Were you on hunger strike and refusing food, so thereby having the tube forced into you against your will whilst physically restained? And you had 8 in 2 years, that's once every 3 months, by average. The hunger strikers will be having it forced into them daily. While he may appear to you to be a wuss, I think his distress, even if amped for the film, more than adequately shows what those who undergo this type of procedure on a daily basis must go through
or we could just let people exercise their right to protest in the way they see fit. I don't agree with any method of force feeding someone who doesn't want it (and that includes those that are terminal, as was the case with my nan).
Well, that's a unique way of looking at it. But they'd die. As you say, it's a protest......they don't want to die & I'd guess they expected some kind of efforts to keep them alive. They could do IV feeding.
Within days, the prison authorities began force-feeding Dolores and Marion Price, Hugh Feeney and Gerry Kelly. They were brutally force-fed for 206 days. On 31 March 1974, Frank Stagg, Paul Holmes, Hugh Feeney and Michael Gaughan joined the strike. Twenty-three days into his strike, Michael was force-fed for the first time. The method of force-feeding hadn’t changed from the days when Thomas Ashe died due to the brutality of it in 1917. The brutality of the force-feeding and resisting the doctors and the warders took its toll on the hunger-strikers. It left them battered and bruised, drained physically and mentally. The physiological torture of this barbaric assault on a person also had an effect as one of the hunger-strikers recounted to a relative at the time: “The mental agony of waiting to be force-fed is getting to the stage where it now outweighs the physical discomfort of having to go through with it.”
During his hunger-strike Michael was force-fed 17 times, the last time on the evening of June 2. (click photo to view)
The physical toll on the hunger-strikers is borne out by Gaughan’s brother John’s statement of his condition when he last saw him. His throat had been badly cut by force feeding and his teeth loosened. His eyes were sunken, his cheeks hollow and his mouth was gaping open. He weighed about six stone.
Visitors to the hunger strikers were only allowed to see them through a glass screen, supervised by prison warders. In what must have been a very emotional visit Gaughan’s mother Delia saw him alive for the last time through this screen three days before his death.
On 3 June 1974, the prison authorities announced that Michael Gaughan had died. They later explained that he died from pneumonia, a result of the force-feeding tube having pierced his lung and food lodging in his lung. He was 24-years-old.
The manner of his death caused controversy in medical circles and the method of force-feeding was later abandoned by the British state.
... and thereby denying the protester their protest. I wonder if TomUS would agree to protesters having their placards forceably removed, because denying someone the right to protest works at every level.
They don't want them to become martyrs either though, that is most likely why they force feed them. Plus it is a demoralising and demeaning process which, though I am sure it is allowed under the geneva convention, really is tantamount to torture (see Casually Red's post above)
That is a bollox comparison. She is not restrained, in a comfortable medical setting and has the tube inseted by a caring professionals with a drink to help her swallow. Mos def had little or no lube that I can see, was restrained AND shackled and had the tube forced up his snout by two burly 'medics' in a hostile setting. The second girl has most likely had plenty of training and experience to carry out the procedure upon herself. Again, she is in a comfortable environment and is not shackled and restrained.
That is a bollox comparison. She is not restrained, in a comfortable medical setting and has the tube inseted by a caring professionals with a drink to help her swallow. Mos def had little or no lube that I can see, was restrained AND shackled and had the tube forced up his snout by two burly 'medics' in a hostile setting. The second girl has most likely had plenty of training and experience to carry out the procedure upon herself. Again, she is in a comfortable environment and is not shackled and restrained.
But I guess we all see what we want to see, innit
Is that not a bit over egging the pudding, I mean on the grand scheme of things Guantanamo is not worse than the war in Syria just to take one example.
I also have to say: what the fuck has her colour got to do with it? Who compiled that video, a republican?
