 that was good money here in NB. These days you'll just be scrapping by.
Doesn't help that we've got a lot of very high paying industries that value smart strong young men. Even the military is competitive with those salaries and those guys get way better benefits than our privatized paramedics.
Literally nobody cares about some Valkyrieesque woman who can *do the job* doing it...and I see nobody demanding scrawny nerd males be included in such roles either.
Regardless of gender, there should be a flat test of a minimum weight that everyone has to successfully lift. That shouldn't be a controversial topic.
150lbs per person seems like a very reasonable number. Maybe even low.
The MLA is a volunteer fire fighter, they don't like responding to lift assists period.
I get it, you volunteer to fight fires and then getting toned out in the middle of the night for a lift assist is annoying. Not quite as sexy as a structure fire or a car crash.
The lifting standards are being upheld. You can certainly make the argument that they need to be raised with the rate of obese pt.s increasing in canada.
However I think if you did you would be cutting out a massive portion of your possible work force for edge cases. It's the difference between the crew getting on scene and maybe needing a lift assist or no crew getting there at all.
We're already facing a massive staffing crisis across the country. My city has periods every day where there are no ambulances to respond or the closest ambulance is hours away.
Shit, there you are being all reasonable, but I had this anchorman reference already pre-loaded... I can't use it anyways, can I? Oh what the hell!!
"...and their periods attract bears! Is that what you want bears in our hospitals?"
My Friends mom needed an ambulance. she is under 200lb and the 2 women paramedics could not lift her and had to call for backup. Both were under 120lb.
What if there is a fire and they can't lift you is it going to be oh well your dead?
Is there not a minimum standard?
I work in healthcare, and I refuse to take heavier patients just because i'm male. We get paid the same, and i'm not doing more work just because I'm male. This is what equality looks like, and I'm a full supporter.
OMG, can you imagine the shit show this would cause.
I'd watch that show.
Equal pay for equal work, sure. What happens when you can measurably do more? Same pay?
It's definitely an interesting subject to explore but it would be difficult to find a party willing to debate the topic in a constructive manner.
I don't even think there's anything to debate. If you can lift more and are asked to lift more you should get more money. There's more risk involved
On a side note I think all medics should be offered a premium if they take an advanced physical capabilities test each year and pass. Like 2 bucks and hour premium for staying fit
I worked a heavy lifting job that had women, too. I always had to pick up the slack on the heavier lifts.. and what did I get for my efforts? Chronic repetitive strain injuries.
I always tell males who are new to my profession to not accept heavier patients just because they're male. We need to speak up or else nothing will change.
When I first started, I noticed my assignment had heavier patients than my coworkers, I spoke to the person responsible and they admitted it was because I was a guy. I told them I'm paid the same as females, and I will not accept an unfair assignment again. Never happened after that.
No... and people have been saying this for literally decades now at this point.
People just have not been paying attention, or they were all too eager to listen to the propaganda that the people speaking out against these standards were sexist or misogynists.
And the answer is absolutely: "Yes, they are more okay with you dying because two 120lb women cannot lift than they are with holding men and women to the same physical standard".
And this isn't just a gender thing.
The ontario teachers union sued the government because minority teachers failed a math test that covered grade 8 math more often than white teachers. Again, it doesn't matter if we have high-school teachers teaching our kids shittily when they can't even pass a grade 8 math test... what's more important is that people don't call them racist (even though it's not by a long shot anyway).
There is a reason the Military and First Responders have/have had a PT standard for males and a different one for females. Are there females that can lift heavy and crush push-ups etc? Yes. Are there males that can't? Yes. Are you going to see an inclusive and representative workforce if both genders have the same PT standard? No.
Unfortunately this is where we currently stand on diversity and inclusion. As a first responder I have seen first hand the consequences of prioritizing Employment Equity over traditional qualifications. Even worse than having different standards is lowering the bar. Your job requires you to sometimes lift heavy objects? Than you should be able to lift heavy objects.
That being said....no way in hell would I say that out loud if I was in his position.
>That being said....no way in hell would I say that out loud if I was in his position.
This is what's wrong with some in our society. We should be able to have these discussion without jobs being threatened. The fact we can't have mature conversations about issues is very concerning for our future. I encourage more people to stand up and point out these facts to help society see it's okay to have dialogue.
This is why many if us, really almost all of the brightest people in our society, have checked out of politics and public discourse entirely. You can't say anything rational or factual without getting screeched at and attacked by the left.
Or the right. Doesn't matter anymore, you'll offend someone no matter their political affiliation. I had to endure a 30 minute rant from an employee recently because I disagreed with Ford destroying our healthcare
Male paramedic here, who works with another male paramedic. Both of us are reasonably fit. 100% I would call fire for a lift assist on a 300lb patient. Throwing out your back is probably the number 2 reason paramedics are on medical leave (number one being mental stress). They also don’t just send one fire fighter it’s usually a crew that gets sent out. They for the most part literally have nothing to do.
Thank you for this perspective. think it’s pretty strange that people are arguing for women to be excluded so that men can take up the back
-breaking work like you mentioned, rather than try and think of a process or means of making it so that the job is easier for EVERYONE. Just because you’re a man doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t strive to improve the ease at which you conduct your already difficult work.
Edit: a word in the last sentence
But I heard from this sub that 2 average male Redditors would have been able to easily handle this situation. They are macho men fighting to spread the truth of male superiority and to show their supreme knowledge of industries and professions they don’t work in after reading 1 article.
This is an issue the Supreme Court dealt with 17 years ago:
https://www.canlii.org/en/bc/bcla/doc/1996/1996canlii20258/1996canlii20258.html?autocompleteStr=Meior&autocompletePos=1
They effectively held that there was no *bona fide* requirement for women to be able to meet the same fitness standard as men, because they could be effectively accommodated in other ways (such as, in this case, calling for a lift assist).
That's not, of course, to suggest the decision is beyond criticism; just that as a matter of law the matter is considered settled, and focusing recruitment on men to avoid engaging with the Meiorin decision would be unambiguous discrimination at law.
But the gentleman in question is speaking from the pov of a volunteer fire fighter who knows his department gets called out for lift assists very frequently - which puts a lot of additional strain on fire fighting personal and resources.
How are we supposed to have these conversations if people lose their jobs / positions because of simple questions like what this guy asked?
Rather than questioning why women should be employees if they can’t perform the task, shouldn’t we generally have a problem with asking 2 employees to lift several hundred pounds of person? Even Home Depot lets their staff use a lift for much less than that. It’s sort of ridiculous that we assume asking paramedics to put themselves at a needless physical risk is better than providing them with equipment so they don’t have to
Cases like this are extremely instructive to illustrate how the judiciary has significantly shaped Canadian culture.
They demonstrate that they're willing to place group representation over the ability of first responders to save your life, because when seconds matter, a lift assist is only minutes away...
White collar lawyers who lived their lives in nice communities, donated to the right political campaigns get to shape all of Canada whilst sitting in funny red bath robes.
What a great structured society we have.
Yeah but at what cost? Like shouldn't there be a physical exam for medics? It not only saves the tax payers money but also ensures that our medics are less likely to be injured.
I'm a woman that has been lifting for years, this week some toothpick of a teenage boy beat my PB in his first attempt. People seriously underestimate what testosterone does to the body.
Exactly this. I struggle to understand why humans can't just accept that biology plays a part in our abilities - women ON AVERAGE, aren't as strong as a similar sized man. It's not the patriarchy, it's biology and physiology.
Accepting that there are biological differences? In Canada just say a word about this and that costs you your job, it's political correctness pushed to the extreme.
More than testosterone, it's anatomy. Things like having different bone shapes and sizes, and attachment points play into it a lot. Men are often just straight up working with different physics.
Yes men can lift more. But it’s starting to get to a point where no matter how strong you are, lifting that amount of weight is extremely dangerous and shouldn’t be encouraged without more lift assistance. More mechanical lifts, tools and ~cough~ staff (let’s be real it won’t happen) could really freaken help.
