Talk:1887 Nanaimo mine explosion

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 3 September 2019 and 20 December 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Chasehobenshield15.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 12:58, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Untitled

The date (1887) is critical to the title of this article because Nanaimo mines often exploded more than once.--Westendgirl 07:55, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Should "...wrote farewell messages in the dust of their shovels" be "...wrote farewell messages in the dust with their shovels"? I didn't change it because it is grammtical, though strange. -- User:Kim.o

I'm guessing that the miners used their fingers to write on their shovels, as opposed to writing on the ground. I think you'd just call the ground dirt, not dust. --Westendgirl 08:38, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Location of mine disaster

What is the source of the coordinates? It is in central Nanaimo. Can that be right? Is there a source? --KenWalker | Talk 08:05, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

All I have found so far is this:Niosi, Goody. "A Walk Through Time". Retrieved 2008-07-02. which puts the location at 49.157923°N 123.929004°W / 49.157923; -123.929004 (Number One Esplanade Mine) Quite a different location than the article. There is supposed to be a tablet at this location. --KenWalker | Talk 09:26, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Dubious blame

The monument on Milton Street lists the names of white miners, but only the tally number for Chinese miners, who were blamed by many white Nanaimoites for the disaster, claiming they could not read signs or instructions.

Is the complaint here against the Chinese workers themselves or against the hiring practice of employing cheap labour lacking sufficient literacy skills in the workplace language environment to maintain a safe working environment?

Is this a minor distinction, or something that Wikipedia ought to get right?

As it strikes me, you would expect the second complaint after a disaster if there has been sustained safety issues for this reason, whether or not the latest disaster is finally determined to have been caused by this reason or for another reason.

• Asian workers are hired with insufficient language skills and little support or training.
• Local population complains about persistent safety issues surrounding this.
• Mine explodes.
• Pre-existing complaints about the unsafe management practice reach a crescendo.
• Report is finally issued stating a different direct cause.

The most racist portion of this narrative is the lack of initial support or training, steeped in historical tensions between capital and labour, with the Chinese workers merely a pawn in the middle and the bulk of the *blame* directed at management—and no doubt with a lot of coarse talk about the unwelcome ethnic group served up on the side.

Running the Chinese out of the operation blends into opposing management's use of unqualified workers.

In any dangerous workplace, if you hire a conspicuous group of unqualified workers (especially those lacking the means to pursue work elsewhere) you automatically paint a target on their backs for the resulting wrath.

Depending on how the Chinese workers were paid, there might have been active incentives for the Chinese workers to ignore formal instructions, up to the point of pretending they couldn't read English as well as they could (at least some within the group); for example, their might be no way to make ends meet on the salary received for doing everything entirely by the book (a long-established exploitative management practice).

If the Chinese are behaving like they can't remember instructions (or read the warning signs)—again for reasons of exploitative management practice—you would expect this to be verbalized in the heated aftermath of such a large disaster. It's not going to remain unspoken.

What has changed since then, rather recently, is that we now have a cultural standard to skip over the disempowered in the initial fury of our scapegoating, and to proceed instead to someone with actual power over the circumstances. Complaining directly about the people in power back in that era could soon find you or someone you know unemployed. Where that goes is you end up getting proxy racism in what is fundamentally a labour practices dispute. — MaxEnt 22:33, 19 June 2023 (UTC)