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Teen Pregnancy Vs. Adult Pregnancy

Stephanie Desrosiers
November 3, 2008

ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST - KEN KESEY

“Which one of you claims to be the craziest?” McMurphy says this to the men during his first day in the institution. In this novel, One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Ken Kesey shows that society and/or social institutions are the cause of an individual’s insanity and not the cure for it. Three characters from the novel that proved that the cause of their insanity came from the institution and proved that the institution was not the cure for their insanity were: Chief, Billy Bibbit and Nurse Ratched.

First of all, Chief is a character in the novel that was drove insane by the institution. “…Microscopic wires and grids and transistors, this one designed to dissolve on contact with air....” The Chief says this while hiding his medication so the nurse doesn’t find out that he didn’t take it. He thinks that there are electronic magnets that control people in the medication, so that is why he chooses not to take it. We have to remember that Chief admitted himself into the institution thinking that he may have had mental problems that really weren’t so bad when he first admitted himself. My point being, that he has become more insane since he has become a mute. He more or less thinks that he doesn’t have a place in society or a voice and that he is now belittled. Now that he has been there for so long, he has been worse than ever. The ward is making him think that he is crazier then he really is. Chief is insane for staying in the institution for so long and allowing the ‘Combine’ to treat him the way it does knowing that he could willingly and freely walk out of there. I think the most insane act on Chiefs part is when he suffocates McMurphy in the end. Although McMurphy is a vegetable, nothing that Nurse Ratched would do to him again would really even matter because he is already practically dead. My point being, what was the reasoning for suffocating McMurphy because it...