• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

SafetyRisk.net

Humanising Safety and Embracing Real Risk

  • Home
    • About
      • Privacy Policy
      • Contact
  • FREE
    • Slogans
      • Researchers Reveal the Top 10 Most Effective Safety Slogans Of All Time
      • When Slogans Don’t Work
      • CLASSIC, FAMOUS and INFAMOUS SAFETY QUOTES
      • BIGGEST COLLECTION of WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2023
      • CATCHY and FUNNY SAFETY SLOGANS FOR THE WORKPLACE
      • COVID-19 (Coronavirus, Omicron) Health and Safety Slogans and Quotes for the Workplace
      • Safety Acronyms
      • You know Where You Can Stick Your Safety Slogans
      • Sayings, Slogans, Aphorisms and the Discourse of Simple
      • Spanish Safety Slogans – Consignas de seguridad
      • Safety Slogans List
      • Road Safety Slogans 2023
      • How to write your own safety slogans
      • Why Are Safety Slogans Important
      • Safety Slogans Don’t Save Lives
      • 40 Free Safety Slogans For the Workplace
      • Safety Slogans for Work
    • FREE SAFETY eBOOKS
    • Free Hotel and Resort Risk Management Checklist
    • FREE DOWNLOADS
    • TOP 50
    • FREE RISK ASSESSMENT FORMS
    • Find a Safety Consultant
    • Free Safety Program Documents
    • Psychology Of Safety
    • Safety Ideas That Work
    • HEALTH and SAFETY MANUALS
    • FREE SAFE WORK METHOD STATEMENT RESOURCES
    • Whats New In Safety
    • FUN SAFETY STUFF
    • Health and Safety Training
    • SAFETY COURSES
    • Safety Training Needs Analysis and Matrix
    • Top 20 Safety Books
    • This Toaster Is Hot
    • Free Covid-19 Toolbox Talks
    • Download Page – Please Be Patient With Larger Files…….
    • SAFETY IMAGES, Photos, Unsafe Pictures and Funny Fails
    • How to Calculate TRIFR, LTIFR and Other Health and Safety Indicators
    • Download Safety Moments from Human Resources Secretariat
  • Social Psychology Of Risk
    • What is Psychological Health and Safety at Work?
    • Safety Psychology Terminology
    • Some Basics on Social Psychology & Risk
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk – Prof Karl E. Weick
    • The Psychology of Leadership in Risk
    • Conducting a Psychology and Culture Safety Walk
    • The Psychology of Conversion – 20 Tips to get Started
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk And Safety
    • Psychology and safety
    • The Psychology of Safety
    • Hot Toaster
    • TALKING RISK VIDEOS
    • WHAT IS SAFETY
    • THE HOT TOASTER
    • THE ZERO HARM DEBATE
    • SEMIOTICS
    • LEADERSHIP
  • Dr Long Posts
    • ALL POSTS
    • Learning Styles Matter
    • There is no Hierarchy of Controls
    • Scaffolding, Readiness and ZPD in Learning
    • What Can Safety Learn From Playschool?
    • Presentation Tips for Safety People
    • Dialogue Do’s and Don’ts
    • It’s Only a Symbol
    • Ten Cautions About Safety Checklists
    • Zero is Unethical
    • First Report on Zero Survey
    • There is No Objectivity, Deal With it!
  • THEMES
    • Psychosocial Safety
    • Resiliencing
    • Risk Myths
    • Safety Myths
    • Safety Culture Silences
    • Safety Culture
    • Psychological Health and Safety
    • Zero Harm
    • Due Diligence
  • Free Learning
    • Introduction to SPoR – Free
    • FREE RISK and SAFETY EBOOKS
    • FREE ebook – Guidance for the beginning OHS professional
    • Free EBook – Effective Safety Management Systems
    • Free EBook – Lessons I Have Learnt
  • Psychosocial Safety
    • What is Psychosocial Safety
    • Psychological Safety
      • What is Psychological Health and Safety at Work?
      • Managing psychosocial hazards at work
      • Psychological Safety – has it become the next Maslow’s hammer?
      • What is Psychosocial Safety
      • Psychological Safety Slogans and Quotes
      • What is Psychological Safety?
      • Understanding Psychological Terminology
      • Psycho-Social and Socio-Psychological, What’s the Difference?
      • Build a Psychologically Safe Workplace by Taking Risks and Analysing Failures
      • It’s not weird – it’s a psychological safety initiative!
You are here: Home / Covid-19 / Why Safety Loves Covid-19

