Lennie Small Research Paper

Cold, stone, rigid walls. A gray blotch of “food” that no one can recognize. Persistent abuse from those who are supposed to aid the mentally disturbed. This is what Lennie Small’s life would have been like if George didn’t shoot him: constant suffering. That is exactly what George didn’t want for Lennie, so he shot him. George did what he thought was best for Lennie. George didn’t want him in a state hospital because he knew that Lennie would deteriorate in the conditions of a state hospital. Everyone knew about the abuse at asylums, but only the patients and doctors knew about the extent of that abuse. In asylums the patients were not seen as people, they were seen as objects. If patients misbehaved, they could get a form of “treatment” called thump therapy. Thump therapy wasn’t actual therapy, it was just abuse termed a different name (Mental: A History of the Madhouse). Beatings were common and persistent, especially with long stay patients. In an example, one patient who continually was pestering the nurses, got a bucket thrown at him. This patient kept on pestering the nurse, so eventually this nurse yanked him to a bathroom and repeatedly dunked his head in and out of the toilet bowl (Mental: A History of the Madhouse). This is just one of the countless cases of abuse in mental institutions.

Doctors used insulin to put the subjects into a coma. They thought it was good because it put the mind to rest. By the end of it all 44 people ended up dying from it, due to the procedure being unsafe (Mental: A History of the Madhouse). Another form of treatment was using tranquilizing drugs. Using tranquilizers was suppose to calm patients down, but instead it was giving subjects the effects of parkinson’s disease: hand tremors, muscle rigidness, and impaired speech (Mental: A History of the