Originally published on July 23, 2020.
Continuing the preceding chapter based on an article by Koko Kato, Managing Director of the National Congress of Industrial Heritage, published in the monthly magazine Hanada, this chapter examines her criticism of an Asahi Shimbun article about a cholera outbreak at the Takashima coal mine.
Although the article itself focused on Takashima and described how lessons from the epidemic influenced later improvements in the working environment on Gunkanjima, Kato argued that the headline and prominent use of a photograph of Gunkanjima could give readers an impression contrary to the article’s actual content.

2020-07-23
This chapter was originally published on July 23, 2020, and continues the quotation from Koko Kato’s article introduced in the preceding chapter.
The central issue is the way headlines and photographs were used in a May 20, 2020 article in the Fukuoka edition of Asahi Shimbun and in its digital version.
The quoted passage describes the 1885 cholera outbreak at the Takashima coal mine, subsequent measures against infectious disease, and the development of working and living conditions on Gunkanjima.
Kato argues that despite this content, the prominent use of photographs of Gunkanjima could lead readers who saw only the headline and photograph to form an entirely different impression.
Text
2020-07-23
People who saw only this headline and photograph would think, “What?
Something that terrible happened on Gunkanjima??”
They are trying to implant in readers, through the headline and photograph, an impression that is the exact opposite of the content of the article.
It is clearly impression manipulation.
The following continues from the preceding chapter.
Asahi’s Cunning Impression Manipulation
Recently, there was another particularly egregious example in Asahi’s reporting.
It was an article in the Fukuoka edition dated May 20, entitled, “Coal-Mining Island, Lessons from Cholera: Many Deaths Amid ‘Fourfold Crowding’; Modernization Exposed the Festering Problems.”
It was an interview with architect Kyoichi Nakamura.
The article explained that cholera spread through the Takashima coal mine, killing more than 80 people, and that the lessons learned there were later applied on Gunkanjima.
“In 1885, a mass outbreak of cholera occurred on the island [Takashima — author’s note].
It is believed that slightly fewer than 3,000 people were working there at the time, but according to the diary of a senior mine official, 132 people fell ill during a single summer and more than 80 died.
From the end of that year through the following spring, 99 people died of smallpox, and there are also documents stating that bodies were ‘put into sake barrels and burned.’
Coal output, which had previously been rising steadily, declined, and Mitsubishi began taking measures against infectious diseases.
Toilets were kept clean, isolation rooms were created in residences, lime was spread for disinfection, and distilled-water equipment was installed to secure clean water.”
“To achieve efficient production, the working environment was improved.
Gunkanjima, which came under Mitsubishi ownership in 1890, was also developed in accordance with that thinking.
The construction of high-rise apartment buildings was an extension of the same policy.
Infectious disease exposed the festering problems that modernization had to address.”
The way this newspaper page was constructed was extremely cunning.
Although the article mainly concerned Takashima, the newspaper used a photograph of Gunkanjima.
Anyone who saw only the headline and photograph would therefore think, “The working environment on Gunkanjima must have been terrible, and many people must have died there.”
What is even more disturbing is that the Asahi Digital version was arranged in a way that could mislead readers even further.
It carried the title, “‘Fourfold Crowding’ on a Coal-Mining Island, Bodies in Sake Barrels… Lessons from a Major Cholera Epidemic,” and prominently displayed a photograph of Gunkanjima at the top.
Because the full article could be read only by paying subscribers, anyone who saw only this headline and photograph would think, “What?
Something that terrible happened on Gunkanjima??”
They were trying to implant in readers, through the headline and photograph, an impression exactly opposite to the content of the article.
Surely this is obvious impression manipulation.
I received this article from Professor Andrew Gordon of Harvard University, and even the professor initially had the impression that the article was about Hashima.
To be continued.