Why Safety Loves Covid-19

June 23, 2023 by Dr Rob Long 13 Comments

Originally posted on June 25, 2020 @ 8:23 AM

imageI read with interest this piece by ASSP in EHS Today (Leading safety Professionals Into the Future). More propaganda from a sector known for its policing, paperwork and zero. Interestingly, the article confirms in its first paragraph that this is how safety people are perceived.

The article goes on to propose that Covid-19 has all of a sudden turned safety cops into an educated, intelligent, humanizing and people-centric industry. And that’s just the first paragraph. How fascinating that doctors, nurses, health providers and epidemiologists have lost their place as leaders in health information.

Ah, in comes Safety to save the day! Talk about an industry struggling for identity. BTW none of the professions on the forefront of Covid have to spend all their time telling you they are professional, only insecure Safety does.

Then when the article proceeds we see more moderate language from the incoming president (Diana Stegall) of the ASSP who asserts ‘we need to get involved … because it is about taking a look at risk’.

What a sensible assertion except only trouble is, safety is about objects and policing and knows precious little about risk. Safety is the industry of objects and hazards, this is why it is a police force. And it will remain a police force until the day it’s curriculum shifts, Body of Knowledge develops and it learns to dump zero. When the global mantra is zero how on earth can this industry talk sensibly about the reality of risk! (http://visionzero.global/node/6). Zero is about risk denial – Safety/Zero has never understood how Risk Makes Sense (https://www.humandymensions.com/product/risk-makes-sense/ )

Unfortunately, the real evolution of the safety industry is bogged down in excessive bureaucracy, compliance and indoctrination (https://safetyrisk.net/first-in-best-dressed-for-indoctrination/). And so, it doesn’t take long in the article till the mythology of the Hierarchy of Controls is trotted out and discussion drifts onto the favourite of Safety – PPE. Of course safety loves Covid-19 the perfect opportunity to police PPE!

So, by the second paragraph of the article we get into the important stuff, PPE. Doesn’t safety love PPE, the prefect medium to assert power and police others!

By the time we get to paragraph 3 of the article we are right into it ‘hazard assessment’, What? Two paragraphs before it was about risk ah! But now we have to get back to what Safety loves, hazards. So, it’s on to cleaning and wearing PPE properly, compliance, awareness and yes, policing. Oh dear.

You can read the rest yourself, concluding with your opportunity to ‘shine’ with all those skills Safety has not received from the standard safety indoctrination curriculum. Of course those skills are not called ‘people skills’ but the derogatory ‘soft skills’, implying that the real skills are the ‘hard skills’ that Safety does so well: policing, PPE and paperwork.

So, the platform for the ASSP for 2020-21 is: Covid, total worker health and value the industry. No mention of zero, no mention of the religious mantra that keeps the industry fixated to counting, reporting and policing. No mention of that symbolic zero that tells Safety everyday that safety is about injury rates, PPE and policing. And the final paragraph makes very clear that Safety knows precious little about ‘total worker health’. If Safety knew anything about total worker health, it could never preach zero. Zero is what keeps Safety from being holistic.

No wonder the industry has zero vision.