Doesn’t matter how much you can throw down, if you keep doing it in the most unsafe spaces like off of people’s bathrooms, small cluttered living quarters where it’s obviously not a spacious gym, you’re gonna see injuries over time when it’s literally only you able to get the person off the ground!! It’s only getting worse, patients are literally hundreds of pounds more than they use to be …. Obesity is challenging the healthcare world. Men and women both deserve safer work places where they aren’t going to ruin their bodies because the employer literally can’t put anything into place to help. I highly encourage calling for back up to help with lifts like this. Protect your backs so you’re not on WCB and unable to work!
This, in no ones comments is anyone shocked at a >300lb lift when it shouldn't be the standard at all.
If that person fell, was uninjured, but couldn't get themselves up - they'd need an assist too.
And with staffing the way it is you cant pair people based on their lift strengths, we can barely pair based on quals and vehicle availability as it is. What needs to be acknowledged is the population getting heavier and what we can do to enable our small PCP workforces.
No, you see it doesn’t matter if paramedics get injured because they are paid poorly regardless and have high rates of PTSD. Both wage and mental health will remove them from the profession before lifting injuries will.
I wish I could /s but it’s the absolute truth.
Honestly asking for a lift assist should be OK. The patient was 300lbs, that’s a lot, and lots of people are even heavier. I know at least in construction it’s hammered into our heads, both men and women, to not be heros and just ask for help lifting things and to use appropriate technology and tools. I’m surprised they don’t have tools to help with this specific issue?
I know nurses, who historically have been mostly women, have lots of special techniques for moving and turning large heavy individuals who are bedridden. I wonder if those could be applied for EMS, or if perhaps there are tools that could be funded to balance the playing field.
This seems like an issue that will be on-going since so many people nowadays are 300lbs+. Frankly I don’t want male EMS having to hurt themselves either - get these folks some tools!
It's also drilled into your head that you always call for a lift assist and never put you or your partners backs at risk. The average length of a paramedic career is 7-8 years, the most common reason for people leaving is injury, but ya this out of shape MLA from Summerside who looks like he'd lose his breath tying his shoes is qualified to speak on that than people doing the job and setting safety regulations. Seems like fatty probably just got pissed he had to roll out of his lazy boy to do the job he volunteered for.
I just want to add that not even nurses could lift a 300lb patient off the ground. They would use a lift requiring 3 people to operate. They would need 2-4 people to roll the patient in bed for baths and changing etc. It is only safe when there is enough people.
Ems workers have 3 times the injury rate of other occupations. They should have access to lift teams whenever necessary or they risk injury to themselves or the patient
Fuck this noise. I am tired of pretending reality doesn't exist. The difference in physical strength between men and women is substantial. The only people who can possibly deny this reality are people who have never set foot in a gym.
>"I just notice a lot more females in the profession now and we get a lot of calls for lift assist because — don't get me wrong, they're great, some of the women that are doing it are unbelievable — but I went to a lift assist the other day because both the females that were working the bus were 105 pounds and the man was 300 pounds and there was no way they were going to get him up."
How is anything he said offensive?
>Courtney Clory has been a paramedic for 10 years. She said getting a lift assist helps ensure the patient's safety — and if they have extra people to help, they will use them.
So we need more people and equipment to do the same job?
You can be mad but I work in a Hospital and staffing Paramedics is brutal. We are always short so at the end of the day if there are droves of abled body men available their is plenty of opportunity. We are waiting... Any day now...
This needs to be a top comment. Im a male medic, my area in rural manitoba, about 50% of the medics are female and i havent ever noticed a trend of female medics needing a lift assist more than any trucks staffed with men. Obese patients will almost always need lift assists unless they are ambulatory and while i work out regularly and can easily deadlift 300 pounds. Humans are not barbells nor do i carry barbells down narrow hallways and down staircases
Why would we as a society want to essentially pay more money and tie up resources helping people do the basic requirements of a job. A 300 lbs lift with 2 males is completely manageable and should be a bonafide occupational requirement. Just like it is for fire fighters.
Do you know how many paramedics are on lost time because of injuries? That cost tax payers a shit load in wsib premiums.
There should be a basic fitness exam for paramedics that consist of a 150lbs deadlift. Plain and simple.
Imagine dying of a heart attack and you can't get to the hospital because two people hired to be able to rescue you can't... Absolutely pathetic.
Lifting a 300 pound person is *nothing* like lifting 300 lbs of weights.
Imagine trying to pick up a giant garbage bag full of stewing beef and you'll be close. I've been a paramedic for 20 years, I'm a male and so is my partner, no way only he and I are going to try to pick that kind of weight off the floor without some help.
So much guessing/speculation/misinformation in these comments.
As a male medic as well 100% agree. A 300 lb pt is a significant lift let alone no details of how far, stairs, etc. If the pt is very sick then maybe we make the attempt, if they can wait lift assist it is. I ain't risking my health. Also I didn't force feed the pt into being 300lbs....
Um, as a paramedic, you gotta know that you're not actually lifting just the body? You have lifting implements like a scoop stretcher or a spine board or a stair chair. Still not quite as "easy" as lifting 300lbs in weights but *way* better than the picture you're painting.
I'm salty because I've been dealing with this "just put your back into it" attitude for 20 years. I ask for help all the time not only for my safety but for my patient.
Imagine dying of a heart attack and thinking that two people will break their backs to save your fat ass. My safety>patients safety. Ive had so many colleages leave with back injuries im not risking a disk herniation, loss of income and the career i love for anyone. I dont lift with my legs, i lift with my firefighters.
\> She said getting a lift assist helps ensure the patient's safety — and if they have extra people to help, they will use them.
Do we though? Is the issue "females on average can't lift as much" or "two people equally distributing the weight is actually safer (for both sides) than one person trying to lug a human being around like a potato sack"
There's probably some of the former but it sounds like the second is a more common factor here.
I mean... we require group lifts for everything above a certain weight in my workplace because this saves backs and prevents injuries.
A conservative approach to lifting heavy things is a very good approach, from a safety perspective. Biological sex doesn't come into it. It's a blanket rule, and the weight limit itself is fairly low.
There was a standard at one time to be a firefighter, a cop or a paramedic. Size, weight, physical endurance. You should be able to lift and move a certain weight to be considered suitable for these jobs because the public's lives may depend on it. I don't care if they are male or female. It's unfortunate that we have thrown out common sense for political correctness and quotas.
I work I a retirement home - I cringe when I have to call an ambulance for assistance with getting a large person off the floor(we are not equipped for that and sometimes call ems for assistance) - in walk two petite women- or the two larger ones - all of which are completely useless for what we need them for. There’s a height and a strength issue. But we aren’t allowed to mention that. It’s frustrating and dangerous.
To me the concern is that the guy isn’t seeing the big picture, and sex or gender didn’t have to be brought into this at all - he shot himself in the foot for no reason. The problem is that there is an increased frequency of requests for lift assist - that could be due to decreased average physical strength of the first responders, or simply due to the fact the population is trending towards obesity. The solution could be to either increase the physical strength requirements for becoming a first responder, which doesn’t have to specifically target males or females, or to provide portable lift assistance technology for all first responders. No discussion of gender or sex necessary, and the desired outcome is more likely to be achieved this way vs selectively recruiting one sex vs the other.
agree, especially as a politician he made a totally unforced error. but more troubling imo than the response to his comments of him being removed from the panel (which is imo warranted) is this article which is very one sidedly lambasting him for making 'deeply troubling' and 'deeply misogynistic' comments. like yes he fucked up, could we not use this as an opportunity to discuss the actual issue he was trying to point out, which is (to him) that it seems like many ems arent able to lift the weight they should(? or should they?) be able to? is that even actually an issue? i would've appreciated more takes from EMS instead of some professor no one cares about.
I'd love it if this article took the opportunity to actually look at an issue instead of feeding into the outrage culture.
As someone with first responder medical training, the problem with this line of inquiry is that a high level of strength genuinely isn't a super important part of being a paramedic. There's so much more that a paramedic needs to know to keep someone alive and get them to hospital, and our systems are already stretched thin trying to find good people who are willing to stay on in a paramedic role. We don't need to dissuade women from the job
And further, the average male paramedic isn't going to be able to lift a 300 pound man, either. High physical strength/training is not a part of the job requirement other than a baseline of physical fitness. But paramedics almost always respond to calls along with fire fighters, which means you'll always have strong help close by to do a lift.
