Conformity In One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest

Also, any person who unpatriotically supported communism was harshly dealt with. These events were represented in an exact scale model of the Mental Institution. Anyone who dared to cause an uproar was humiliated in group therapy sessions, or given Electroshock Therapy, or in extreme cases such as McMurphy, lobotomy. In the hospital, McMurphy represented the rebel, the opposer to the Combine (McCarthyism), the one who wanted to break free of society's conformity.

Randle McMurphy, the protagonist, is introduced to break down the nurse’s oppressive ways. McMurphy, a con man who was sentenced to a work farm, was diagnosed as a psychopath and sent to the mental hospital, which he much preferred. Serving as a savior figure to the patients of the ward who have already been battered by the Big Nurse, McMurphy causes interference to the nurse’s control. He supports the men as they are ridiculed in meetings and supports their attempts to change policy. Although he does help other patients, he first looks out for himself. He cons the patients out of their money and then follows the nurse’s rules for awhile because of the threat of being kept on the

McMurphy can also be considered a tragic hero. Although he could almost always take control of a situation and never let the combine get the best of him, he could not always control his temper. It was the one think that could get him in trouble because Nurse Ratched could not punish him with electric shock therapy unless he had an outburst. The best thing that McMurphy could have had in the hospital was patience and a calm temper because the only weapon Nurse Ratched had was to try to frustrate him. Since she has ultimate power on the ward, she could do anything she wants and make any rules. For instance, when the patients wanted to watch the world series and they clearly had a majority, she didn’t let them because she wanted them to know that she has authority

After leaving the hellish work farm where he serving his prison sentence, McMurphy arrives at the ward, which is exponentially more dull and drab in comparison. The impact of his arrival at the ward is seen instantly. The enthusiasm and energy he brings to the ward is so uncharacteristic, that even some of the Chronics, who are longstanding patients that have become “machines with flaws inside that can’t be repaired,” show some life (Kesey 10). In his typical westernized fashion, McMurphy arrives at the hospital with the aura of “a frontier

Ratched has complete power over all patients, including their curfew, possessions, punishment, etc. Her might and authority is instilled within the minds of the inhabitants of the ward, leaving no one to challenge her. However, her tight grip over every nook and cranny of the ward and its inhabitants dissipates when McMurphy comes in. He is accustomed to doing whatever he wants while higher powers attempting to restrict his actions. The thoughtless actions of McMurphy could be seen as a catalyst for nurse Ratched’s resolute demonstration of power and authority. His disobedience starts to influence others, and in turn chips away her power as can be seen with the patients gradually easing up. As time goes on, McMurphy's constant breaking of the mold eventually shatters Ratched’s tolerance, causing her to act with an iron fist. With McMurphy’s final act, the choking incident, she finally snaps and abuses her authority and power to the maximum. After the ultimate disobedience, McMurphy unrightfully gets lobotomized as revenge. With this lobotomization, Ratched demonstrates the ultimate use of her power: the power to take away life. McMurphy is officially classified “unstable”, even though he is seen as perfectly normal by the doctor. Nurse Ratched’s power allows her to “help” him by lobotomization. Her power is so terrifying it inspires Chief, who was

McMurphy learns that involuntarily committed patients cannot leave the hospital without staff approval. Therefore, he cannot leave at the end of his six months sentence, but when Nurse Ratched says he can and he begins to submit to her authority. However, by this time, he had become the leader for the other patients. Their sanity, their claim to manhood lies in the balance. Cheswick, dismayed by McMurphy’s surrender, commits suicide.

Instead, the novel is told through the lens of Chief Bromden, a patient in the ward who has lived there for the past ten years. Because Bromden narrates the story, the audience is able to see how he views the world and how that contributes to McMurphy’s destruction. He refers to society as the Combine, saying that its goal is for everyone to conform to the norm. This can be seen in how Bromden, since he was born from the Chief of the Columbian, says that he “discovered at an early age that [he] was...different...it was the feeling that the great, deadly, pointing forefinger of society was pointing at me–and the great voice of millions chanting, ‘Shame. Shame. Shame.’ It’s society’s way of dealing with someone different” (265). Because he did not fit into the expectations of society, Bromden was looked down on, all because he simply did not feel the norm. He does not view beating society and Nurse Ratched an option, stating that “she’ll go on winning, just like the Combine, because she has all the power of the Combine behind her” (100). Society has all the power in modern times, and Bromden is well aware of it. Even though Bromden believed that McMurphy was the one who could protect them from the pressures of society, believing that “McMurphy was a giant come out of the sky to save us from the Combine” (231), in the end, McMurphy also loses himself and his sense of identity to the mental institution.

