What I see is an anecdote from a wildfire firefighter who conjured a narrative reflective of what we hope most firefighters’ jobs are — waiting for nothing.

Moreover, as others have mentioned, firefighting as a full time job is the same as military, search & rescue, etc.: training. Why? Because it’s super dangerous and people don’t want their children/spouses/parents to take a job that gets their loved one killed.

If we want to defund the fire department like others want to defund the police, we have to take the same approach as the ladder: a heavy investment and focus on prevention related to the systemic issues that cause fires. And much like the ladder “defund the police” thing, it would get super political and polarized faster than a spark burning down a warehouse full of fireworks, sawdust, and crisco lard.

I have family who did wildfire fighting in the private sector and yeah, a big part of the job is waiting. The other part is largely not being anywhere close to the fire. It is digging a fireline, getting the fuck outta there, and hoping to god the wind doesnt carry too many big cinders across it to negate that laborious effort.

If you are surrounded by flames immediately around you as a wildfire fighter, you are less likely to be “firefighting” and more likely to at the stage of your job where search and rescue is retrieving your cinders for your family to bury.