Nurse Ratched was bad, but Mcmurphy wasn't a hero either.
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cartesianthought — 9 years ago(May 13, 2016 03:43 AM)
I don't get the comments on here that try to defend either of them. Both were quite selfish jerk. Both had part in Billy's death.
McMurphy was anarchy and Ratched was totalitarianism. Ratched was about keeping society stable, insofar as she has control over other people. McMurphy was about shaking up the establishment, though he used people too. -
themidgarzolom — 9 years ago(June 07, 2016 07:30 PM)
No argument regarding the actual end result, but I do think it's a significant point that McMurphy did have positive intentions regarding Billy. Knowing Billy's backstory and remembering what McMurphy said about Billy's voluntary status there (Get out of here! Go live your life!) and his relative youth, it would seem that McMurphy believed that by getting Billy to hook up with Candy that he would get the confidence to leave the prison of anxiety and fear that he's trapped himself in, literally and figuratively. This was also a sacrifice for McMurphy, since he clearly viewed Candy as his girl, despite his assurance to Billy that he wouldn't "marry her." It only took Ratched about 5 minutes of needless fear, manipulative threats and intimidation the next morning to not only back Billy right back into his cage, but drive him all the way to suicide.
So yes, McMurphy's action played a role in the end result, but there's a substantial difference in how it could have played out if Ratched wasn't the far more evil character. After all, Billy wasn't an inmate now, was he? -
Adebesi — 9 years ago(June 09, 2016 07:31 AM)
Of course McMurphy wasnt perfect, I think introducing him as a statutory rapist sets the context that he is a flawed human being, he is clearly immature and impulsive and reckless. He is charismatic but deserves to be doing time. You are not supposed to feel him being locked up is a miscarriage of justice.
But I dont think there is much reason to sympathise with Nurse Ratched. I found her treatment of her patients sadistic. The group therapy sessions were quite clearly ritual humiliations. Even her preventing McMurphy from going back to prison was malicious, given he would have finished his sentence quickly if he had gone back, whereas while he was under her care his incarceration was at her discretion.