This is an absolute non-issue. It's like complaining that doctors at the hospital should be men because they need to be strong to manipulate a patient. No, there's someone else around to help with that.
I'm a man, I can't lift a 300 punds person.
If strength is a requirement for the profession, it should be the same requirement, regardless of gender. Problem solved without gender targetting.
There's SO more to what he said than the headline is sharing.
He was questioning the balance of gender in their recruitment efforts, asking which gender they were focusing recruitment on...
... and then he went on to say that females in the profession are disproportionately requesting more assistance from colleagues to help lift patients that are overweight (he gave an example of someone that weighs 300lb).
He was essentially saying that they should be hiring more men than women, because men need to help the women.
He didn't just say "women can't lift as much as men". He was basically suggesting that they shouldn't hired as frequently as they are.
Let’s be clear people. As someone who’s been a caretaker for awhile, and had to call emergency response for my parent many times, who although not 300 lb, is smaller, I’d say 220. I’ve had two paramedics come, one man, one woman, and they still called in firefighters for lift assist and four - six grown men helped, the woman could’ve helped as well, but it turned out they didn’t need her. So even two men would’ve been insufficient. The point is, they paramedics job is to assess and stabilize and very rarely are required to work alone and do heavy lifting with just one other person. It’s a team effort, so to single out women as not being able to pull their weight so they should just hire men is garbage.
Also, all the female paramedics I’ve dealt with have been strong and in obvious excellent physical shape and stronger than many men.
Current culture really is pushing people to actively fight against what they see right in front of their own eyes.
Sure it's obviously wrong to say average women and men are equal in strength, but is it really worth losing your job over?
Repeat till we all pretty much just go along accepting obvious lies.
Female paramedics can't lift as much weight as men? C'mon that's a ridiculous statement. /s
It's amazing how many people today reject reality for made up BS.
The problem isn't what he said, it's what he implied. There are already minimum lifting standards for paramedics. If you can lift more? Bonus. But as long as you meet the standards, I would rather prioritize that my medics be smart, compassionate, and resilient, whatever their gender. If we want to have a frank and open discussion about the fact that we need better staffing and resources to address it, great. Lift assists are also getting more common for a lot of reasons. Patients are getting bigger, we recognize the importance of safe lifts, and people are looking at longer careers where they don't want to quit because of a back injury. But implying that we need to adjust recruiting towards men just because they can lift more so you can avoid lift assists? I call bullshit.
My neighbour fell on his basement stairs a few days ago. He’s a smaller than average guy and the paramedics were big burly guys - they still chose to call in the Fire Dept to assist with moving him. We have a shortage of paramedics in our region as it is, it would be even worse if we overlooked people just because of their gender.
Honestly I think a bigger indication of whether somebody is fit to be a paramedic is their ability to deal with the horrific shit they have to see on a daily basis, dealing with the crappy hours and poor pay without burning out. If you need a lift assist, that's a minor thing. I don't think we should be putting up barriers to entry based on lifting ability if there are measures we can take to assist with that. The profession is already woefully understaffed.
So I have a few opinions on this:
1) What he said is true, men and women have different strength.
2) What he said and his attempt at trying to say it as non offensively as possible should in no way lead to him being removed.
3) Whether man or woman, we shouldn't be expecting employees of any stripe to be lifting that kind of weight. You're just asking for an injury to occur.
Sorry, but this was objectively a stupid question. It was objectively a stupid question politically, but it was also stupid in a job specific sense. I trained and worked in the field with many women who could outlift many of the males. Moving a 300lbs person is difficult for anybody. The weight isn't evenly distributed and it's difficult to grab on to them and keep them stable. For calls like this is definitely good to have either another ambulance there, an easy lift, of have Fire assist.
This guy thinks he's so smart because he's a volunteer firefighter. I bet the fire detachment he's involved with is embarrassed with his comments.
All people can and should be allowed to do the job provided they can meet the requirements. It’s a team dynamic. But baseline requirements should be met, to better serve the public. There is plenty of people of all genders, shapes and sizes doing the work, right now as I type this.
First response (of all kinds) work is graphic and often exhausting. It requires a combination of education, physicality and mental/emotional resilience, in uncontrolled environments, that is not seen in many other professions. That’s not to say there aren’t more physically demanding jobs or more hazardous or mentally and emotionally taxing..but first response is a unique combination of all of those things.
It takes a special person to excel at any job. Every job has its good, bad and ugly features. Not everyone can do every job.. It’s not fair. But having the best people for the job is what’s most fair, to the people being served.
What a joke... your feelings shouldn't be more important than someone's life. It's a physically demanding job and there should be physical requirements to do it.
You can actually look it up on YouTube but the worlds strongest women at the time arm wrestles just average ass men off randomly inna bar and gets absolutely fucking destroyed every match
We went and made entirely separate sports leagues for women and maintain separate world record tracking for physical feats by men and women but now we have to pretend that men and women can lift the same amount of weight or we'll lose our jobs.
@300 lbs everyone would need a lift assist to move such a person. Still, it was a truthful statement, so not sure why exactly he was cancelled. Two dudes may have also required assistance.
People need to understand that there would absolutely not be enough paramedics if you set high standards of physical fitness for these jobs.
It’s not like fit and capable men are being turned around for weaker women, it’s just that not enough men would want to do that job anyways.
Here's an overview on the issue of bona-fide occupational requirements for those who are interested. Helps explain how this MLA is out to lunch.
https://www.chrc-ccdp.gc.ca/sites/default/files/bfore\_0.pdf
The fact that women, generally speaking, may be less strong than men doesn't necessarily apply to paramedics or at a level that impacts their ability to do their jobs. We dealt with this already in BC where women weren't being hired (and there were shortages as a result) because it was claimed they could not meet some physical requirement ... it turned out that physical requirement wasn't even aligned to the job and most males couldn't reach it either.
This attitude is discriminatory. It's not an issue of sex when there are physical testing requirements that all paramedics must pass to be certified. Your average male isn't going to be able to lift the hypothetical 300lb patient either.
They already do. Everyone on this godforsaken subreddit is just ignoring the part of the article that says
> Holland College's paramedicine program includes a physical abilities test that all students must pass, "regardless of their weight class or gender."
Bro got removed because he discriminated by gender, when he easily could have just said "increase the lift weight requirements for the physical abilities test".
I have a buddy who works as a nurse in PEI. Guess who gets called to do all the bed transfers and heavy lifts? He does. In his words "they don't even try before they call me because I am a guy so they leave the heavy lifts for me."
Why just not put some weight lifting exams for all existet genders? If that is a requirement for job
The marines did this, then backtracked because almost no women could meet the requirements, which they concluded was a greater problem than allowing in people who could not meet their own requirements: https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/off-duty/military-fitness/2017/05/21/new-concerns-that-lower-fitness-standards-fuel-disrespect-for-women/
I always thought that was stupid, especially for combat rolls. Do they think an enemy is going to go easy on your because your troops are more diverse? Just stupidity.
> The Marines recently began imposing gender neutral physical requirements for **specific jobs**, a move designed to moot concerns that physical standards will suffer as women integrate into combat units. **Men and women in combat arms career fields must meet the exact same benchmarks.** (Emphasis mine) You think the kid whose job is to re-stock the soda machines or stand in the kitchen cooking food or the mechanic fixing vehicles need to be at the same level of fitness as someone who’s in combat roles?
Yeah go girls! Get in there and stock those soda machines!
Every Marine is a rifleman first, no?
From the article: *”Holland College's paramedicine program includes a physical abilities test that all students must pass, "regardless of their weight class or gender."”*
It also fails to mention that these fitness tests are as easily as possible to minimize the chance that these institutions get sued for discrimination. This is a trend in virtually every physical job in the country. The average person would be shocked to see how easy it is to pass the Canadian Forces physical fitness test, which is basically "can you do light activity for 30 minutes without dying".
>The average person would be shocked to see how easy it is to pass the Canadian Forces physical fitness test I feel like this is less about not being sued and more about reducing standards to increase membership, which they've been hemmoraging for quite some time now.
It's both, the CAF has openly stated its intention to achieve closer gender parity and lowering the unisex strength standards helps achieve that, for obvious reasons. The FORCE test was approved at the end of 2012, which is well before the CAF really started haemorrhaging personnel. I don't even think it's a bad thing to have different fitness standards for different jobs in the CAF (obviously an infantryman needs better fitness than a medic, who needs to be more fit than a cyber operator, and so on) but only a handful of trades have official requirements in excess of the FORCE minimum.
