I will be performing at a Fireman's ball.

So I'm wondering if it would be ok to do effects with fire, or if that would might offend some of the firefighters.

It depends - I am from middle Europe and I do believe that here it will be okay for them. Unless you choose very unhappy way to deliver the tricks, like claiming that you can control the fire, that could actually offend some of them since their work is trying to controlling the flames and they know how incredible hard it is and that they are risking their life for that.
You can easily move them on your side by one or two clever sentences where you will appreciate their work and you will not disregard their work by claiming that manipulation with fire is easy to do.
In my country I would even build the whole show story around firemen and I do believe it will be well appreciated.
You can start by claiming that in a years you learned the power of the fire - like physically destructive force and also like an important element in magic. You can claim, that you know some powerful spells containing the fire but you always respected its power so you actually never practiced them. But tonight, with crowd full of trained profesionals you would like - with their kind permission - try some of this magic.

Well, last year I did a show for NAACP, and I built my entire show around black culture (playing hip hop music, black colored props, etc.) And that did NOT go over well.

So now I'm extra paranoid about these things.

I think you answered your own rather dumb question!

Any time you take small, stereotyped aspects of someone else’s culture, especially when that culture represents a historically oppressed and marginalized people, you run the very real risk of looking like you are just typecasting and patronizing your employers. Not good.

Advice: if you were booked to perform your act, don’t start thinking you are clever by “customizing” the show for an audience. If they ask you to put in particular references, then consider doing so. Otherwise, do the show you spent years building and polishing. They want your best material.

If you are taking gigs before you have a show, you might want to rethink your approach. Would you be happy going to a concert if the performer hadn’t actually practiced the music? Why think magic is different from other performing arts?

Patrick

It looks like the best way to perform magic for firefighters good luck in that gig

The original post was over a month ago. Did you do the show? Did you pull permits? Was it successful? Did it go down in a blaze of glory?

I don't think firemen would like anyone to be playing with fire... but yes, how did your show go? lol

Would like to know too, how the show went. I plan on a few shows for the local fire and police departments - to help them raise funds for kids. Police was easy with an humorous escape routine, but the fire show was something I needed to research a bit more - although the self-lighting candles and lighter tricks could work okay. Let us know how it went and what you did.

Here’s a (very) weak analogy from personal experience:

Police (at least the few I’ve dealt with) seem to enjoy the idea of magician escaping from regulation handcuffs.

“Can we borrow your cuffs and give it a try?”

Smiles all around. “Sure! Knock yourself out!”

I really would be interested how the gig went.

Overall if you go into a culture thing it can be very sensetive ang go wrong.

But I think if you do fire effects with firemen or handcuffs with police it is more of a job thing and nobody really identifies a large part of their personality with fire or handcuffs. So go for it. Some personal touched would be great. But be careful with jokes ;-)

Overall: As long as you treat everybody with respect it will go fine.