  • Bio
  • Latest Posts
  • More about Rob
Dr Rob Long

Dr Rob Long

Expert in Social Psychology, Principal & Trainer at Human Dymensions
Dr Rob Long

Latest posts by Dr Rob Long (see all)

  • Embodied Enactivity in Safety - September 21, 2023
  • The Meaning of Myth in Risk - September 20, 2023
  • Myth Making and Why it Matters to Safety - September 20, 2023
  • The Power of Safety Myths - September 18, 2023
  • What Do You Mean By Performance? - September 17, 2023
Dr Rob Long
PhD., MEd., MOH., BEd., BTh., Dip T., Dip Min., Cert IV TAA, MRMIA Rob is the founder of Human Dymensions and has extensive experience, qualifications and expertise across a range of sectors including government, education, corporate, industry and community sectors over 30 years. Rob has worked at all levels of the education and training sector including serving on various post graduate executive, post graduate supervision, post graduate course design and implementation programs.

Please share our posts

  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

Related

Filed Under: Covid-19, PPE, Robert Long, Vision Zero Tagged With: ASSP, coronavirus, EHS Today

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Wynand says

    November 26, 2022 at 3:58 PM

    Interesting to read this now in hindsight and to realise how wrong a lot of what was done in the name of safety turned out to be the opposite. Many of the measures I encountered wete laughable but policed with fervour.

    Reply
  2. Brent R Charlton says

    February 26, 2021 at 11:46 PM

    When I first read this from ASSP back in June I just had to shake my head. It really made me question whether to spend another membership dime with this organization. My most common answer to COVID prevention questions has been “I don’t know, let’s go find out.” Where I go to find out is not ASSP or other safety professionals – it’s CDC and others who have actually dealt with infectious disease prevention. After all, I don’t ask bicycle mechanics to fix my car or a plumber to frame my new house!

    Reply
    • Rob Long says

      February 27, 2021 at 7:37 AM

      Brent, you are spot on here. It’s all about political territory and then duplication to claim some sort of expertise where there is none. What is most important is membership to the group, not competence or expertise. Safety anxiety about always being in control, always knowing everything and always taking power in what is going on, and then they claim the word ‘professional’. So much of this fixation by safety on Covid demonstrates just how amateurish the industry is.

      Reply
  3. bernardcorden says

    June 26, 2020 at 10:01 AM

    Another intriguing and narcissistic corporate title that sets my blood boiling is “Vice President of Safety”. It is most common amongst US corporations.

    You never meet the President of Safety and the panjandrum is often employed like a creative accountant who circumvents legislation on behalf of the organisation to avoid paying tax.

    “Laws are spider webs through which the big flies pass and the little ones get caught.”….Honore de Balzac

    Reply
  4. bernardcorden says

    June 26, 2020 at 7:57 AM

    Hans Johst allegedly proclaimed………”Whenever I hear the word culture, I reach for my revolver.”

    Whenever I hear the term safety professional I reach for my Kalashnikov.

    Reply
  5. bernardcorden says

    June 25, 2020 at 9:21 AM

    This turgid sludge from the ASSP even surpasses the relentless bilge from Australia’s peak safety body.

    Reply
    • Rob long says

      June 25, 2020 at 9:30 PM

      Oh yes Bernard, don’t you know PPE is the measure of professionalism

      Reply
  6. Admin says

    June 25, 2020 at 8:28 AM

    So, according to ASSP, Safety Professionals should now be focussing on risk rather than just hazards – what an amazing revelation. That article has caused many to question thier membership of ASSP

    Reply
    • Rob long says

      June 25, 2020 at 10:03 AM

      You can change the label but it’s all about zero and engineering. What a fascinating icon fir the ASSP, PPE as how to express what you love.

      Reply
    • Edward Chainani says

      June 26, 2020 at 2:44 AM

      Ouch! (Just received my ASSP member T-shirt and coffee mug)

      Reply
      • Rob Long says

        June 26, 2020 at 8:10 AM

        Funny how ASSP loves Safety, I would have thought the key to safety is a love of people. However, the real message is ‘I love PPE’

        Reply
        • Admin says

          June 26, 2020 at 8:15 AM

          I’ve had that discussion with them but they don’t get it – their latest tshirt is a black cat with a hard hat that says “cool cats wear PPE” – I tried to talk to them about all the semiotics of that but nothing……

          Reply
          • Rob Long says

            June 26, 2020 at 8:21 AM

            Safety thinks semiotics is a sports jacket.

