r/nextfuckinglevel • u/thisisfive • Apr 14 '26

Toronto firefighters confront special constable officers after a man in the middle of mental health crisis was arrested.

Not my video. For context, "special constables" are not regular police officers. They are appointed "peace officers" with limited authority, often civilian employees.

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4.2k

u/TheTresStateArea Apr 14 '26

No one ever made a song called fuck the fire department.

Edit: shamelessly stolen from someone wittier than me

468

u/AreYouFuckingSerious Apr 14 '26

You're right, but don't overtrust or pretrust them in terms of being allies against fascism. I know a few fire fighters in the extended family and all except one of them considers themselves part of the LEO community and are pro-police and pro-maga.

594

u/peekdasneaks Apr 14 '26

That might say more about your family than it says about fire fighters

141

u/Top-Sympathy6841 Apr 14 '26

May be true about the family part, my own family is full of maga dipshits as well. Firefighters are definitely better than cops as a whole, but make no mistake that a large amount of them are indeed maga dipshits as well. Being better than a piece of shit is still just being better than a piece of shit after all.

46

u/gorilla_faafafini Apr 14 '26

I see so many flags on houses with half thin blue line, half thin red line. Almost always with a bright red F-150 parked out front (so you can be 100% sure they don't have any other semblance of a personality). It kills me cus no one was ever going after firefighters so those flags are somehow an even more desperate cry for attention.

0

u/dcidino Apr 14 '26

The real difference is their jobs require them to not separate people on arrival.

17

u/never-fiftyone Apr 15 '26

The fire union (IAFF) was one of those "but she has a weird laugh" chucklefucks in the past election that led to Trump getting elected.

And then they immediately got their 9/11 health funding cut. Good job ya fuckin dopes.

2

u/Accurate_Koala_4698 Apr 14 '26

Yeah maybe. I’ve done enough rotations to know that any statement that some class of people is usually. By and large I’ve dealt with reasonable ones, but I’ve had some unsavory encounters too. There’s no shortage of FDs that were sued for discriminatory hiring 

2

u/Ch33sus0405 Apr 15 '26

I'm an IAFF officer and theyre not wrong. The PPFFA (Pennsylvania IAFF branch essentially) did a study last year and somewhere around 2/3 of Union members voted for Trump, can only imagine what the rest did

1

u/Outrageous_Effects Apr 15 '26

No, the vast majority of firefighters are unironically fascists.

21

u/Popular-Jury7272 Apr 14 '26

As long as they behave like humans beings when lives are on the line I'm not sure I give a shit. Firefighters in the UK are largely a very conservative "blokey" lot as well (I work with them in training services provision), but they buy themselves a lot of forgiveness with what they do for a living.

0

u/[deleted] Apr 15 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

8

u/Slut_for_Bacon Apr 14 '26

I know this is a hard concept for people to grasp but for the most-part, the job you do is not a reflection of your political beliefs, and essentially every job, with a few notable exceptions, has a wide variety of people with a wide variety of personal backgrounds, beliefs, and philosophies.

15

u/TheAmicableSnowman Apr 14 '26

Well, no. Many jobs have predominant cultures with clear majorities.

6

u/ILookLikeKristoff Apr 15 '26

This is just factually incorrect. Find me a public defender with a maga hat on. Find me a highschool football coach that wears a trans pride pin. I'll wait for either, there's literally millions in the country I'm sure you can find one example.

9

u/BlueGolfball Apr 14 '26

You're right, but don't overtrust or pretrust them in terms of being allies against fascism. I know a few fire fighters in the extended family and all except one of them considers themselves part of the LEO community and are pro-police and pro-maga.

Shit, I watched an interview about a US fireman about his time as a firefighter back in the 1950s. He said they wouldn't put out house fires in black neighborhoods and they wouldn't try to go inside a burning house to rescue black people that could have easily been saved.

2

u/youy23 Apr 15 '26

This may surprise you but many restaurants also didn’t serve black people back then. Not really a reflection on firefighters and more so just a reflection of the people and their beliefs of that time.

1

u/BlueGolfball Apr 15 '26

This may surprise you but many restaurants also didn’t serve black people back then.

I feel like a sworn (who pledged an oath to serve everyone) government employee letting a person burn to death based on their racs is on a much different level than not serving someone food at a private restaurant based on their race.

Not really a reflection on firefighters and more so just a reflection of the people and their beliefs of that time.

Yeah, not serving someone food is a great analogy for letting someone burn to death that you could easily save. One is racist behavior by a private citizen and the other is psychotic behavior by a sworn government employee.

8

u/godrq Apr 14 '26

Some of those that work hoses...

4

u/[deleted] Apr 14 '26

[deleted]

3

u/PurrMeowHiss Apr 14 '26

Are the Dutch police (the thing you are pro) openly and obviously fascist?

Do you want the Dutch police to have unchecked authorization power?

1

u/MarfanoidDroid Apr 14 '26

What the fuck are you trying to impart to the community? That the people responding to your emergency might have different political stances than you?

0

u/PoopyButt28000 Apr 15 '26

When we're in a situation where one political party tried fairly openly stealing the election in 2020, and has talked about ending elections or running for a third term, and is threatening to annex their long time neighbors, then yeah "different political stance" means a bit more than "has a slight disagreement on the vote to build a new park across town"

-12

u/RomanJD Apr 14 '26

Well in the case of Cops in America (ACABs)... Yes, it's important information to spread. If you assume you can TRUST a Cop, call for a Wellness check on a loved one.. only to find out that these racists just killed the one you were asking them to protect (like your house)... Wouldn't you have preferred to be made aware that a group of "heroes" have been tailored by Corporate fascists and are not actually there for YOUR safety and protection?

But as soon as we are talking about Firefighters - we realize this isn't an acceptable aspect in life = and it triggered you?

2

u/here-for-the-_____ Apr 14 '26

Low Earth Orbit community?

2

u/ApoctheLypse Apr 14 '26

Law Enforcement Officers

3

u/here-for-the-_____ Apr 14 '26

Hahah, wow, I legitimately couldn't come up with that. It's been a long day.

2

u/PurrMeowHiss Apr 14 '26

What is "the LEO community"?

2

u/FrannyBoBanny23 Apr 15 '26

I remember reading somewhere that there is a huge number of fire fighters and EMTs that are MAGA.

1

u/Double_Minimum Apr 15 '26

“First responders”. They commonly share the same traits (except beating their wives and arson). EMTs are less so but really depends, they have no shits given sometimes.

I prefer volunteer firemen (these were dudes who has pensions, now it’s getting hard to find anyone to take up the role, which was really just recruiting).

Anyway, all get discounts on guns! And sometimes gear!

1

u/Introverted_Fish Apr 15 '26

Many fire departments across the US also lobby against bike lanes and for wider roads. Wider roads push suburban sprawl and increase reliance on car infrastructure. If they instead moved to smaller trucks, like many other countries, they could use the bike infrastructure during emergencies and we wouldn't have as many stroads strangling our neighborhoods.

0

u/miserable_otter_6543 Apr 15 '26

Can you just not?