Prejudice in our book plays the role of separating the patients. In the beginning, there was a prejudice against the patients. Patients are separated into two groups, the acutes and the chronics. Because they are in the institution they are automatically perceived as bad people. Stereotypes are presented as the patients being mental psychopaths and the aides being heavenly people who are just trying to help them. This changes the story because as we read we see that its really kind of flipped around. The aides and nurses are torturing the patients into a deeper insanity. This makes our eyes open as we continue to read the story.
A good quote that expresses the prejudice is when chief says, "One side of the room younger patients, known as Acutes because the doctors figure them still sick enough to be fixed" he continues the say, "Across the room from the Acutes are the culls of the Combine's product, the Chronics" (Kesey 15). This to us shows that if you come in young you are considered "sick enough to be fixed", however, its funny because what they do to cure you really makes you a chronic. They can even send anyone to the disturbed. Cheswick even committed suicide because of the way stuff is run in the ward.
I also see the cycle for the chronics and acutes. Early in the book when they described the separation between the groups, they were probably more separated by age which created the two different groups.
ReplyDelete