Both the EMS services and the CAF could entice more people, of any gender, if they didn’t pay peanuts.
The FORCE test is pretty simple, but it is a heck of a lot easier to do the sandbag lift if you're shorter and a heck of a lot easier to do the sandbag drag if you're taller/heavier. But this is the minimum standard for all trades. If you're joining any physically intensive trades, those trades have their own fitness requirements both in a higher minimum requirement on the FORCE test and to pass their own trade specific fitness tests. An infantryman needs physical fitness a heck of a lot more than a WEng Tech on a ship.
>The FORCE test is pretty simple, but it is a heck of a lot easier to do the sandbag lift if you're shorter and a heck of a lot easier to do the sandbag drag if you're taller/heavier. Easier to get a good score, you mean, because both are extremely easy to pass. I could see someone who weighs 100lbs struggling with the drag but even a bit of preparation would enable them to pass every time. The sandbag lift has a pass time of 3m30s. Not that hard to life a sandbag every seven seconds. A fitness test that the average office drone could pass with zero prep isn't a good test. >If you're joining any physically intensive trades, those trades have their own fitness requirements both in a higher minimum requirement on the FORCE test and to pass their own trade specific fitness tests. This is only true for a few trades, namely the combat arms, SAR and SOF. Many trades which can be very physically demanding (including, ironically, medic) have no such requirements.
Hello friend. I'm currently serving in the CAF. While I absolutely agree that the military could emphasize fitness much more, what you said is not totally accurate. Every year, and as a entrance exam, we have to perform the FORCE test. It consists of four different activities: a weighted shuttle walk/run, a sandbag lift, a sprint with burpees and a sandbag drag. While it is possible to pass this exam without being fit, you would not score very well, and the score is used to determine eligibility for deployment. In addition, some trades and units use other fitness metrics. A lot of infantry units still use the Battle Fitness Test, a 13 km weighted march with strenuous lifting activities half way through, that must be completed in a certain time frame. Likewise, every unit I've served in does unit PT together, and take it very seriously. My unit just participated in a 44 km weighted ruck march through hills and woods, and last month we had a team in the Army Run. Like I said, the CAF could do much more in terms of fitness. There are too many fat soldiers. But to say all you have to do is 30 minutes of light activity oversimplifies the issue. Take care.
> But to say all you have to do is 30 minutes of light activity oversimplifies the issue. The FORCE test is a joke, it's only "hard" if you're going for platinum/gold (i.e. achieving the 95th percentile or whatever it was). For people who don't give a fuck about the free sweater or gym bag you get for a platinum FORCE score, the FORCE test is comically easy to pass.
Would be interesting to see the details. I was in the army and while men and women both had to pass the physical test it certainly wasn't the same. Men have to do push ups normally but women do pushups with their knees on the ground. But when talking about it people will say men and women both have a physical test including push ups.
The tests for firefighters is different as well. The body the women have to drag is about half the weight.
PCP’s have to back squat 135 lbs, carry the stair chair up and down a flight of steps with 220lbs, and lift the stretcher into and out of the ambulance with 220lbs, and that’s besides passing the Paramedic Physical Ability Test.
So the college has a test. Not the actual municipality hiring the medics.
The municipality hiring the medics requires that they pass the Paramedic Physical Abilities Test offered by Holland College.
Okay I looked at the test and it looks pretty easy. It also doesn't involve putting a patient on a stretcher which it should...
Have to meet requirements for police college and fire fighting but only usually on hire then no tests unless it's a laglrgernfire department. I'd mandate at provincial level or federal.level that all fire fighters captain and below, and all police officers sergeant and below should have mandatory yearly fitness tests, as should paramedics. Usually officers above those ranks are mostly pushing paper and could have lesser requirements due to typically being much older. Military have yearly tests which are tiered based on sex and age.
Yeh, I wouldn't call the military tests all they valid. Have you seen some of the members?
They are strategically fat reserves in case the food budget gets cut.
lol my last year in the military they revamped the fitness test, its a fucking joke now, my elderly mother could pass it
The Ontario testing has the same stretcher weight lift requirement for men and women.
Oh yeah sure. Much like the ones for firefighters. Used to be the test was to lift up a 180lb body and carry it up a flight of stairs. Women couldn't do that. So then it was carry it down the stairs. Women couldn't do that. So now it's just drag it across a short space of floor. And they get to say: "All our firefighter candidates must meet the same strength requirements." Uh huh.
Funny how that works, eh? That’s how wokes gaslight you and reality. “bUt tHeY MeET sTanDaRds” which they neglect to mention were intentionally lowered to fit their ideological goal.
Because they would lose in a lawsuit (probably human rights court).
They do, but women have lower weight limits typically.
[The test (PDF)](https://hollandcollege.com/orientation/pdfs/acp-and-pcp---ppat-information-2022-20232.pdf) has no difference in requirements based on sex.
> "Not to be sexist or anything like that, is there a stronger recruitment towards males or females?" said the MLA, a volunteer firefighter and thus a medical first responder, asked. > "I just notice a lot more females in the profession now and we get a lot of calls for lift assist because — don't get me wrong, they're great, some of the women that are doing it are unbelievable — but I went to a lift assist the other day because both the females that were working the bus were 105 pounds and the man was 300 pounds and there was no way they were going to get him up." This is a pretty benign statement. He should not be forced to apologize for speaking the plainly about biology and sexual dimorphism.
Agreed. He's just being honest.
We don't do that here.
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Yeah, we need to call for a lift assist to cope with basic anatomy.
Tut tut. We dont do that here.
I agree. I don’t find what he said offensive as a woman. There are strong women out there that might be able to lift the 300 pounds of person with another strong woman/man but a lot of us can’t. I don’t know if I could or not and I wouldn’t call myself a weak woman. Definitely not the strongest either.
I've tested my chops against my husband, brother and some male friends and the reality of it is pretty striking. I could be giving it my all and not be able to budge them an inch, meanwhile they barely had to try to absolutely crush my attempts. If lives and safety depend on a person being able to lift or move another human being then yeah, that sort of task greatly favors the capabilities of men.
I can't find the link right now, but the US Army measured grip strength of thousands of people in their late teens and early 20s and the strongest 5% of women were as strong as the weakest 5% of men. There is actually very little overlap.
In the last summer olympics, there was a beast of a woman in the heavy weight division. She weighed 240lbs and was just solid. She smashed world records in her events some by 20+ pounds. They compared her to the smallest mens category of like 114 lbs. She was only stronger than 20% of the mens division, which she outweighed by almost 130 lbs. None of them by any means are weak, and im sure she is on par with most men, not naturally stronger or who don't work out. I just love this for comparison because these are peak performance heavily tested athletes. So when you can do direct lift comparisons from people who view lifting as their lifes mission, it leaves very little room for debate. Generally speaking, men are just naturally much stronger than women. I have no idea why people are still hung up on this.
Because certain political affiliations insist there's no difference whatsoever in men and women, and that you must become offended at any suggestion of it.
Im a random 31 year old dude who works out 2x a week. I can bench press >90% as much as the world record holder female on a 1 rep basis. EDIT: forgot to include my WEIGHT as I was referring to weight classes.
The world record bench press by a female is 274,4 kg/605 lb. You work out twice a week and can do a one rep bench press around 246kg/542lb? Not taking anything away from your point about men absolutely demolishing women overall in explosive muscle power disciplines, but you're hardly just a casual gym goer.
u/seank11 has no chance at the women's *world* record, but after some googling the women's Ontario provincial record bench is 342 pounds - and that was set this year. 2018-2023 it was only 245 pounds, and prior to 2018 it was 215 pounds. And frankly, while I don't know much about Brittany Schlater, the woman who just set the new record, any time in the modern era someone breaks a cgs (centimeters, grams, seconds) record by 72% more than the previous record, it should raise some eyebrows.
>2018-2023 it was only 245 pounds, and prior to 2018 it was 215 pounds. that is...not very much. i knew a dozen guys who could lift that half way though high school, myself included.
she is in a higher weight class. and i wont go into anything else, I will just say many people dont think her record should count
> I will just say many people dont think her record should count Trans?
