Personal History Statement Firefighter: Fill & Download for Free

There is a famous photo from the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks in New York City. Three firefighters are raising an American flag over the rubble of the towers. The photo even made its way onto a U.S. postage stamp.I remember reading about someone who found a problem with the picture. All three firefighters were white.This person said the photo should be restaged. There should be a white firefighter, a black firefighter, and a Hispanic firefighter raising the flag.That is, change a record of history, falsify the event, because what actually happened is not what you wish had happened to give the correct unrelated cultural message. This person’s priorities were wrong. Three Americans had taken it upon themselves to make a statement by hoisting their flag at the scene of an attack on their country. And someone thought that two of them should be erased from the event and replaced by people who weren’t there.

And here comes “Forbes” with their Most Stupid Take on Television.The author is worried that the dramatic license taken to present the material in the context of a dramatic televisions show (telling the audience what radiation is, the danger it presents, and the magnitude of what is happening) will demonize the technology of Nuclear power (which may be humanity’s best long term solution to global warming). This is an understandable position to take. But it is done (in my opinion) poorly.Let me give some examples of what Forbes gets wrong about the miniseries and why.“In one episode, three characters dramatically volunteer to sacrifice their lives to drain radioactive water, but no such event occurred."The three men were members of the plant staff with responsibility for that part of the power station and on shift at the time the operation began," notes Adam Higginbotham, author of, Midnight in Chernobyl, a well-researched new history. "They simply received orders by telephone from the reactor shop manager to open the valves."So, instead of a dramatic request for volunteers for a suicide mission, they were ordered to do it. They were “volun-told”. That’s not really a big difference. Nit picking a historical drama is not interesting or valid criticism. Especially when you are criticizing hyperbolic language being used by characters in a terrifying situation."Nor did radiation from the melted reactor crash a helicopter that flew too close, as is suggested in "Chernobyl." There was a helicopter crash but it took place six months later and had nothing to do with radiation. One of the helicopter's blades hit a chain dangling from a construction crane. "Two things: (a) the show actually did show the helicopter hitting the crane, and (b) some have theorized that the crash happened because the pilots may have been suffering from radiation poisoning and didn’t see how close they were to the crane, which is exactly how the show portrayed it.The only difference is that the show used acute radiation poisoning instead of built up over months.“The most egregious of "Chernobyl" sensationalism is the depiction of radiation as contagious, like a virus. The scientist-hero played by Emily Watson physically drags away the pregnant wife of a Chernobyl firefighter dying from Acute Radiation Syndrome (ARS)."Get out! Get out of here!" Watson screams, as though every second the woman is with her husband she is poisoning her baby.”Why is this even a complaint? This literally happened. Lyudmilla Ignatenko was a real person who really did lose her newborn daughter because she was suffering from radiation poisoning. Radiation is not contagious, as Forbes notes, but her husband was suffering from acute radiation poisoning and was dangerously radioactive himself!Heck, the firefighters clothes are still in the basement of that hospital and are still emitting radiation today! Honestly, this Forbes article is offensively incorrect and so pro-nuclear that its bias is palpable.The miniseries took great pains to show that the RBMK reactors had serious design flaws, and that flaw was exploited by systematic rot and the fact that its operators disabled every single safety system in order to conduct a test. Chernobyl is not anti-nuclear power. It’s anti-lies and anti-recklessness, which is what Legasov makes perfectly clear in his testimony in episode 5.EDIT#1: I truly hope that everyone who is so invested in commenting on my post has individually responded to this question as well, so that they can show me (and everyone else on Quora) how wrong I am. I stand by my statements.EDIT #2: Thank you for the editing suggestion. And if any of you haven’t seen it yet, there is a Chernobyl podcast (available on YouTube and Spotify) with creator Craig Mazin that I highly recommend.

Thanks for the A2A. My interview was years ago and I have been told that my interview was apparently quite unorthodox.'So what have you been up to recently?'Brief description of my national service time.'Oh, so what's firefighting like?'More detailed rant about my daily duties and some of the fires I helped put out.'How did you manage to retain your English during national service?'Talked about how, as a non-Army personnel, I was not subject to the distinctive mental degradation that takes place from marching around in jungles for weeks on end.'It says in your personal statement you want to be a Judge, we don't get many of those, why?'Talked about how I always wanted to do something that really mattered, and how I thought judges helped to bring about some of the most significant changes in law.'Did you consider other fields?'Briefly talked about how I considered working for the foreign office and my work with law firms.'So, moving on, Singapore has a law [S.377A of the Penal Code] that prohibits sodomy. If you were a Judge, how would you treat this law?'A prepared speech about the sanctity of the legislature, of judicial deference, quoted a case example of a Judge who apologised for his deference in his judgement, and of the Fuller/Hart debate on natural versus positivist theories on law.'So how did you manage to publish a history paper?'Talked about my desire to make the work I do count for something, and my personal interest in history, specifically the Battle of France.'What would you like to do in Cambridge?'I hadn't prepared this, gave some weak answer about rowing, learning new languages and possibly joining drama. [Disclaimer: I did almost none of this.]I believe I had one other 'competency' [law-related] question, though I've forgotten what it was. In general, Cambridge interviews are only supposed to be on your competency through law-related questions like the 377A question, though mine was heavily inclined to more personal questions.Interview report and assessment criteria for those curious:It turns out you have a right to claim your interview report under the Freedom of Information Act.