The Use of Force is a recounting of a house visit by a physician. We see themes of battle for dominance, a breakdown from professionalism to a more basic emotional state, the idea of suffering for progress of the society, and strong sexual imagery and undertones in the conflict between the physician and the girl.
The idea of authority is established early on, with the physician being paid, the parents who are the legal guardians of the girl are deferring their authority to the doctor. This would be seen as the norm until the girl challenges him and refuses to open her mouth. Throughout their interaction she strikes away his glasses and tongue depressor, both symbols of professionalism and tools of science, noting that his glasses going unbroken symbolizes that his position of power as a profession is unbroken. Force is met with force at every point, to the point that the parents try and subdue the girl, showing that they, out of fear for the girls life, are willing to harm her. With each attack on him he retreats further from logic and reason, falling further from level headed reason and logic. He even admits that he should've stepped back and taken a breath but didn't. He knows he can justify his actions in the need to save this girl, to complete the task for the sake of the girl, the parents, and society as a whole. Sexual tones are set early on when the doctor admits that he found the girl, while young, attractive. Followed by attempts to force a phallic object into her mouth or to expose the membrane which symbolizes her sexual organs. He falls further from the restrained societal norms and even derives pleasure and satisfaction from finally revealing the membrane, through force and against such a determined adversary. I wonder if he would feel such satisfaction if she had been compliant and easily accepted his examination. The muscle satisfaction is reminiscent of a dog with a squeaky toy, deriving satisfaction from the audible feedback. Applying a stimulus and feedback returned, is such a basic joy in animals as they learn to control their surroundings. Compared to a battle field surgeon where life is the most important result, crippling someone by sawing their leg off would be seen as a success. Ethics have always been ever changing with time, as societies age and change so do the collective values and ethics. Bioethics, which some might argue is a minor subset of bio politics.
I wonder if his initial mention of his attraction to the girl is less about wanting to have sex with her and more about, attraction for her created from this struggle, after all this is a recount of the experience. Could the use of sexuality in this short story be about a break from restrained and acceptable social norms. If we take into account all of these factors in conjunction with the sexual undertones we can see it as a throwback to a more primitive and emotional mentality when facing conflict. We attempt to live by societal norms and conduct ourselves in a manner we deem appropriate.
This reminds me of the recent news story regarding the removal and relocation of the Dr. James Marion Sims statue from Central Park. He followed current medical procedures and theories for the time region while trying to possibly save lives for these women. Looking back now we judge with our current ethics and some judge it as a blemish on the unrelenting force of progress and science for the greater good. He pioneered and created a procedure that would help countless people in the future at the expense of those who were his test subjects. If we can move past the idea of consent and if he performed his experimental procedure in an ethical manner and view this as a more active form of suffering in experimentation, then can we compare it to our more passive form of experimentation with drug trials. We offer the real drug to some and a placebo to others, if this a form of abuse knowing that all of the patients are ill and suffering but only some are getting the actual drug being tested? One might say that if the drug works with few side effects then they are denying these people their lives, but if the drug is ineffective and coupled with traumatic side effects we might say this is the cost of progress. This story is so far removed from the, once told by the subjective recounting of a doctor by a writer in the early 1900's.
The idea of authority is established early on, with the physician being paid, the parents who are the legal guardians of the girl are deferring their authority to the doctor. This would be seen as the norm until the girl challenges him and refuses to open her mouth. Throughout their interaction she strikes away his glasses and tongue depressor, both symbols of professionalism and tools of science, noting that his glasses going unbroken symbolizes that his position of power as a profession is unbroken. Force is met with force at every point, to the point that the parents try and subdue the girl, showing that they, out of fear for the girls life, are willing to harm her. With each attack on him he retreats further from logic and reason, falling further from level headed reason and logic. He even admits that he should've stepped back and taken a breath but didn't. He knows he can justify his actions in the need to save this girl, to complete the task for the sake of the girl, the parents, and society as a whole. Sexual tones are set early on when the doctor admits that he found the girl, while young, attractive. Followed by attempts to force a phallic object into her mouth or to expose the membrane which symbolizes her sexual organs. He falls further from the restrained societal norms and even derives pleasure and satisfaction from finally revealing the membrane, through force and against such a determined adversary. I wonder if he would feel such satisfaction if she had been compliant and easily accepted his examination. The muscle satisfaction is reminiscent of a dog with a squeaky toy, deriving satisfaction from the audible feedback. Applying a stimulus and feedback returned, is such a basic joy in animals as they learn to control their surroundings. Compared to a battle field surgeon where life is the most important result, crippling someone by sawing their leg off would be seen as a success. Ethics have always been ever changing with time, as societies age and change so do the collective values and ethics. Bioethics, which some might argue is a minor subset of bio politics.
I wonder if his initial mention of his attraction to the girl is less about wanting to have sex with her and more about, attraction for her created from this struggle, after all this is a recount of the experience. Could the use of sexuality in this short story be about a break from restrained and acceptable social norms. If we take into account all of these factors in conjunction with the sexual undertones we can see it as a throwback to a more primitive and emotional mentality when facing conflict. We attempt to live by societal norms and conduct ourselves in a manner we deem appropriate.
This reminds me of the recent news story regarding the removal and relocation of the Dr. James Marion Sims statue from Central Park. He followed current medical procedures and theories for the time region while trying to possibly save lives for these women. Looking back now we judge with our current ethics and some judge it as a blemish on the unrelenting force of progress and science for the greater good. He pioneered and created a procedure that would help countless people in the future at the expense of those who were his test subjects. If we can move past the idea of consent and if he performed his experimental procedure in an ethical manner and view this as a more active form of suffering in experimentation, then can we compare it to our more passive form of experimentation with drug trials. We offer the real drug to some and a placebo to others, if this a form of abuse knowing that all of the patients are ill and suffering but only some are getting the actual drug being tested? One might say that if the drug works with few side effects then they are denying these people their lives, but if the drug is ineffective and coupled with traumatic side effects we might say this is the cost of progress. This story is so far removed from the, once told by the subjective recounting of a doctor by a writer in the early 1900's.
I think the attraction that the doctor have for the girl is more for her strength, her willing to not give up the secret that she is hiding from him. Throughout the struggle between them the doctor seem to be relishing the challenge and his social welfare for her is what motivated him to allow his basic impulses to get the better of him. If Matilda had given in to the doctor without a fight, then the doctor would not have learnt what he did about himself. He took pleasure in using force on a child in order to get a culture that could possible save here life. This however made him feel bad about what he had done when the author states "but a blind fury, a feeling of adult shame, bred of a longing for muscular release are the operatives. One goes on to the end."
ReplyDeleteGreat post Jacq, I think your perspective on the story is definitely the way I viewed it after a couple reads. Initially I took his attraction to Mathilda a little too literal and created a bit of a sadistic profile of the doctor but the more times i read it over, I couldnt find any significant attack on her directly other than then her defiance casing her to hurt herself. I now more so see it as that this stubborn child of a lesser social background attempted to challenge his authority and though he finds it refreshing, he refuses to relinquish his dominance to this little brat.
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