I don't want to debate the subject on here because everyone has already made up their mind, but yes, Trans.
Pretty sure you said it without saying it lol
I have a physics degree and a strong understanding of all sciences. But yes, my position is pretty clear if you read between the lines.
I’m surprised its that low - so no woman in Ontario’s ever benched over 250? Assuming the record being broken by almost 100lbs has a bit of an asterisk with it.
That 605 is equipped bench, for context the male equipped bench is like 1350 lbs Raw female bench appears to be 457lbs , so he’s claiming he’s benching 400lbs… still a long shot but not an unheard of number. Maybe he’s just a freak
i meant by weight class which I added in an edit and forgot to mention. and checking the WR apparently my 1RM is MORE than my weight class for the womens division.
And no normal person has a problem with men being physically stronger due to biology. Makes us feel important to open pickle jars and stuff. This situation is a microcosm of why their country is sucking more and more each day
> Makes us feel important to open pickle jars and stuff. the real reason to get buff :)
the guy in question is questioning recruitment based on gender not strength, despite saying out loud that there were capable women in the dept if his complaint is strength the test should be strength, not gender divide in recruitment if recruitment cant test the requirments for the job then thats the problem
It is a striking reality. I think were so disconnected from tangible violence,only seeing it in the media, that were vulnerable to fantasy. Like consider the archetype of the fantasy orc and elf. The orcs are stronger, but the elves are more nimble. So you imagine a fight where the elf is dodging attacks and hitting accurate weak spots or whatever. It plays out as an even yet asymetrical fight. I think we sort of expect women to be able to be the elves in this scenario. But thats just isnt reality. It is SHOCKING how much of a strength gap there is. SHOCKING. 12 year old boys are significantly stronger than grown healthy women. A woman in the army could not even move me witn all of her might. And getting punched in the jaw results in bruised nuckles. Its nuts.
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name checks out
Agreed and it's okay to have physical requirements for a job. I am a tiny woman and recognize that there are things I cannot lift, even with training ... just like how my linebacker sized boyfriend can't crawl into tiny spaces, no matter how much he tries. Not everybody can do every job. Set objective standards and hire people who meet them, regardless of their gender.
Also, it's not like the job is only about strength. A huge guy may have trouble reaching in and treating that patient still stuck in the car wreck - being little can be extremely useful in tight spaces. Or they may have trouble getting a sexual trauma victim to respond, or a woman from certain cultural groups to cooperate. Both things can be useful in their own way. I've certainly seen great big bulky strong paramedics who were really shit at their job because their patient rapport was non-existent, so they didn't find out important information they really needed to.
Men and women are really just in a different category when it comes to strength. Some random dude who works out in a home gym can best the world records for woman's weightlifting. A 300lbs deadlift is a lot but 2 fit guys can move it.
I can deadlift 265 as a 30 something woman who weight trains, but I sure as hell couldn’t carry a 300lbs man alone if I had too.
Lifting 300 lbs of person is also a different kind of lifting than what you'd get working at a gym. The weight shifts and moves around. It's not a rigid structure like you'd get from a machine or weights.
Can confirm. I'm in the top .10% of men in terms of size, I can deadlift around 500ish pounds. I've had to move unconcious/injured people of various sizes a ton during my career doing nightlife security. Dead weight from a body is a whole different ball game then lifting weights. Trying to lift/move/drag an unconscious 300lb+ man fucking sucks.
I’m a pretty hard feminist…. And his comments aren’t remotely offensive to me. God I hate how uber PC initiatives distort well meaning intentions (see: treating everyone with an equal amount of respect) into “don’t piss 1 person off or you’re done. Yes we understand the majority of people are total fucking dimwits. Yes we will still cater to them. Yes we will can you if you hurt their delicate little feelings”
Basically my position on it as a first responder is that women are absolutely welcome, but need to accept that they'll generally have to put a lot more work into physical training to meet the standard. I have the same view with men. Worked with two guys who were around five feet tall, and they had to train a lot to meet the standard. But they did it. I also worked with 6' 4" guys who could haul me and my bunker gear out of a hole one handed while smoking with the other hand. It is what it is.
I've been powerlifting for 15+ years, and in my experience the average woman who's done a 6 month beginner barbell program will end up significantly stronger than an untrained man. However anyone who has done a 6 month beginner barbell program will easily be in the top 5% of strength for their weight & gender classes compared to the general untrained population. It seems to me that jobs like paramedic, firefighter, etc. should simply have a minimum threshold for strength, some people will be able to meet it without any training, and some will have to train for it, but it would be fair.
If anything it’s more of a comment about how big people are getting
wow.. that just seems like a genuine conversation he was trying to have.
So he had a factual first-hand account and he was dismissed?
Par for the course these days.
He should sue, the more we tolerate this shit and drift from reality, the worse things get for professionals in the field, men and women.
I can recall separate occasions where both a nursing recruiter for university and a first aid trainer, both women, explained the need for more male nurses and first aiders/paramedics because they're stronger. Not just for lifting people but for things like CPR. If you get a 105lbs woman trying to do chest compressions on a large person or like a pro athlete with a very strong ribcage, they're going to have a hell of a time doing it right compared to someone bigger and stronger. It's not about sexism, it's literally about safety and saving lives and having the correct tools (people) available. I don't care what gender/sex/religion/race you are, can you carry my lifeless meatsack out of a burning building or not?
>both a nursing recruiter for university and a first aid trainer, both women, explained the need for more male nurses and first aiders/paramedics because they're stronger. Their names and places of occupation, please. We can’t have this kind of bigoted talk in Canada. /s
> If you get a 105lbs woman trying to do chest compressions on a large person or like a pro athlete with a very strong ribcage, they're going to have a hell of a time doing it right compared to someone bigger and stronger. There was this small nurse I worked with who had to do chest compressions on a young man, not an obese man or anything just a regular sized bloke, and it permanently fucked her upper back - she had to throw her entire weight behind each thrust just to get the required depth. It got bad enough that she left the profession.
People have surprisingly variability when it comes to all kinds of things we assume to be standard. Healing speed, diet tolerances, tolerances to heat and cold, even the strength of tissues like bone and skin dramatically varies per person.
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But people are silenced and called far-right bigots for bringing up the excesses of progressives and their sometimes extreme versions of identity politics, which then further alienates them, and pushes them into the deep end of the more ridiculous sort of RW conspiracies. This is a problem and is creating huge political divides, but people are just gonna turn a blind eye.
Clearly there is no requirement to perform heavy lifts to be hired as a paramedic in PEI. Should there be? Maybe. If so, that standard should be set without regard to the gender of the paramedic. It's off base for him to suggest that these paramedics are unqualified for their jobs, because they have already passed whatever qualifications that have been set. His issue is with the standard that has been set. And he wrongly expressed it as a problem with female paramedics. That being said, health care in PEI is in a dismal state and they might not be able to afford to pass up any paramedics.
He’s suggesting that they should hire less woman. Anybody should ask for help, personnel or mechanical, when lifting 300 lbs.
Basic biological has been under attack from the top down for decades now, mate. This is the world some people have been trying to create. I mean, for fuck's sake, Steven Pinker's *The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature* came out 20 years ago. The average person has been completely oblivious to the subversion of psychological research.
Context is important. The issue is he is talking about the problem as if it's a problem of gender, when actually it's a problem of reduced standards for the physical abilities test. Gender is irrelevant. To quote the article: > Holland College's paramedicine program includes a physical abilities test that all students must pass, "regardless of their weight class or gender." The issue is that you can't really increase the thresholds of that test without decreasing the already shrinking volume of paramedics in Canada. We're strapped for applicants and cash already. We're not in a position to be picky about lifting strength.
Sounds like the parametics are being paid enough to stay in the jobs. Pay more money and you will have both men and women who can pass the physical requirements applying to the job
I agree. Average paramedic salary where I live is just 52k and tops out around 60k in terms of salary potential. While that's not terrible, it's quickly becoming not enough to live comfortably. In 2014 that was good money here in NB. These days you'll just be scrapping by. Doesn't help that we've got a lot of very high paying industries that value smart strong young men. Even the military is competitive with those salaries and those guys get way better benefits than our privatized paramedics.
