UK: Fireman Sam cancelled for toxic masculinity

Article here. Excerpt:

'If representation matters, doesn’t it matter for little boys, too? Not according to the Lincolnshire Fire and Rescue, which has determined that talking fire extinguishers will do more to recruit women to the force than the character of Fireman Sam, and isn’t particularly concerned about making the career choice attractive to little boys. At events and parades and things, fire fighters will no longer be permitted to dress as popular animated firefighter. Why can’t the firemen dress up as Fireman Sam? The answer is inclusion, of course. If firemen dress up as firemen it’s off putting to little girls who might otherwise want to be firemen.

Fireman Sam is a long running show about a fire department in the fictional Welsh town of Pontypandy, and was created in the 1980’s by firefighters. While it features women firefighters as well as men firefighters, the concern for many, from London’s Mayor to the Fire Brigades Union, is that this animated fireman is the reason more young women aren’t signing up to work for the fire force. It couldn’t be some other reason that no one wants to talk about, like that perhaps there are differences between boys and girls that result in them having different interests sometimes (maybe could that be or are we so confused that we can’t even say that anymore?), at all.'