One more last working class hero

They have struggled for a long time not to be seen as sex objects at work, and it is difficult to understand the rational of
those women who draw attention to their sexual imagery by displaying themselves as sex objects as firefighters in the
2002 Calendar. Some will argue they are showing they have the power to do so, but most feminist arguments would
suggest that they are complying with male power by displaying themselves and objectifying women who are firefighters.
What is clear though is that if women think they are equal because they have been able to take off their clothes for an
audience of men, they are sadly mistaken.
19
1.11.2. A picture of masculinity
Whilst sportsmen might provide an example of the masculine standards of aggressive heterosexuality, physical/mental
strength and stoic discipline, it might also be that firefighters can have similar characteristics. Firefighters also encompass
the status of the paternalistic protector without the savagery of the military. The painting “The Rescue” (Millais, 1855;
see Appendix 7) provides an example by portraying a Victorian fireman rescuing children from a fire, with their mother at
his feet thanking him and in so doing glorifies all that is good in proletarian masculinity. However, Cooper (1986) sees
two other images in this picture, gender and class: gender, because a man is rescuing children and their mother thanks
him; class, because the missing father indicates that it would be inappropriate for an upper class Victorian man to thank a
working class fireman. However, the wife/mother does not have such a place in the hierarchy, and in stark contrast the
upper class woman is able to thank the working class fireman. This is important in patriarchal terms, an acknowledgement
that the Victorian mother’s status is dependent on her husband and in his absence she can be subordinate to all men (see
Goldthorpe 1983; Lipman-Blumen 1976: 19). It is also possible to suggest that Millais found it difficult to portray a father
in the picture at all, because the father has failed in his duty to protect his children. Today, such a picture might appear in
a newspaper as a photograph under a banner headline, “Mother thanks firefighter for saving children in Pimlico fire.”
However, although not so artistically contrived, a discerning eye might witness similar political messages. First, the
firefighter would more likely be male and would therefore be undertaking the patriarchal responsibility of protecting
children; second, it is still a mother’s place to thank the firefighter (because most women still have the responsibility for
caring for children).
According to Cooper, “The Rescue” is more about sex differences than sexuality. Cooper’s gaze does little to
emphasise the submissive position of the mother, but she is less clear about another heroic image “Saved” (Vigor, 1892;
Appendix 7). Here, Cooper sees the rescue of a pre-pubescent child almost as if a victim of rape. Implicit in Cooper’s
observation is that proletarian heroism does not hide the physical threat embodied masculinity poses to women (see
Brownmiller 1975; Dworkin 1981; Hearn 1998). As if to explain what Cooper might imply, the threat of sexual
desire/possession is one way that men make women dependent on them for protection as partners 80 . It is also recognised
that firefighters, soldiers and policemen protect women 81 . Leaving unchallenged for the moment the commonsense
assumption that all firefighters are men, then “The Hero” is a typical example of how a male artist has used a firefighter to
portray and support the commonsense belief that men have a fixed masculinity “inherent in their body” (Connell 1995: 45;
see also Pateman and Gross 1986: 5; Cockburn 1991a: 206; Hearn 1994; Seidler 1997; Kimmel and Messner 1998). This
artistic impression epitomises a historically constructed base for masculinity (see Connell 1995, 1998; Hearn 1996).
There are dividends to be gained from such an image and commonsense beliefs, and these are available not only to
firefighters, but to all men 82 .
Historically, the firefighter has always been identified as male and masculine 83 , but not all firefighters’ images are
so contrived, or complimentary. Firefighters are a group of men who will adopt extreme physical measures to exclude and
harass women (see Hearn and Parkin 1987, 1995: 74; Walby 1990: 52) 84 . My report in no way intends to challenge these
findings, but it will suggest that now female firefighters too are actively defending their rights to be firefighters through
their networks 85 . However it will also report that the few trailblazing female firefighters I have spoken to are as active as
their male counterparts in constructing and testing themselves against the positive characteristics of firefighters’
80 MacKinnon (1979), Hadjifoutiou, (1983: 9) and Cockburn (1991b: 142) would all identify that women at work suffer harassment from the male gaze,
pinching their bottoms, pin-ups and pornography. It also has to be considered that men often use violence directly against women to remind them of
their place (Hearn 1998) and that violence/rape are a source of power that allows all men, violent or not, to scare women (see Brownmiller 1975;
Dworkin 1981).
81 Interestingly Lorber (1994) appears to stereotype these occupations as male.
82 Connell (1995) calls this dividend a patriarchal dividend, which is available to all men and not because all men have, or even support those
characteristics, but just because there is a commonsense belief that all men have such characteristics (see also Hearn 1994).
83 So much so that the fire service (alongside the police) sought to gain exclusion from equal opportunities legislation arguing that, “women could
not/should not perform all the duties” (Corby 1999: 99).
84 The incident referred to is one that occurred at Soho fire station (see Ballantyne 1985). There are no clear publicly available details of this incident,
but I understand it involved a considerable physical sexual abuse of a female firefighter. However, there are even dividends that men might gain from
firefighters’ abuse of their female colleagues. This behaviour seeks to exclude women and, as in all male violence against women, it puts women in fear
of men’s physical strength and is taken as a false proof that women cannot take the pace in men’s jobs (Brownmiller 1975; Dworkin 1981; Hearn 1998;
Chapter 1).
85 These networks are organised by women, but have been mainly sponsored by the FBU. Recently the government (no longer prepared to accept
women’s harassment and token presence) and employers are now supporting these female firefighters by taking a new proactive approach to women by
setting targets for their recruitment (Home Office 1999a, 2000; see Lovenduski and Randall 1993 for an account of how women can organise their
networks and the difficulties they might find).