Use of Force

Use of Force Essay- Pro Force

Have you ever felt so angry you would like to hit them, just to make them understand what you are saying? As humans we have a tendency of making people do what WE want them to do. Now, in some cases we tend to review our decisions at the end and decide what we could have done would have been better than what we did do. In the “Use of Force”, a short story by Williamson Carlson Williams, the author introduces the readers to a village setting, where there has been a recent spread of the life threatening, extremely contagious disease; diphtheria. We are introduced to a family in this village to whom a doctor is going too, to help cure their daughter, Mathilda. The doctor must first find a diagnosis to the fever she has been suffering for the past three days, which the parents have noticed. In order to however figure whether or not Mathilda has diphtheria, the doctor must check her throat to see if there is any mucus buildup. The girl however refuses to open up, and the doctor is forced to use force to open Mathilda’s mouth. In my opinion the doctor had no other option but to use force on the patients because he had no other options. However, the doctor could not ignore his fundamental duties; to cure their patients and protect the public, to obey the wishes of the patient, and to protect himself/ herself in the face of danger to his own individual well being. These fundamental principles cannot be ignored and to blame the doctor for using force on the patient is unjust.

All doctor’s must swear to a oath before they begin to practice which includes the statement: “I will prevent disease whenever I can, for prevention is preferable to cure. I will remember that I remain a member of society, with special obligations to all my fellow human beings, those sound of mind and body as well as the infirm.”-Hippocratic Oath. According to this a doctor’s job is to cure their patients, and to protect the public from diseases and infections. A...