I wonder which political party made OSHA as toothless as a newborn?

With respect, I will only think about naked women when I stream porn to my phone.

When not doing that, I have all the sympathy in the world for working folks being fucked by the man, having been working folks fucked by the man for many years. Not on towers like this, but still.

So.. that training video is dated 2010, and specifically encourages free climbing implying that it's a requirement, but here, they talk about how it's discouraged partially because of deaths that made national attention several years earlier. I know people bend the rules at any job, but nowhere in a food safety video will it tell you that it saves time NOT to wash your hands for a full 90 seconds, or that the "safety zone" isn't as big of a deal as you think it is as long as it's close, etc. etc.

I know this is a piece of investigative journalism, and as such, a certain level of editorial menace and emotional manipulation is to be expected. I don't mind that. However, having watched this clip, the training video, and read a few articles, I must admit that I'm having a hard time seeing what exactly the problem is with this job. Now, hear me out, because it's important to remember that people (you and I included) have a tendency to project their own fears and preconditioned social attitudes onto new situations. I think it is fair to say that most people are afraid of heights, and would never in a million years consider climbing a fifteen hundred foot tower, with ropes or not. As such, it can be very hard to maintain objectivity when the one thought foremost in your mind is "FUCK. GET ME OUT OF HERE!" But objectivity is exactly what we need, and we must have a care that we do not let our own fears lead us into job-shaming, and making up backseat OSHA-rules for a workplace culture which many of us have only just learned about!

Two points to consider:

One, some people love to climb. I mean, really, they LOVE to climb! We've all seen parkour videos and GoPro footage shot by Russian freeclimbers - people in those scenes do stuff like this as a hobby, for fun, for free. Get to climb crazy high, AND get paid between and an hour - heck, if you're an adrenaline junky, why NOT do something like this?! This isn't a job for everyone, of course, but if you've got a brave and adventurous sort of mindset, if you are the kind of person who gets a rush out of spitting in the face of death (even the propaganda-oriented journalists in this video are forced to admit that most cell tower workers are indeed these sorts of people), then surely we can see why repairing cell towers might be an ideal career choice. See also: cops, firemen, Coasties, skyscraper construction workers, fishermen, NASCAR drivers, professional mountaineers, Jackass stuntmen, and bouncers. All callings where brave men and women risk life and limb to provide services for the rest of us cowards.

Two, the actual statistics. As OZ's previous link indicates {1}, over the last eight years, there have been fifty fatalities on poles like this. Fifty. Honestly, that's not very many! I mean, if there were thousands of people dropping off cell towers every year, then yes perhaps the sensationalism would be justified. But there isn't; it's maybe like five to ten people, nationwide. In fact, more workers are killed deep sea fishing in any single year, than have been killed by falling off cell phone towers since the technology was first widely adapted{2}! FURTHERMORE, the numbers of fatalities for this career are heavily skewed by AT&T. Again, as OZ's link indicates, the vast majority of deaths took place on AT&T towers; if you're getting service from someone like Sprint or Verizon, the actual number of deaths is actually far lower, maybe one or two per year. Not too shabby, right? We have to remember, a lot of jobs are dangerous. But when measured against the human costs of things like diamonds, crabmeat, and of course gasoline{3}, cell phones - well, they really don't come out too bad.


So, again, not really seeing what the big deal is here. Is there something I'm missing? Let me know below.


{1} http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/social-issues/cell-tower-d eaths/in-race-for-better-cell-service-men-who-climb-towers-pay-wit h-their-lives/
{2} http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5927a2.htm
{3} https://www.iraqbodycount.org/