Sexuality, Masculinity, and Taint Management Among Firefighters and Correctional Officers: Getting Down and Dirty With "America's Heroes" and the "Scum of Law Enforcement"

Headnote

Based on qualitative field and interview data, this comparative analysis of dirty work by firefighters and correctional officers demonstrates that taint management and its relative utility is inextricably bound to and embedded within macro-level discourses. While firefighters labor to fulfill expectations as "America's heroes," correctional officers work to squelch images as "professional babysitters" and the "scum of law enforcement." The authors' analysis illustrates how discourses of occupational prestige and masculine heterosexuality allow firefighters to frame their work in preferred, privileged terms while correctional officers struggle to combat taint discursively associated with low-level feminized care work or with brutish, deviant sexuality. This study extends theoretical understandings of identity construction, dirty work, taint management, and organizational performances of masculinity and sexuality. The authors' analysis concludes with limitations, future directions, and practical applications regarding the potentially dysfunctional results of taint management.

Keywords: identity; dirty work; taint management; gender; masculinity; sexuality; dirty jobs

We're the scum of law enforcement. We're bottom of the barrel.

-Stephanie Jones, Women's Minimum Correctional Officer

It's almost like you're worshipped.

-Paul Peterson, Plateau City Fire Department1

In spite of the inconsistency of the above statements, firefighters and correctional officers have a number of things in common. Both employee groups work with stigmatized populations. Firefighters deal with 911 "frequent flyers" including indigents, the homeless, and the elderly. Correctional officers work with alleged and convicted criminals. As such, firefighters and correctional officers regularly do "dirty work"-tasks that society considers socially, morally, or physically undesirable (Ashforth & Kreiner, 1999; Hughes, 1951). However, the occupations have very different reputations. While firefighters successfully labor to sustain their reputation as "America's heroes" and manage dirty work about which few outsiders are aware, correctional officers must work to overcome their reputations as "professional babysitters" and the "scum of law enforcement."

Understanding how employees achieve an esteemed sense of self through their work has been of increasing interest in the field of organizational studies (Alvesson & Willmott, 2002; Collinson, 2003). Organizations are places where we "come to understand who we are and who we might become" (Trethewey, 1997, p. 281), so discourse not only reflects occupational values but also constitutes workplace selves. Occupational identity, a set of central, distinctive, and enduring characteristics that typify a line of work (Albert &...