Power

“Never before did I realize that mental illness could have the aspect of power, power.” (238).

Today we will focus on the turn of power. There is a transition underway in the ward, a flip for power, a flip for what seems like the better. We learn early off that Nurse Ratchet has all the power. She is top nurse backed by the whole power of the government. Yet we see a change, a change in the form of a small red hair man. And now, the power has fully turned. We see the group now allowed to go on a fishing trip, with women, and participate in the outside. The doctor is now standing up for what he truly wishes to do. And we see the effects of power, we see Chief begin to speak.

The group is allowed to go to the coast. McMurphy does one heck of a job convincing and coaxing people into joining his expedition, despite the nurse’s best efforts to deter the men. The patients are starting to feel a sense of security again, and now a sense of adventure. We see attacks against the nurse whenever possible and we see her starting to wear down. This is the flip of power, this is her final press for control before she is fizzled out; or is it? She still holds all the cards. The men are merely nipping at them. Yet we see an effect that washes over the men. This effect, this disease called power. Now the men believe they have power. They see the effects of having power, how it is great, how they can do as they please. However we can also see how power corrupts in the form of Cheswick. He thought he had power – hopes of an influential input – but it turned out to be nothing. It is curious to see how this plays out.

The quote at the top is when the men learn power through scare tactics. McMurphy props all the men up to being enraged killers from the crazy, loony hospital. This, in turn, gives the men power over people that have heard this, because they are scared. “Think of it: perhaps the more insane a man is, the more powerful he could become. Hitler an example.” (238) I love the example being Hitler because he was an expert at scare tactics. I am not here to debate if he was crazy or not, and I am not going into depth on what sanity really is, but for all intensive purposes we will say Hitler was crazy. Now with these men coming to a realization that their mental health can be used as a way to gain power over an everyday citizen by portraying that they are potentially dangerous, it does not solve their issues in the ward. They begin to like the feeling of power, they enjoy the intimidation factor that they can display, but back at the ward there is no way that this will fly with the nurse. 

This is a clash of powers – power hungry patients and a dominant nurse backed with every possible resource imaginable – yet we always cheer for the underdog.