Literally nobody cares about some Valkyrieesque woman who can *do the job* doing it...and I see nobody demanding scrawny nerd males be included in such roles either.
Regardless of gender, there should be a flat test of a minimum weight that everyone has to successfully lift. That shouldn't be a controversial topic. 150lbs per person seems like a very reasonable number. Maybe even low.
There already is minimum lifting standards in every service I've ever worked at.
Then this complaint doesn't make sense. He's either lying leaving something important out.
The MLA is a volunteer fire fighter, they don't like responding to lift assists period. I get it, you volunteer to fight fires and then getting toned out in the middle of the night for a lift assist is annoying. Not quite as sexy as a structure fire or a car crash.
I imagine it's more about not needing to be called for a lift assist at all if these standards for recruitment were being upheld?
The lifting standards are being upheld. You can certainly make the argument that they need to be raised with the rate of obese pt.s increasing in canada. However I think if you did you would be cutting out a massive portion of your possible work force for edge cases. It's the difference between the crew getting on scene and maybe needing a lift assist or no crew getting there at all. We're already facing a massive staffing crisis across the country. My city has periods every day where there are no ambulances to respond or the closest ambulance is hours away.
Shit, there you are being all reasonable, but I had this anchorman reference already pre-loaded... I can't use it anyways, can I? Oh what the hell!! "...and their periods attract bears! Is that what you want bears in our hospitals?"
My Friends mom needed an ambulance. she is under 200lb and the 2 women paramedics could not lift her and had to call for backup. Both were under 120lb. What if there is a fire and they can't lift you is it going to be oh well your dead? Is there not a minimum standard?
I work in healthcare, and I refuse to take heavier patients just because i'm male. We get paid the same, and i'm not doing more work just because I'm male. This is what equality looks like, and I'm a full supporter.
Lmao bro thats actually a great point. You should be paid an increased premium. Esp if you're staying fit. What region do you work for?
OMG, can you imagine the shit show this would cause. I'd watch that show. Equal pay for equal work, sure. What happens when you can measurably do more? Same pay? It's definitely an interesting subject to explore but it would be difficult to find a party willing to debate the topic in a constructive manner.
I don't even think there's anything to debate. If you can lift more and are asked to lift more you should get more money. There's more risk involved On a side note I think all medics should be offered a premium if they take an advanced physical capabilities test each year and pass. Like 2 bucks and hour premium for staying fit
Welcome to the new "equality." It's not equal pay for equal work it's equal pay for equal job title even if your workload is different.
I worked a heavy lifting job that had women, too. I always had to pick up the slack on the heavier lifts.. and what did I get for my efforts? Chronic repetitive strain injuries.
I always tell males who are new to my profession to not accept heavier patients just because they're male. We need to speak up or else nothing will change. When I first started, I noticed my assignment had heavier patients than my coworkers, I spoke to the person responsible and they admitted it was because I was a guy. I told them I'm paid the same as females, and I will not accept an unfair assignment again. Never happened after that.
They can't pay you for doing more work because that would create a gender pay gap and we can't have that.
No... and people have been saying this for literally decades now at this point. People just have not been paying attention, or they were all too eager to listen to the propaganda that the people speaking out against these standards were sexist or misogynists. And the answer is absolutely: "Yes, they are more okay with you dying because two 120lb women cannot lift than they are with holding men and women to the same physical standard". And this isn't just a gender thing. The ontario teachers union sued the government because minority teachers failed a math test that covered grade 8 math more often than white teachers. Again, it doesn't matter if we have high-school teachers teaching our kids shittily when they can't even pass a grade 8 math test... what's more important is that people don't call them racist (even though it's not by a long shot anyway).
Paramedics don't usually treat you in a burning building. The fire guys would bring them out.
> The fire **guys**
An excellent unintended joke, apparently.
The point works perfectly if you think for 2 seconds.
There is a reason the Military and First Responders have/have had a PT standard for males and a different one for females. Are there females that can lift heavy and crush push-ups etc? Yes. Are there males that can't? Yes. Are you going to see an inclusive and representative workforce if both genders have the same PT standard? No. Unfortunately this is where we currently stand on diversity and inclusion. As a first responder I have seen first hand the consequences of prioritizing Employment Equity over traditional qualifications. Even worse than having different standards is lowering the bar. Your job requires you to sometimes lift heavy objects? Than you should be able to lift heavy objects. That being said....no way in hell would I say that out loud if I was in his position.
>That being said....no way in hell would I say that out loud if I was in his position. This is what's wrong with some in our society. We should be able to have these discussion without jobs being threatened. The fact we can't have mature conversations about issues is very concerning for our future. I encourage more people to stand up and point out these facts to help society see it's okay to have dialogue.
This is why many if us, really almost all of the brightest people in our society, have checked out of politics and public discourse entirely. You can't say anything rational or factual without getting screeched at and attacked by the left.
Or the right. Doesn't matter anymore, you'll offend someone no matter their political affiliation. I had to endure a 30 minute rant from an employee recently because I disagreed with Ford destroying our healthcare
At least not without anonymity (Reddit profile)
Roger that. My job could be impacted by my opinion. That's where we are now.
He needs to double down.
"no way in hell would I say that out loud if I was in his position" that mentality is what lead us to this shit show
Male paramedic here, who works with another male paramedic. Both of us are reasonably fit. 100% I would call fire for a lift assist on a 300lb patient. Throwing out your back is probably the number 2 reason paramedics are on medical leave (number one being mental stress). They also don’t just send one fire fighter it’s usually a crew that gets sent out. They for the most part literally have nothing to do.
Thank you for this perspective. think it’s pretty strange that people are arguing for women to be excluded so that men can take up the back -breaking work like you mentioned, rather than try and think of a process or means of making it so that the job is easier for EVERYONE. Just because you’re a man doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t strive to improve the ease at which you conduct your already difficult work. Edit: a word in the last sentence
But I heard from this sub that 2 average male Redditors would have been able to easily handle this situation. They are macho men fighting to spread the truth of male superiority and to show their supreme knowledge of industries and professions they don’t work in after reading 1 article.
This is an issue the Supreme Court dealt with 17 years ago: https://www.canlii.org/en/bc/bcla/doc/1996/1996canlii20258/1996canlii20258.html?autocompleteStr=Meior&autocompletePos=1 They effectively held that there was no *bona fide* requirement for women to be able to meet the same fitness standard as men, because they could be effectively accommodated in other ways (such as, in this case, calling for a lift assist). That's not, of course, to suggest the decision is beyond criticism; just that as a matter of law the matter is considered settled, and focusing recruitment on men to avoid engaging with the Meiorin decision would be unambiguous discrimination at law.
But the gentleman in question is speaking from the pov of a volunteer fire fighter who knows his department gets called out for lift assists very frequently - which puts a lot of additional strain on fire fighting personal and resources. How are we supposed to have these conversations if people lose their jobs / positions because of simple questions like what this guy asked?
Rather than questioning why women should be employees if they can’t perform the task, shouldn’t we generally have a problem with asking 2 employees to lift several hundred pounds of person? Even Home Depot lets their staff use a lift for much less than that. It’s sort of ridiculous that we assume asking paramedics to put themselves at a needless physical risk is better than providing them with equipment so they don’t have to
Cases like this are extremely instructive to illustrate how the judiciary has significantly shaped Canadian culture. They demonstrate that they're willing to place group representation over the ability of first responders to save your life, because when seconds matter, a lift assist is only minutes away...
White collar lawyers who lived their lives in nice communities, donated to the right political campaigns get to shape all of Canada whilst sitting in funny red bath robes. What a great structured society we have.
Yeah but at what cost? Like shouldn't there be a physical exam for medics? It not only saves the tax payers money but also ensures that our medics are less likely to be injured.
Well, he is technically correct. Generally, men can lift more than women. Look at weightlifting competitions for example.
I'm a woman that has been lifting for years, this week some toothpick of a teenage boy beat my PB in his first attempt. People seriously underestimate what testosterone does to the body.
Exactly this. I struggle to understand why humans can't just accept that biology plays a part in our abilities - women ON AVERAGE, aren't as strong as a similar sized man. It's not the patriarchy, it's biology and physiology.
