Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire - Pilant's Business Ethics Blog

I used this film today in two classes. The students gave it rapt attention.

Here is the link. You click on it to see the film:

Triangle Factory Fire 1-2 (New York: A Documentary Film, Ep4).avi

Some of the teenage workers who jumped rather than be burned to death.

The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire is the story of an unregulated factory that burned. The doors were locked?from the outside to prevent union organizers from entering. There was no fire exit and the upper floors were accessible by elevators, all of which were rapidly knocked out of service by the fire. A great number of the workers, perhaps most of the them, usually teenage girls, who in this day and age?would normally be attending high school were trapped on the eighth, ninth and tenth floors. Fire engine ladders only reach six floors. Rather than burn to death the young girls jumped to their deaths.

The factory owners suffered no legal penalties for locking the doors from the outside or in fact any legal penalties as all. They had broken no law. They paid no damages for the dead or injured. The freedom to contract meant that if the dead had wanted protection they should have negotiated for it. After all the bargaining power?of a large industrial organization is roughly equal to the bargaining power of a fourteen year old girl. Doesn?t the old fashioned?days of self reliance?dictate that these impovershed immigrants denied even bathrooms or breaks should have bought insurance if they worried about the lives?

The owners of the ill fated building?opened a new factory with the same name up the block in a few weeks. Building inspectors found the doors blocked by stored sewing machines.

The great gentlemen on whose kindness and benevolence, the public depended for worker safety and fair treatment were little better than socially acceptable murderers.

We are told by many publication, including not just a few academics ( Do I need to mention the Chicago School of Economics?) that businesses freed of regulations will self regulate. It is in their best interest,we are told, not to bring unfavorable publicity and they will, of course, exercise good judgment. It seems to me that this historical incident?as well as recent events such as the Wall Street meltdown and?the gulf oil spill cast some doubt on the efficacy of free market fundamentalism.

But what are facts weighed against the beauty, the elegance of a utopian theory of human success?

When I began teaching, I would on occasion encounter?a free market fundamentalist in the class. I made sure they had a opportunity?to express their views ? up to five minutes to address?the class and any literature they wished to present copied and distributed to the class out of my allocation of copies. But in the last few years, they are no more of them. They have disappeared. My current students stand convinced that they are pawns in a badly played game. Many hold on to the idea that through their personal efforts that they will beat the odds of a cruel society where employment for many of them will be difficult because of the sheer numbers of those without jobs. I try to teach them every angle to give them a shot at success. I give negotiating tricks, explain unusual aspects of the law that can be used to a person?s advantage, and explain that lifelong personal development is critical to living a full and significant life. I try to build better human beings. It is a great challenge, not quite as easy as the canned lectures that come with the book and each chapter?s test bank. But that?s okay.

Teaching is an art that calls forth every ability, every insights, every experience to develop thinking significant human beings.

James Pilant

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Source: http://pilantsbusinessethics.com/2011/09/26/triangle-shirtwaist/

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