Leave a Reply to Rob longCancel reply

Primary Sidebar

Search and Discover More on this Site

Never miss a post - Subscribe via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,511 other subscribers.

FREE eBOOK DOWNLOADS

Recent Comments

  • Matt Thorne on Myth Making and Why it Matters to Safety
  • Rob Long on What’s Funny About Safety?
  • Rob Long on Perfection is Safety Child’s Play
  • Rosa Carrillo on Hopkins-Dekker on Reason and Other Laughs
  • Brent Charlton on Perfection is Safety Child’s Play
  • Anonymous on What’s Funny About Safety?
  • Rob Long on Zero Hour part 6 Knowing Yourself
  • Rob Long on Safety Cops and Safety’s Adoration of Power
  • Rob Long on Book Launch – “Zero, The Great Safety Delusion” – Free Download
  • Rob long on Don’t Be Dumb Like Me, the Typical Safety Keynote
  • Anonymous on Don’t Be Dumb Like Me, the Typical Safety Keynote
  • Joseph D Zinobile on Book Launch – “Zero, The Great Safety Delusion” – Free Download
  • Jason Martell on Safety Cops and Safety’s Adoration of Power
  • Rob Long on Safety Cops and Safety’s Adoration of Power
  • Peter Collins on Safety Cops and Safety’s Adoration of Power
  • Rob Long on Zero Hour Part 4 – Zero and the Unconscious
  • Chiara on Zero Hour Part 4 – Zero and the Unconscious
  • Rob Long on Zero Hour Part 4 – Zero and the Unconscious
  • Yasmin Saunders on Zero Hour Part 4 – Zero and the Unconscious
  • Rob Long on Seven ‘Golden’ Rules for Zero and Yet No Ethic

RECOMMENDED READING

viral post – iso 45003 and what it cannot do

Introduction to SPOR – FREE!!

Psychosocial Safety and Mental Health Series

7 Golden Rules that are NOT Golden

Why Zero Vision Can Never Tackle Mental Health

If Psychosocial Health Matters, Stop Hot Desking

Effective Strategies in Mental Health at Work

CLLR Newsletter July 2023

Playing With Mental Health in Safety is Dangerous

STOP ‘BREAKING’ PEOPLE! The notion of Psychological Safety

Learning to Learn Socially

Not Just Another ‘Hazard’

Hazards Near Me

More Posts from this Category

NEW! Free Download

Please take our 2 minute zero survey

Footer

Top Posts & Pages. Sad that most are so dumb but this is what safety luves

  • CATCHY and FUNNY SAFETY SLOGANS FOR THE WORKPLACE
  • BIGGEST COLLECTION of WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2023
  • Free Safety Moments and Toolbox Talk Examples, Tips and Resources
  • Road Safety Slogans 2023
  • FREE RISK ASSESSMENT FORMS, CHECKISTS, REGISTERS, TEMPLATES and APPS
  • How to Calculate TRIFR, LTIFR and Other Health and Safety Indicators
  • Safety Acronyms
  • Icebreakers and Games that Safety Trainers Play
  • What Is Safety?
  • Electronic Risk Score Calculator

