The use of force-by William Carlos Williams

The story is written by William Carlos Williams and quite worth thinking for a while.




The doctor uses force as a means to check whether the girl has deadly illness. Trying to hide the sore throat, the girl dares not open her mouth, so the doctor uses violent actions to open up the girl's mouth. Finally, the mouth is opened but with brood and the girl's tears. The doctor's inner activities is quite interesting: he say to himself that what he is trying to do is in good purpose and it is what doctor should do-save life; but he also enjoys the violent attack, imagining he is tearing the girl apart. There is no description of the girl's psycological activities, but we can imagine that she obviously knows her illness and the need to be checked. But she tries her best to defense and would not let others know her secrect. After she is forced to open her mouth, her defence becomes attack with anger and frustration.



I natrually connect this story to the relationship between US and Iraq. US attacked Iraq violently, claiming that they did that for the sake of peace and welfare of people in Iraq and the rest of the world. But is it justified to use violence to achieve peace? During the war, how much blood and tears it brought with? How many innocent people died for so call "justification"? In the story, the doctor gains his success, but in the light of the girl's feeling, it might be a lost. Iraq people, just like the girl, know the ills of their country, but they just don't wanna other countries to solve problems for them. They try to defense though they know they may be better if the illness of their political system is cured. After US successfully won the battles and arrested Saddam and his accociates, people in Iraq started to attack US army by suicide bombs and terrorist attack. Exactly as what the story descrides!



The war, I think, is the exaggerated human conflict. The means applied to achieve the good aim might not be necessarily fair and justifed.