From personal experience.
On Dec 2, my dad had a stroke, mini as they are calling. EMTs were called and they arrived within 10 minutes. Two women. Now this occurred in my parents bedroom, on the second floor of their house. They had to take him downstairs in this portable chair.
Dad is a retied civil servant (Dept. of Sanitation, City of New York), and weighs about 275 pounds on a 5'-5" frame. These two women had difficulty taking dad down the stairs, in this chair, the two of them had the front, and I had the back. They had to rest the chair every second step, I wanted to go further, they were straining with the lifting. two steps from the bottom, i loose my footing, and fall foward and esentially "tea-bag" dad who is in this chair contraption. I weigh 260 pounds myself, I thought I almost killed him (hes home mostly recovered), but had there been two men instead, i believe that the whole ordeal of getting him down stairs would have been smoother, and i wouldnt have had that incident happen.

I think women should be paid equally for any job that a man does. However, if this house was on fire, and my dad had a broken leg, and a women firefighter came to his rescue, and was about 5'-2", 120 pounds, my dad would be roasted, and the bedroom lamps would be saved.

Sometimes being equal comes with a price.
(Subway Riding the rails underground, Wed 30 Dec 2009, 2:48, 10 replies)

In such a situation
They should've called for assistance. It is one of the basic tenets in health and safety at work.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Wed 30 Dec 2009, 9:09, closed)

That's true
and it sounds as if the patient would've been too heavy for a two-handed male crew anyway. Where the staff went wrong was in not calling back-up.
(Juan Quar is clinging to her front teeth on, Wed 30 Dec 2009, 12:01, closed)

Your points are well made and thought-provoking
but I'm afraid the image of you teabagging your fat old dad has me hooting with amusement. You've slightly unhorsed yourself with that one.
( Monty Boyce, My cheese game is strong, Wed 30 Dec 2009, 9:30, closed)

i know
at the time, i was worried that i did some sort of damage to dad, but now we look back and laugh, because it is funny.
(Subway Riding the rails underground, Wed 30 Dec 2009, 11:07, closed)

If it had been men
Only one would have been needed to hold the other end of the chair and the other would have been free to hold the camera, resulting in an amusing teabagging photo for your dad to come home to.
(Richy_T hundreds if not thousands of dollars, Wed 30 Dec 2009, 19:48, closed)

275 - 5ft5?
Couldn't you just have rolled him down?

/gets coat.


Glad he's ok though
( evilamnesiac says fuck you Prince, Wed 30 Dec 2009, 14:43, closed)

when he was younger
Dad was a mass of solid muscle - now, not so much.

But the important thing is for now, he is OK. The doctors have determined, that the valve they replaced about two years ago isnt working right. They are going to try medicines for a couple of months, and if doesnt work, they got to crack him open again.
(Subway Riding the rails underground, Fri 1 Jan 2010, 4:59, closed)

They should follow the example of the UK army
and possibly others, who knows. In the Royal Artillery, women are allowed to work with the biggest guns, as long as they are physically capable of working with the weights involved. I'd imagine that maybe a smaller proportion of women meet this criteria than men, but who cares? No exceptions are made for people so the men and so no one's work is seen as second to someone elses

Same should go for your ambulance crews etc, a team, between them should be able to perform any task that could reasonably be expected of them without assistance and the gender of the people should be irrelevant.
( greedyostrich Cheese is evil! Cheddar is VOODOO!, Wed 30 Dec 2009, 14:46, closed)

Fire Service
The fire service allows female fire fighters but they have to pass the same physical tests as the men on recruitment, for obvious reasons.
(FF_Sam is currently on call...., Mon 4 Jan 2010, 13:26, closed)

Paramedics have to, at minimum, be able to carry a 75kg person about without difficulty, and that applies for both genders. So, anyone who hasn't prepared for the heavier of people, regardless of gender, will struggle.
(Anachronist misplaced in time since, Wed 6 Jan 2010, 16:41, closed)