Recent Posts

  • Embodied Enactivity in Safety
  • The Meaning of Myth in Risk
  • Myth Making and Why it Matters to Safety
  • Icebreakers and Games that Safety Trainers Play
  • The Power of Safety Myths
  • What Do You Mean By Performance?
  • Hopkins-Dekker on Reason and Other Laughs
  • Perfection is Safety Child’s Play
  • Podcast – Dr Rob Long With John Morlan and The Risk Matrix
  • What’s Funny About Safety?
  • Zero Hour part 6 Knowing Yourself
  • Free Videos, Podcasts and Books on Zero
  • Don’t Be Dumb Like Me, the Typical Safety Keynote
  • If You’re Happy in Safety, Clap Your Hands
  • Safety Cops and Safety’s Adoration of Power
  • Zero Hour Part 5 – Surfacing the Unconscious
  • Zero Hour Part 4 – Zero and the Unconscious
  • Auditing the 7 Golden Rules of Zero, A Miserable Fail
  • 7 Golden Rules that are NOT Golden
  • The Non-Golden Rules for Leadership in Zero
  • Seven ‘Golden’ Rules for Zero and Yet No Ethic
  • Why Zero Vision Can Never Tackle Mental Health
  • Is this Your Safety?
  • SPoR Workshops Canberra 18-21 September
  • The Dominance of Zero as the ‘Common Denominator’ of Safety
  • Zero Hour Episode 3
  • Goal Setting and Zero
  • Zero as a Worldview
  • If Psychosocial Health Matters, Stop Hot Desking
  • Book Launch – “Zero, The Great Safety Delusion” – Free Download
  • Breach of Faith and Psycho-Social Risk
  • Zero Harm is Never Zero Harm
  • Why Would You Want to be a Safety “Geek’ or Hero?
  • The Mental Illness of Identifying as Safety
  • Zero Hour – Zero as a place holder
  • Zero Hour – Zero as a Philosophy
  • CARING ABOUT PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY
  • Care is NOT a Factor and Yes, Your Model Matters
  • Care Ethics and the Ethics of Care, in Risk
  • FEAR AND CONTROL – Dialogue in a technological society
  • Of Course, Method Matters in Safety
  • Day 12 SPoR in Europe
  • Free Study Module Following-Leading in Risk August-September
  • Effective Strategies in Mental Health at Work
  • CLLR Newsletter July 2023
  • Playing With Mental Health in Safety is Dangerous
  • The Sacred and Profane, Rituals and Semiotics, A Lesson for Safety
  • Day 11 SPoR in Europe
  • STOP ‘BREAKING’ PEOPLE! The notion of Psychological Safety
  • Free “It Works” Download, Now Works

VIRAL POST!!! HOW TO QUIT THE SAFETY INDUSTRY

FEATURED POSTS

SAFETY IS A MYTH, LONG LIVE SAFETY

Social Psychology Applied to the Discernment of Risk

Seven Essential Safety Reminders

SOCD – Safety Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

The Safety Worldview

SPoR Community Network

The Safety Worldview and the Worldview of Safety, Testing Due Diligence

Conforming and Questioning in Safety

Psychosocial Safety, I think it is about a 7?

Why Personify Safety?

London Workshops 24-28 October

Independent Thinking in an Uncertain World, A Mind of One’s Own

Organising to Manage Uncertainty in an Unpredictable World

Safety Justifies Anything and Everything

By What Method?

The Seduction of Measurement in Risk and Safety

Safety-as-Persona

Social Psychology of Risk – Body of Knowledge

We need to make sure this can never happen again

Sensemaking and ‘Hapori’ – Essential for Tackling Risk in New Zealand

Hoarding as a Psychosis Against Uncertainty

By What Method Do You Tackle Risk?

Psychology and safety

Amping it Up in Safety

Just distract you!

Beware of Hazardous ‘OINTMENT’

Holistic Well Being in Risk Differently

Social Psychology Of Risk Workshops

Workshops with Dr Long – Vienna, Austria 26-30 June 2023

Sticks and Stones and the Nonsense of Zero Harm

The Trajectory of Zero Vision

The Language of Priorities

Envisioning Risk in Canada

Data Cannot Drive Vision

Reflections of a ‘Doer’

‘Can’t Means Won’t Try’ – The Challenge of Being Challenged

Some Basics on Social Psychology & Risk

SPoR Convention Canberra 18-21 September 2023

Blind Faith in Safety

Safety and Risk Leadership Master Class

More Posts from this Category

VIRAL POST – The Risk Matrix Myth

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,511 other subscribers.

WHAT IS PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY?

What is Psychological Safety at Work?


WHAT IS PSYCHOSOCIAL SAFETY