Cuckoo's Nest

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Destruction of the Mind

One Who Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is a movie in which the rebellion against conformity is shown. The action develops in a mental health institution where patients receive electroshock treatments and sometimes lobotomy even though both practices are not approved by the medical community.
The director Milos Forman uses an actual mental hospital called Oregon State Mental Hospital. Patients are divided in Acutes, who can be cured and Chronics who cannot be cured. They are treated unfairly for being mentally ill. The staff personnel always treat the patients with no respect. The treated patients are being controlled with medications and turned against each other by the nurses who are working there. The patients are given medication to make them better, even though it bears no effect. Misbehaving patients are being punished with electro shock therapy and patients who cannot be controlled receive the ultimate therapy lobotomy. Techniques used on patients such as medications, shock therapy and lobotomy never work; it only makes the mentally ill patients even sicker.
The first component to destroy the mentally ill's mind is medication. In the movie we see patients form a line as the nurses speak through the intercom. One by one they come to pick up their medications with a little bit of juice; staff personnel are making make sure that they are taking their medications. Medications are used to treat symptoms such as depressions, schizophrenia, anxiety disorders and bipolar; not all medications act the same they are used differently for each mentally ill symptom, for example: schizophrenia patients are given Chlorpromazine and Haloperidol to name a couple. These medications come with powerful side effects like ra...

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... ill patients who suffered from schizophrenia and all lobotomy did was to destroy their minds, making them not able to function anymore. Lobotomy technique was utilized to control the people who cannot be controlled, instead of using it to help the person. A lot of people had suffered from lobotomy when it was put in use late 1940's. These people had suffered, so today it does not need to be preformed anymore destroying the human mind.
In conclusion, techniques like medication, shock therapy and lobotomy, were used to a greater extent as a control toll rather than serving the people who demonstrate symptoms of mental un-wellness. Many medications used for treatment of behaviors in mid 1900s are no longer approved by the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) due to the serious side effects. What was believed to be a cure ended up being just a destruction of the mind.

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