6d ago

Respect fire guy

(TikTok screencap)

140 comments

There's something really cathartic about placing shit in a firepit and just watching it burn away.
- " ...some men aren't looking for anything logical, like money. They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the wood burn "
- White guy detected
- It's also the smell of smoke. The crackling. The heat. How the poking stick feels in your hand. Poke poke

Of course I know him. He’s me!

I didn't know it was a racial trait.
- Yeah, like why does race need to be involved here? Fire should be for everyone to enjoy.
  
  Outdoor recreation and camping was and still sort of is exclusionary to black folks especially, but there's a lot of people trying to change that
  
  There are quite a few black comedians in the USA who explain why. Basically life as a black man in the US is hard enough and there is no need to introduce recreational "challenges" like campingto feel fulfilled.
  
  It's a joke.
- White people's ancestors had to survive brutal winters. It's the reason they're white.
  
  Ehhhh, even places like the Sahara can get below freezing temps at night. Of course we also shouldn't forget that people native to the Asian steppe and American high plains would also need to deal with freezing temps. I just think that it's a human trait in general to need to mess with fires. (That probably stems from a vast amount of people on earth being able to trace their heritage back to the Mongols)
- Or gendered. I do this in my friend group. I also grill, smoke, and bbq.
  
  Yeah my sister and I are both the fire keeper type.

I absolutely adore keeping the fire going. I was a white man for decades so i'm not dodging the allegations. I have never been camping where i was not the last person awake and always keeping the fire just right until all the wood was gone.
It's all about the air flow. Too much and everything burns too quickly in a roaring furnace, too little and you have no light and not enough heat. By constantly adjusting the logs you can maintain the proper air flow to keep everything just right. Rotating a log to present fresh wood to an eager flame here. Squeezing two logs a little closer to reduce the oxygen and trim things up there. A proper fire adjusting stick (and a backup) is crucial.
Give me a stack of seasoned wood, a k-bar, a magnesium fire starter and a comfy camp chair and i'm in heaven from the time the sun sets until the wood runs out.
- I was a white man for decades
  I feel like someone's gotta ask: Are you no longer a white man?
  
  Too much soot from staying near the fire
  
  Probably a trans woman? From the name and Fed instance.
  
  @Alxe has it, I am now a white woman :)
  
  reverse Micheal Jackson?
- Solidarity from another former white guy and campfire enthusiast.
  
  Three of us!
  
  💖
- I read this in Ron Swanson's voice.
- As someone else who was a white man for decades, ever started a fire from sratch ?
  I've done it once. Pain in the ass, but the sense of accomplishment you get from starting a fire with nothing but kindling, some sticks, and a boot lace is amazing.
  
  have tried 3-4 times but never even got a whiff of smoke! The region i camp in is generally described as 'rainforest' and while i have to assume it's possible I am missing some trick to it.
  
  Pro tip: dip a paper towel in olive oil, stuff it under the main log, and light it up. Olive oil burns slow and hot.
- I love when I get back home and even after a shower and laundry, my hair and clothes still smell smokey.
  
  fuck yeah that's good shit

It's all good until you experience a fire where there's two of them.
- 'I was kind of saving that stick'
  
  'Dude, you're choking it'
- Lol, depends on the group. I was recently at an sca event and had a fire going with another tender, and we worked great keeping the fire stoked and we're super chill about it. We even helped each other reset the stack as it collapsed and more fuel was added.
- Oh man.
  One = chill small little fire.
  Two = big fire, no one's getting cold.
  Three = call the fire department cause we're about to start throwing big shit on this flame.
- Wrong! Give me a fire buddy!
- where there's two of them.
  This is getting out of hand!
- If there isn't another I will become that person just to fuck with them.

I feel like it's a do-or-die caveman instinct or something.
I was hanging out with a group of people in my friend's backyard. We were supposed to have a bonfire, but the wood was wet and wasn't burning. We used all sorts of fuel, fire starters, etc. I saw what looked like corner of a log turn into ember, so wouldn't give up. Never got a flame when we were there, of course.
I felt very proud though when my friend sent me door camera footage of the firepit turning into a massive blaze in the middle of night that woke her up.
- Wet wood is the worst. If you have some dry and some wet you can sort of power through it. A cabin we were at with a wood burning fireplace had a lot of wet wood. It kept popping and scaring us so we kept making that joke from The Office "the fire is shooting at us!"