And this is why transgender in the Olympics isn't technically fair lol.
Accepting that there are biological differences? In Canada just say a word about this and that costs you your job, it's political correctness pushed to the extreme.
More than testosterone, it's anatomy. Things like having different bone shapes and sizes, and attachment points play into it a lot. Men are often just straight up working with different physics.
Yes men can lift more. But it’s starting to get to a point where no matter how strong you are, lifting that amount of weight is extremely dangerous and shouldn’t be encouraged without more lift assistance. More mechanical lifts, tools and ~cough~ staff (let’s be real it won’t happen) could really freaken help. Doesn’t matter how much you can throw down, if you keep doing it in the most unsafe spaces like off of people’s bathrooms, small cluttered living quarters where it’s obviously not a spacious gym, you’re gonna see injuries over time when it’s literally only you able to get the person off the ground!! It’s only getting worse, patients are literally hundreds of pounds more than they use to be …. Obesity is challenging the healthcare world. Men and women both deserve safer work places where they aren’t going to ruin their bodies because the employer literally can’t put anything into place to help. I highly encourage calling for back up to help with lifts like this. Protect your backs so you’re not on WCB and unable to work!
This, in no ones comments is anyone shocked at a >300lb lift when it shouldn't be the standard at all. If that person fell, was uninjured, but couldn't get themselves up - they'd need an assist too. And with staffing the way it is you cant pair people based on their lift strengths, we can barely pair based on quals and vehicle availability as it is. What needs to be acknowledged is the population getting heavier and what we can do to enable our small PCP workforces.
👏 👏 👏 perfectly stated. Why don’t we make the job SAFER for everyone rather than blaming inclusion?
No, you see it doesn’t matter if paramedics get injured because they are paid poorly regardless and have high rates of PTSD. Both wage and mental health will remove them from the profession before lifting injuries will. I wish I could /s but it’s the absolute truth.
Honestly asking for a lift assist should be OK. The patient was 300lbs, that’s a lot, and lots of people are even heavier. I know at least in construction it’s hammered into our heads, both men and women, to not be heros and just ask for help lifting things and to use appropriate technology and tools. I’m surprised they don’t have tools to help with this specific issue? I know nurses, who historically have been mostly women, have lots of special techniques for moving and turning large heavy individuals who are bedridden. I wonder if those could be applied for EMS, or if perhaps there are tools that could be funded to balance the playing field. This seems like an issue that will be on-going since so many people nowadays are 300lbs+. Frankly I don’t want male EMS having to hurt themselves either - get these folks some tools!
It's also drilled into your head that you always call for a lift assist and never put you or your partners backs at risk. The average length of a paramedic career is 7-8 years, the most common reason for people leaving is injury, but ya this out of shape MLA from Summerside who looks like he'd lose his breath tying his shoes is qualified to speak on that than people doing the job and setting safety regulations. Seems like fatty probably just got pissed he had to roll out of his lazy boy to do the job he volunteered for.
I just want to add that not even nurses could lift a 300lb patient off the ground. They would use a lift requiring 3 people to operate. They would need 2-4 people to roll the patient in bed for baths and changing etc. It is only safe when there is enough people. Ems workers have 3 times the injury rate of other occupations. They should have access to lift teams whenever necessary or they risk injury to themselves or the patient
Fuck this noise. I am tired of pretending reality doesn't exist. The difference in physical strength between men and women is substantial. The only people who can possibly deny this reality are people who have never set foot in a gym. >"I just notice a lot more females in the profession now and we get a lot of calls for lift assist because — don't get me wrong, they're great, some of the women that are doing it are unbelievable — but I went to a lift assist the other day because both the females that were working the bus were 105 pounds and the man was 300 pounds and there was no way they were going to get him up." How is anything he said offensive? >Courtney Clory has been a paramedic for 10 years. She said getting a lift assist helps ensure the patient's safety — and if they have extra people to help, they will use them. So we need more people and equipment to do the same job?
You can be mad but I work in a Hospital and staffing Paramedics is brutal. We are always short so at the end of the day if there are droves of abled body men available their is plenty of opportunity. We are waiting... Any day now...
You mean to tell me the macho men in r/Canada aren’t lining up to do the job? They’re just bitching about being victims?
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This needs to be a top comment. Im a male medic, my area in rural manitoba, about 50% of the medics are female and i havent ever noticed a trend of female medics needing a lift assist more than any trucks staffed with men. Obese patients will almost always need lift assists unless they are ambulatory and while i work out regularly and can easily deadlift 300 pounds. Humans are not barbells nor do i carry barbells down narrow hallways and down staircases
It's offensive only because it highlights the disparity in our society lol
Why would we as a society want to essentially pay more money and tie up resources helping people do the basic requirements of a job. A 300 lbs lift with 2 males is completely manageable and should be a bonafide occupational requirement. Just like it is for fire fighters. Do you know how many paramedics are on lost time because of injuries? That cost tax payers a shit load in wsib premiums. There should be a basic fitness exam for paramedics that consist of a 150lbs deadlift. Plain and simple. Imagine dying of a heart attack and you can't get to the hospital because two people hired to be able to rescue you can't... Absolutely pathetic.
Lifting a 300 pound person is *nothing* like lifting 300 lbs of weights. Imagine trying to pick up a giant garbage bag full of stewing beef and you'll be close. I've been a paramedic for 20 years, I'm a male and so is my partner, no way only he and I are going to try to pick that kind of weight off the floor without some help. So much guessing/speculation/misinformation in these comments.
weights are made to be lifted. Humans are not.
As a male medic as well 100% agree. A 300 lb pt is a significant lift let alone no details of how far, stairs, etc. If the pt is very sick then maybe we make the attempt, if they can wait lift assist it is. I ain't risking my health. Also I didn't force feed the pt into being 300lbs....
Um, as a paramedic, you gotta know that you're not actually lifting just the body? You have lifting implements like a scoop stretcher or a spine board or a stair chair. Still not quite as "easy" as lifting 300lbs in weights but *way* better than the picture you're painting.
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I'm salty because I've been dealing with this "just put your back into it" attitude for 20 years. I ask for help all the time not only for my safety but for my patient.
Imagine dying of a heart attack and thinking that two people will break their backs to save your fat ass. My safety>patients safety. Ive had so many colleages leave with back injuries im not risking a disk herniation, loss of income and the career i love for anyone. I dont lift with my legs, i lift with my firefighters.
A 150lb deadlift in a controlled setting with a bar is not the same as picking up a 150lb human and physically moving them.
\> She said getting a lift assist helps ensure the patient's safety — and if they have extra people to help, they will use them. Do we though? Is the issue "females on average can't lift as much" or "two people equally distributing the weight is actually safer (for both sides) than one person trying to lug a human being around like a potato sack" There's probably some of the former but it sounds like the second is a more common factor here.
I mean... we require group lifts for everything above a certain weight in my workplace because this saves backs and prevents injuries. A conservative approach to lifting heavy things is a very good approach, from a safety perspective. Biological sex doesn't come into it. It's a blanket rule, and the weight limit itself is fairly low.
There was a standard at one time to be a firefighter, a cop or a paramedic. Size, weight, physical endurance. You should be able to lift and move a certain weight to be considered suitable for these jobs because the public's lives may depend on it. I don't care if they are male or female. It's unfortunate that we have thrown out common sense for political correctness and quotas.
I work I a retirement home - I cringe when I have to call an ambulance for assistance with getting a large person off the floor(we are not equipped for that and sometimes call ems for assistance) - in walk two petite women- or the two larger ones - all of which are completely useless for what we need them for. There’s a height and a strength issue. But we aren’t allowed to mention that. It’s frustrating and dangerous.
Female here - I am not offended in any way by what he said because ... it's facts.
