New York Mayor Ed Koch had a commonsense approach to hiring first responders, and it made a lifelong impression on me when I first heard it maybe 40 years ago. "I don’t care what sex a firefighter is," Mayor Koch said all those years ago, "as long as they can carry a 200 pound Mayor out of a burning building."
When it comes to dangerous jobs — first responders, soldiers, sailors, pilots, industrial workers, etc. — every other consideration must come in second to the question of whether or not this particular applicant has the physical and mental stamina to do the job.
Tell that to the folks in the Nashville Police Department where they just dropped an "ability test requirement in order to increase its female force from 13% to 30%," according to End Wokeness and a recent report on local station WSMV.
Before we get to that, let's talk a little common sense.
I don't think anyone should discriminate against narcoleptics, but that doesn't mean I want someone who suffers from it to pilot my flight to Tucson next month. If you lack the strength to climb up the wall and help haul the next guy up, maybe you just weren't meant to be a Navy SEAL. If you can't carry a 200-pound mayor out of a burning building, it doesn't really matter whether you're a man or a woman because firefighting is not for you.
Out of nowhere right now, my brain wondered how it would go during one of those arrests when the arresting officer has to spend 20 minutes calming down a hysterical suspect...
...if the cop had Tourette's.
Not well, of course. But the body cam footage would become one of the most sought-after downloads of all time.
But I digress.
Watch this report from WSMV-4 News.
BREAKING: Nashville Police Department drops ability test requirement in order to increase its female force from 13% to 30%
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) March 17, 2024
MNPD will also allow more flexible working schedules in addition to the preexisting maternity leave and sick days
Director Tiffany Gibson is the first… pic.twitter.com/xAWrWzq4lY
"It's a male-dominated profession," some Metro Police Trainee told WSMV, as though that fact automatically makes the whole idea of policing somehow suspect.
And why does Metro Nashville need a force that's 30% female? Why not 42%? Or some other arbitrary figure?
If 100% of this year's crop of MNPD recruits are female and able to meet the mental and physical requirements of the job, then 100% of this year's inductees to the force are going to be women — and that wouldn't be a problem because they meet the requirements.
Here's what needs to be said again and again: the physical requirements for being a cop are not arbitrary. It's a physically demanding job, and in this next clip, you'll see what happens when you drop the non-arbitrary physical requirements just to meet an arbitrary Diversity/Inclusion/Equity (DIE) hiring goal.
4 overweight female cops try to arrest a male shoplifter for over 2 minutes.
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) November 24, 2023
He ends up escaping.
Diversity quotas are our strength!
pic.twitter.com/RY12jsO3rs
DIE gets people killed — and its next victims are lining up in Nashville, even though they have no idea.
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