Brown guy here, I like fire too
- I went to an engineering school and I am here to tell you that pyromancy is practiced by every type of person.
  
  The best pyromancy comes from the United States, we have such classics as The German Barbeque, Korean Barbeque, Vietnam Barbeque, and California.
- You know it's American when skin colour is mentioned for no reason
- Yeah, whats the deal with "white guy"? Guys like fucking with fire. Black, white, brown, blue. If theres an alien species on the other side of the galaxy, you can bet they have something very much like guys, and the love fucking with fire.

Wait... I'm white!?
- sorry you had to find out this way
  
  Does dad know?!

You all laugh until the fire is in the oven of a hut with freezing temperatures outside and the fire guy is the one getting up in the middle of the night to keep the fire going. You then wake up to a cozy hut instead of spending the first two hours awake freezing in your sleeping bags.
- you mean recruit. we recruit.

DONT HATE it’s all he’s got
- Well, technically without him there would be no fire.
  
  be honest, the Nike gel soles are doin most of the heavy liftin’
- That's what I'm sayin'! I'm mildly autistic and not very good socially. Even if I want to be there it can be difficult. Tending to the fire is a way I get to participate.

I don't know why, I just have to keep poking that fucker with the dedicated poking stick, then wave the burning poking stick around for a bit.

In my experience, they’ve been Mexican or Puerto Rican. Though those are my two main travel destinations, so there might be some selection bias. Both for me and the meme

I know a set of brothers who all have this ingrained. They have each said at one point or another "You gotta fuck the fire."
Hope the intent has/will always be basic firepit maintenance.

- I too feel very seen right now.

I kind of get that way but I've never really realized it was obsessive behavior until this meme pointed it out.

I’m the one obsessively scavenging for wood around the camp site to keep that wood pile healthy.
- I got the largest kelly kettle because loads of friends said they would be interested in using it as a group. This was like 3 or so years ago and since I got it absolutely no one has been interested in actually going outside. So I recently bought the smallest one now as I am only ever using it on my own, may as well get something easier to carry.
  Shame that I don't know anyone else interested in it though, don't even have to go camping, just a day/afternoon trip or even just sit on the beach, but even that doesn't get any interest.
- Yeah, you look like you're the type alright.

It's me, i'm that guy. I'm fun to camp with ladies ;)

Evolved trait

my girlfriend is that guy. she can't sit down at a fire. she always has to be poking at it lol

Sabre-tooth tigers might sneak up and attack if the fire goes out, at least, I've not been attacked by one when the fire is burning, so I just can't take the risk.

This is a white thing? I never knew that.
- I'm black and I like fire, though aside from a fireplace visiting family once, I haven't had much opportunities to tend an open flame. I did enjoy keeping it going that one time though.
  
  I grew up in the woods and chopped wood and did all the back-country stuff, but it wasn't until looking back way later in life that I realized that we lived in what was basically rural, racist, white America. The segregation that still exists is unfair in what it denies to children growing up. I feel like if were a black parent I might have serious reservations about taking my family out to most of rural America.
  The legacy of homesteading being a "white settler" thing has left indelible marks on many places.
- The OP's observation is that there is at least one white guy that fucks with keeping the fire going. There can be as many others as you wish!
  
  Right, but it mentions a white guy specifically.

That's 100% my brother. The weirdest part, it looks so much like him I had to text him and ask if the chick in the background is an old girlfriend, because I'm genuinely not sure that's not my brother.
- Source
  
  Really not trying to be rude.
  I don’t have TikTok and don’t want one. I want to be a part of online stuff such as this story you’re telling. But.
  TikTok is fucking cancer on a phone/device that doesn’t have an account and doesn’t (therefore) have the app installed.
  Popups of all forms. Just like sketchy websites. It’s just a red flag. That’s all.
  These experiences really reinforce my decision to NOT have a TikTok.
  