Ken Kesey’s novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, examines the vitality of struggle and sacrifice, in challenging conformity. The majority versus the individual is one of the most prominent themes throughout Kesey’s novel. The plot largely revolves around characters which are subjected to extreme oppression, yet eventually, come across their different forms of liberation. However, the reader is left contemplating whether the end justifies the means. Kesey best describes opposition to conformity through the novel's antihero, Randle McMurphy, who ultimately suffers due to his opposition. He also details the unkind consequences that result from rebellion and uses his narrative as a vessel for loosely describing the battle between those that

Although he is so different from everyone else in the combine, that doesn’t stop him from being fearless. Instead of hiding from the black boys like Chief, McMurphy goes out of his way to bother them. He does the exact opposite of Chief, he won’t back down from anyone. Therefore, McMurphy inspires all of the other patients on the ward because of how confident he is of being different. He is a man on a mission to take down Nurse Ratched and won’t let anyone stand in his way although such a thing is unthinkable to all of the others on the ward. He commands the respect of his peers through his unthinkable actions. In fact, Chief praises him so much that he thinks of him as some inhuman figure when he asks, “How can McMurphy be what he is” (Kesey, 161) rather than asking, “How can McMurphy be who he is.” Seeing McMurphy as something higher than humanity says a lot about how unique and unafraid he is of everything that sets foot in his

     The one that flies over the cuckoo's nest is the giant, allegedly deaf-mute Chief Bromden. In Ken Kesey's original novel, Chief narrates the story, providing evocative images of an all-powerful bureaucratic 'harvesting machine' fostering functionalist social integration: a combine that would process out individuality, thus creating compliant individuals (the exaggerated representation of this in the film's ward is a microcosm of society at large). Those who did not conform would be relegated to a correctional facility for repair or removal.

Kesey describes, “Working alongside others like her [Ratched] who I call the “combine”, which is a huge organization that aims to adjust the outside as well as the inside has made her a real veteran at adjusting things. She was already the Big Nurse in the old place when I came from the outside so long back, and she’d been dedicating herself to adjustment for God knows how long.” Ratched uses her social skills amongst the outer society from the ward to gain power within the ward. Due to her ability of networking herself in this case, a powerful social skill, she gains the “veteran” experience to then be all powerful and able to manipulate what she wants in the ward. McMurphy on the other hand socializes in a different manner as Kesey expresses, “Twenty-one! The Chief’s vote makes it twenty-one” and “…And we’re all sitting there lined up in front of the blanked out TV set, watching the gray screen, just like we could see the baseball game clear as day and she’s ranting and screaming behind us.” McMurphy is able to rally the members of the ward through persuasion of hope. His inspiration of the hope in freedom and happiness inspires Chief Bromden, a man who isolated himself and played deaf amongst the ward, to interact and at that act against the major authority. Not only does he inspire Chief Bromden but a group of patients, thus we see McMurphy is great with his social skills

Before entering into a life of gambling and alcoholism, McMurphy served in the Korean War. He was likely one of thousands of conscripted American men, allied with South Korea and armed against the invading forces of North Korea. According to his records, McMurphy earned a “distinguished Service Cross in Korea, for leading an escape from a Communist prison camp. A dishonorable discharge, afterward, for insubordination” (45). During the war, McMurphy’s character—as well as the potential to suffer from mental health issues—developed. He displayed great bravery in leading an escape from a prisoner-of-war camp, as well as a fierce dedication to helping others. However, he was also unwilling to follow orders, suggesting a lack of concern for his own well-being. In effect, McMurphy calls upon both his former strength and carelessness in an ambush of Nurse Ratched. When he is blamed for causing another patient to commit suicide, McMurphy grows irate and violently attacks Nurse Ratched. He exposes her womanhood before turning to the rest of her body, while the hospital aides attempt to “[pry] those heavy red fingers out of the white flesh of her throat as if they were her neck bones” (319). McMurphy loses control of his emotions in this final exploitation of the Big Nurse. However,

McMurphy’s Attitude towards to the ward and life can be described by his will to make people stand up for themselves, and his never ending spirit of rebellious behavior. His behavior is matched by an overload in authority and proves even the most driven people can lose control of their minds. “And we're all sitting there lined up in front of that blanked-out TV set, watching the gray screen just like we could see the baseball game clear as day, and she's ranting and screaming behind us. If

Nurse Ratched makes one last attempt to gain back the control when she uses the same principle she used earlier to ensure that the patients acceptance to her well being. She starts off with a lot of distrust with the mental patients by making the financial gain public which McMurphy has enjoyed since his transfer from the farms where someone is constantly defending McMurphy, this leads to pointing out that McMurphy has more than repaid the patients with there financial losses and providing them with the means to dodge nurse Ratched’s terrible influence. McMurphy knows that nurse ratchet is cruel and states," In one week, I can put a bug so far up her ass, she don't know whether to shit or wind her wristwatch." This shows that McMurphy is ready for a fight and he is not afraid to tell nurse Ratched what he thinks about her. This final scene shows us the contradiction between Tyranny and Sanity.

“People don't want other people to get high, because if you get high, you might see the falsity of the fabric of the society we live in.” This quote by Ken Kesey embodies his view of society in the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s nest. He depicts the modern society through Nurse Ratched, a strong authoritarian figure, that embellishes the nature of society. Nurse Ratched is notorious in her endeavors to control the men and uses her power to regulate the men. In this domain the beams of society cause the men to shrink from individual freedom that is reawakened with McMurphy, who teaches the men to be bold in the face of society. In Kesey’s work he highlights several major ideas about society. He illustrates the repressive nature of society that causes men to conform to boundaries. Further, he depicts how society rejects those who are deemed defective in the system. Lastly, he also illustrates how society is a major cause of shame and indignity. Thus, Kensey delineates the nature of society as being repressive, selective, and a cause of diffidence.