Fire Department of New York Mandatory Gender Inclusion Training

In New York Cityfirefighters are taught about “The Genderbread Person”—a cartoon that’s part of mandatory diversity, equity and inclusion training designed to explain the “spectrum of myriad identities” people can have.

In the fire department’s Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion training video, which employees must watch by December, firefighters are shown the Genderbread cartoon that explains the differences between gender identity, gender expression, sex and orientation sexual.

*A screenshot from the New York Fire Department’s Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion showing “The Genderbread Person.”*

The daily signal obtained a copy of the video.

“This is a huge sick joke. No one takes it seriously,” an active New York firefighter told The Daily Signal. “The Genderbread person sounds like the FDNY has a contract with an activist group that specializes in propaganda for children.”

The FDNY source added that “it’s scientifically inaccurate and to have it explained to you like you were a 4-year-old in a condescending manner by a cartoon gingerbread man is offensive, weird and wrong “.

The Genderbread Person was originally created by feminist and self-described “social justice comedian” Sam Killermann, according to his website Pronounced metrosexual.

The training video also includes slides of transgender “Orange Is the New Black” actor Laverne Cox, black Atlanta firefighter Anaré Holmes discuss being in the “affirmation business” and a segment where unseen speakers discuss “penis and vaginas” when trying to explain the difference between gender identity and gender expression .

*A screenshot from the New York Fire Department’s Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion of the training video featuring transgender actor Laverne Cox.*

“So let’s talk about penises and vaginas, shall we? Let’s go right there,” a female voice exclaims.

A male voice replies, in an attempt at a humorous tone, that “if you haven’t already talked about penises and vaginas, we need to talk about penises and vaginas.”

The female voice says, “The bottom line is that your external genitalia don’t dictate your sex.”

The FDNY source explained that there were more important things to discuss than the genitalia of his fellow firefighters.

“If Johnnie breaks open a door and rams his penis into a mortician, maybe it would be a good time to talk about penises and vaginas, but until that happens, we don’t have to talk about it,” he said. source. “Why don’t we see if the junior members can force a door or put the rig in the pumps first?”

*A screenshot from the New York Fire Department’s Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion training video.*

The video also contains a series of multiple-choice questions for the firefighters to answer, one of which asks: “What two words does Q stand for in the LGBTQ+ acronym?” The answers given are A. “Quartet, Queer”, B. “Queen, Quiet”, C. “Queer, Questioning” and D. “Quiet, Quartet”.

“As far as the question of who you are, I would suggest you seek therapy,” the source said. “This is serious business for serious people. We don’t care who you are, as long as you can do the job.”

New York City Fire Commissioner Robert Tucker was hired by Mayor Eric Adams in August. At the commissioner’s swearing-in ceremony, Adams said Tucker would “put out the flames that are actually burning inside the agency.”

Amanda Farinacci, a spokeswoman for the FDNY, told The Daily Signal that, “The Fire Commissioner supports the work of the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and courses such as one for LGBTQ+ are required pursuant to Executive Order 16. The FDNY provides such training to promote awareness and understanding among our members.”

Executive Order 16 requires all New York City agencies to provide access to single-sex facilities based on a person’s chosen gender identity or expression, rather than their actual sex as determined by one’s DNA. Official identification, medical proof or gender verification is not required.

The FDNY source said he would not speak publicly for fear of losing his job. “Nobody will say anything because we’re not allowed to have opinions that differ from this weird narrative,” the source said.

Michele Fitzsimmons, a battalion chief who was featured in the video with a history of gay rights, told The Daily Signal that she had “nothing to do with the production of the video.”

“Basically, I was given a clip where I spoke and that’s all I had to do with it, really. I wasn’t involved in the development of it or anything like that,” Fitzsimmons said.

(Editor’s note: This article uses the convention of referring to unnamed sources using male pronouns, but this editorial decision should not be taken as revealing the individual’s actual gender.)