  It is insane how much that dude looks like my brother. He even has the exact same shirt and shoes. Like I genuinely thought some random picture of him had been put online. When I texted him about it he had to text his best friend to find out if the chick in the picture was maybe one of the friends old girlfriends or something he'd forgotten about. Even my brother thought it was a picture of him. Lol

I wonder if there is a genetic component to keeping fire for recreation or comfort.
I think all societies have a cooking on fire aspect.
The use of fire seems to play a much more active role in societies in cold climates. It seems to play a less prominent role in the tropics with warmer nighttime temperatures.
- This reminded me of something my dad told me when I was younger. It was mostly to justify saying that no, I did not need a TV in my room, but still kinda interesting:
  In many cultures (definitely the ones my family grew out of), the fire served as a gathering spot. People would talk about stuff, share food and jokes, and relax together. It was a shared experience and source of comfort that helped strengthen interpersonal bonds.
  His argument was that the family TV served a similar function (without the whole 'also it's the means for cooked food' aspect, which shouldn't be overlooked). It's a point that made some sense to me at that stage of late 20th century mainstream society.
  Hmm...the 21st century, defined as billions of little fires, and many of us cold. There's a really pretentious poem here somewhere.
  
  Yeah I miss the days when my entire family would gather by the TV at night to watch something, anything really, I could be laying on the sofa reading a book but still enjoy the company and finding something interesting while channel surfing was it's own joy, now I can stream or download anything I want to watch on all my devices and I can't find anything interesting that makes me feel the sense of peace I had back then as a kid
- Survivalists like to boast of their skills to start a fire from scratch with no modern tool. But that wasn't the main skill in ancient times. Most societies found it easier to start a fire once and then keep the flame going through several mediums. It was a practical, mundane but vital activity that everyone participated in. The calories gains from eating cooked food was our cheat code for unlocking brain power.

This is the campfire equivalent of that one person who makes best friends with the family dog at every party. Some of us enjoy the group but our social skills are only on par with fires and dogs.

I'm out for a bit. Need more wood.
- ; )

Why is it always the guy who looks like that though? The two main friend groups I've been part of in the past decade had that one guy and they both looked very similar to the guy in the image.
- They are Carriers of the Bloodline
  
  Destined to link the flame

Closet pyros
- The closet burned down a while back

That's just Ignius, Keeper of the Flame.
He's cool like that.

Rookie fire guy using a stick.
Pro tip: Get leather work gloves. Take your fire guy skills to the next level.
- Always wear gloves!
  
  Legendary fire guys don't use gloves. They have built years and years of scars, burns, and callouses on their hands. To the legends, they don't feel the heat from a burning log.
- Even better are some welding gloves. That way you’re protected up to your elbows. I can grab a burning log with mine.
- The leather doesn’t get ruined?
  
  Leather can take quite a bit of heat. I wouldn't leave it laying in the flames, nor would I hold anything for too long because eventually the heat does get through. But if you just wanna shift a log or something, it gives you more control than a stick.

Hah jokes on you i kept the fire going with an autistic filipinx lesbian butch! Tho i am a straight white male... also i have no idea if filipinx is the correct term, how do you use it in a gender neutral way?
- The x endings are generally regarded as white saviorism.
  
  My experience is very anecdotal, but a friend of mine who is nonbinary and Mexican American uses and prefers e endings. So novie instead of novia/novio, amige instead of Amiga/amigo, et cetera. Pronounced Ay, like "no-vee-ay" instead of "no-vee-ah/oh"
  I have adopted that generally when it's come up, but for the most part of I just stress over my sentence structure to avoid gendered terms at all costs. Like when it took my several tries to avoid the terms Latina/Latino/Latine in the first sentence of this comment.
  
  Idk i always had a hard time as hungarian, my first language, doesnt have gender. Im a very proficient english speaker, almost at a native level but i do struggle with the gender stuff sometimes. Tho in daily speech i just use they/them as a fallback so i guess that works.
- Filipino is the gender neutral way :) I'm a half filipino raised in america though so take it with a grain of salt, but I honestly have never seen anyone use filipinx before
  
  Ok ill use that, its just last time i used that someone had to point out that technically the male form... i guess it still is like in spanish where multiple people with undetermined gender are adressed with the male plural right?

Might be easier to talk to her, if fuckin' Debra over there'd get off her damn phone while camping, FFS. 🤷🏼‍♂️

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