“Guess you’re the brains behind this operation!”

I saw a commercial which I felt illustrated some of our class discussions very well. The commercial features a neurosurgeon poking and prodding into a patient’s head causing the patient to surf on a laptop for good travel deals. A black nurse intervenes, “This is completely unethical!” But the doctor replies, “My hours are unethical!” and continues to explain hat he doesn't have time to do this himself while the patient (victim) performs spastic movements. Then the nurse suggests, “Just use Kayak, to compare hundreds of travel sites at once!” The doctor's response is, “Guess you’re the brains behind this operation!” Then proceeds to manipulate the patient to point his fingers at her in a mocking fashion and then high-five the doctor.

This commercial I feel reflects how doctors are in control of patients and their bodies. They are able to make incisions, perform operations/experiments, and ultimately manipulate the patient’s body for their (purported) benefit. Furthermore, the fact that the nurse was black may also have some hidden undertones of medical history, for she is the one suggesting that the procedure is unethical only for the doctor to respond that his hours are unethical. Does this attempt to demonstrate the illegitimacy of the performance of black medical experiments as unethical? Does it attempt to demonstrate that a white male doctor’s opinion is the valid one? Also, for him to mock her may also reflect the discrimination of a women within the medical world, for a nurse could never have the prestige and knowledge that a doctor would have.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Flov7Q6pQNk

Angela Barney