pages 272-290/July 25, 2010
Reading Response #10
Nurse Ratched ordered the Chief to have one electrotherapy shock treatment while McMurphy was given three in one week. The Nurse continually ordered the treatments for McMurphy because she did not like that he wakes up/ recovers from them as fast as he does. Nurse Ratched is threatened that the other patients on the ward look to McMurphy as a role model. She wants the patients to follow her rules and either do what she says or be punished. Although they acted in ways that were inappropriate at the ward, I believe that for any person to be given this shock treatment is cruel and unusual punishment. After the treatment, it usually takes most patients days to recover but they never fully get back to the person that they were before the shocks. Eventually after so many of these treatments, the person is virtually numbed and physically cannot do anything. Chief Bromden described men at the beginning of the book (Ruckly) where their body and brain was so destroyed they might as well be dead. If they want to punish the patients they should keep them in rooms away from others for a while or find alternative ways that do not involve killing the patients body, brain and spirit.
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