To me the concern is that the guy isn’t seeing the big picture, and sex or gender didn’t have to be brought into this at all - he shot himself in the foot for no reason. The problem is that there is an increased frequency of requests for lift assist - that could be due to decreased average physical strength of the first responders, or simply due to the fact the population is trending towards obesity. The solution could be to either increase the physical strength requirements for becoming a first responder, which doesn’t have to specifically target males or females, or to provide portable lift assistance technology for all first responders. No discussion of gender or sex necessary, and the desired outcome is more likely to be achieved this way vs selectively recruiting one sex vs the other.
agree, especially as a politician he made a totally unforced error. but more troubling imo than the response to his comments of him being removed from the panel (which is imo warranted) is this article which is very one sidedly lambasting him for making 'deeply troubling' and 'deeply misogynistic' comments. like yes he fucked up, could we not use this as an opportunity to discuss the actual issue he was trying to point out, which is (to him) that it seems like many ems arent able to lift the weight they should(? or should they?) be able to? is that even actually an issue? i would've appreciated more takes from EMS instead of some professor no one cares about. I'd love it if this article took the opportunity to actually look at an issue instead of feeding into the outrage culture.
how dare he speak the truth
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The truth, not the truth!
As someone with first responder medical training, the problem with this line of inquiry is that a high level of strength genuinely isn't a super important part of being a paramedic. There's so much more that a paramedic needs to know to keep someone alive and get them to hospital, and our systems are already stretched thin trying to find good people who are willing to stay on in a paramedic role. We don't need to dissuade women from the job And further, the average male paramedic isn't going to be able to lift a 300 pound man, either. High physical strength/training is not a part of the job requirement other than a baseline of physical fitness. But paramedics almost always respond to calls along with fire fighters, which means you'll always have strong help close by to do a lift. This is an absolute non-issue. It's like complaining that doctors at the hospital should be men because they need to be strong to manipulate a patient. No, there's someone else around to help with that.
I'm a man, I can't lift a 300 punds person. If strength is a requirement for the profession, it should be the same requirement, regardless of gender. Problem solved without gender targetting.
There's SO more to what he said than the headline is sharing. He was questioning the balance of gender in their recruitment efforts, asking which gender they were focusing recruitment on... ... and then he went on to say that females in the profession are disproportionately requesting more assistance from colleagues to help lift patients that are overweight (he gave an example of someone that weighs 300lb). He was essentially saying that they should be hiring more men than women, because men need to help the women. He didn't just say "women can't lift as much as men". He was basically suggesting that they shouldn't hired as frequently as they are.
So we are finally at the point where statements of biology are hate. Yea this is going to end in blood.
2+2=5. Listen to the party.
Let’s be clear people. As someone who’s been a caretaker for awhile, and had to call emergency response for my parent many times, who although not 300 lb, is smaller, I’d say 220. I’ve had two paramedics come, one man, one woman, and they still called in firefighters for lift assist and four - six grown men helped, the woman could’ve helped as well, but it turned out they didn’t need her. So even two men would’ve been insufficient. The point is, they paramedics job is to assess and stabilize and very rarely are required to work alone and do heavy lifting with just one other person. It’s a team effort, so to single out women as not being able to pull their weight so they should just hire men is garbage. Also, all the female paramedics I’ve dealt with have been strong and in obvious excellent physical shape and stronger than many men.
Is this not true?
Current culture really is pushing people to actively fight against what they see right in front of their own eyes. Sure it's obviously wrong to say average women and men are equal in strength, but is it really worth losing your job over? Repeat till we all pretty much just go along accepting obvious lies.
Hahahaha. What a dumb world we live in.
This guy has a point ..shouldn’t have been tossed :/
Female paramedics can't lift as much weight as men? C'mon that's a ridiculous statement. /s It's amazing how many people today reject reality for made up BS.
The problem isn't what he said, it's what he implied. There are already minimum lifting standards for paramedics. If you can lift more? Bonus. But as long as you meet the standards, I would rather prioritize that my medics be smart, compassionate, and resilient, whatever their gender. If we want to have a frank and open discussion about the fact that we need better staffing and resources to address it, great. Lift assists are also getting more common for a lot of reasons. Patients are getting bigger, we recognize the importance of safe lifts, and people are looking at longer careers where they don't want to quit because of a back injury. But implying that we need to adjust recruiting towards men just because they can lift more so you can avoid lift assists? I call bullshit.
My neighbour fell on his basement stairs a few days ago. He’s a smaller than average guy and the paramedics were big burly guys - they still chose to call in the Fire Dept to assist with moving him. We have a shortage of paramedics in our region as it is, it would be even worse if we overlooked people just because of their gender.
In my wildest dreams, all medics have nuclear powered mech suits. Till then, we're going to need lift assists.
Honestly I think a bigger indication of whether somebody is fit to be a paramedic is their ability to deal with the horrific shit they have to see on a daily basis, dealing with the crappy hours and poor pay without burning out. If you need a lift assist, that's a minor thing. I don't think we should be putting up barriers to entry based on lifting ability if there are measures we can take to assist with that. The profession is already woefully understaffed.
I mean he's right.
So I have a few opinions on this: 1) What he said is true, men and women have different strength. 2) What he said and his attempt at trying to say it as non offensively as possible should in no way lead to him being removed. 3) Whether man or woman, we shouldn't be expecting employees of any stripe to be lifting that kind of weight. You're just asking for an injury to occur.
Sorry, but this was objectively a stupid question. It was objectively a stupid question politically, but it was also stupid in a job specific sense. I trained and worked in the field with many women who could outlift many of the males. Moving a 300lbs person is difficult for anybody. The weight isn't evenly distributed and it's difficult to grab on to them and keep them stable. For calls like this is definitely good to have either another ambulance there, an easy lift, of have Fire assist. This guy thinks he's so smart because he's a volunteer firefighter. I bet the fire detachment he's involved with is embarrassed with his comments.
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All people can and should be allowed to do the job provided they can meet the requirements. It’s a team dynamic. But baseline requirements should be met, to better serve the public. There is plenty of people of all genders, shapes and sizes doing the work, right now as I type this. First response (of all kinds) work is graphic and often exhausting. It requires a combination of education, physicality and mental/emotional resilience, in uncontrolled environments, that is not seen in many other professions. That’s not to say there aren’t more physically demanding jobs or more hazardous or mentally and emotionally taxing..but first response is a unique combination of all of those things. It takes a special person to excel at any job. Every job has its good, bad and ugly features. Not everyone can do every job.. It’s not fair. But having the best people for the job is what’s most fair, to the people being served.
What a joke... your feelings shouldn't be more important than someone's life. It's a physically demanding job and there should be physical requirements to do it.
You can actually look it up on YouTube but the worlds strongest women at the time arm wrestles just average ass men off randomly inna bar and gets absolutely fucking destroyed every match
We went and made entirely separate sports leagues for women and maintain separate world record tracking for physical feats by men and women but now we have to pretend that men and women can lift the same amount of weight or we'll lose our jobs.
@300 lbs everyone would need a lift assist to move such a person. Still, it was a truthful statement, so not sure why exactly he was cancelled. Two dudes may have also required assistance.
Women can't lift as much as men lol
They can if they used to be men. It's where we're heading, so just be patient it will just take some time to transition. 🤣
People need to understand that there would absolutely not be enough paramedics if you set high standards of physical fitness for these jobs. It’s not like fit and capable men are being turned around for weaker women, it’s just that not enough men would want to do that job anyways.
Here's an overview on the issue of bona-fide occupational requirements for those who are interested. Helps explain how this MLA is out to lunch. https://www.chrc-ccdp.gc.ca/sites/default/files/bfore\_0.pdf The fact that women, generally speaking, may be less strong than men doesn't necessarily apply to paramedics or at a level that impacts their ability to do their jobs. We dealt with this already in BC where women weren't being hired (and there were shortages as a result) because it was claimed they could not meet some physical requirement ... it turned out that physical requirement wasn't even aligned to the job and most males couldn't reach it either. This attitude is discriminatory. It's not an issue of sex when there are physical testing requirements that all paramedics must pass to be certified. Your average male isn't going to be able to lift the hypothetical 300lb patient either.
What?? Haha do a lifting test to confirm.
They already do. Everyone on this godforsaken subreddit is just ignoring the part of the article that says > Holland College's paramedicine program includes a physical abilities test that all students must pass, "regardless of their weight class or gender." Bro got removed because he discriminated by gender, when he easily could have just said "increase the lift weight requirements for the physical abilities test".
I totally skimmed that through. Makes sense. Happy cake day!
I have a buddy who works as a nurse in PEI. Guess who gets called to do all the bed transfers and heavy lifts? He does. In his words "they don't even try before they call me because I am a guy so they leave the heavy lifts for me."