Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

A History of Force Feeding‘I Would Have Gone on with the Hunger Strike, but Force-Feeding I Could Not Take’: The Coercion of Hunger Striking Convict Prisoners, 1913–72

A History of Force Feeding: ‘I Would Have Gone on with the Hunger Strike, but Force-Feeding I... [Do prison doctors force-feed to save lives or to punish? The answer to this is unclear. In reality, it seems likely that doctors hold differing views on the ethics of force-feeding. Their opinions might also depend upon the particular context in which they perform force-feeding. This chapter argues that, regardless of intention, force-feeding has proven itself in the past to be a remarkably effective weapon for stamping out hunger strikes. In December 2005, Guantánamo received a delivery of mobile restraint chairs, similar to those used in maximum-security prisons for violent mentally ill patients. Previously, Guantánamo detainees had been nasally fed. However, this new method of feeding involved strapping prisoners to a chair and inserting a forty-three inch tube through the body twice a day. It was infinitely more uncomfortable than nasal feeding. The number of detainees on hunger strike dropped swiftly from twenty-four to six.1 Even if prison doctors do genuinely believe it is their ethical duty to save lives, stomach tube feeding clearly serves a purpose in quelling prison protests, adding to the sense of physical and mental discipline felt by prisoners.] http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png

A History of Force Feeding‘I Would Have Gone on with the Hunger Strike, but Force-Feeding I Could Not Take’: The Coercion of Hunger Striking Convict Prisoners, 1913–72

Download PDF
36 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/springer-journals/a-history-of-force-feeding-i-would-have-gone-on-with-the-hunger-strike-0aW2FSMer0

References (79)

Publisher
Springer International Publishing
Copyright
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2016. This book is published open access.
ISBN
978-3-319-31112-8
Pages
153 –189
DOI
10.1007/978-3-319-31113-5_6
Publisher site
See Chapter on Publisher Site

Abstract

[Do prison doctors force-feed to save lives or to punish? The answer to this is unclear. In reality, it seems likely that doctors hold differing views on the ethics of force-feeding. Their opinions might also depend upon the particular context in which they perform force-feeding. This chapter argues that, regardless of intention, force-feeding has proven itself in the past to be a remarkably effective weapon for stamping out hunger strikes. In December 2005, Guantánamo received a delivery of mobile restraint chairs, similar to those used in maximum-security prisons for violent mentally ill patients. Previously, Guantánamo detainees had been nasally fed. However, this new method of feeding involved strapping prisoners to a chair and inserting a forty-three inch tube through the body twice a day. It was infinitely more uncomfortable than nasal feeding. The number of detainees on hunger strike dropped swiftly from twenty-four to six.1 Even if prison doctors do genuinely believe it is their ethical duty to save lives, stomach tube feeding clearly serves a purpose in quelling prison protests, adding to the sense of physical and mental discipline felt by prisoners.]

Published: Aug 18, 2016

Keywords: Common Debate; Food Refusal; Solitary Confinement; Prison Staff; Hunger Strike

There are no references for this article.