
By looking at Nellie Bly’s narrative and also keeping in mind the societal history of nineteenth century asylums, we are able to get an insight into how corrupt these historical asylums truly were. Nellie Bly’s piece called “Ten Days in a Madhouse” is an autobiographical piece of Bly’s first-hand experience posing as a mental patient in Blackwell’s Island mental institution in New York. This piece was published in the New York Times and was  hugely popular and controversial. It revealed the truths about the asylums that the media covered up. why did the media try to censor this info and why was her piece so controversial? you want to introduce the idea of 'asylums' before you get into this info. There had been articles written about these controversial asylums and their treatment of the patients in the past, but Bly’s first-hand experience was the first to truly reveal what they were actually like in a very real way that caused more strict inspections and even the shutting down of some asylums. It seems like your intro is a bit reversed – the first sentence reads more like a thesis statement than an opening, since i do not yet have a context for Nellie Bly, the history/social issue of insane asylums, etc. The best way to go about this is to first explain Nellie Bly's piece and the brief social/historical implications of asylums. Then give a backbone for your essay by providing what specific area you will focus on (sent.1 does this fairly well).

Before the nineteenth century, there were reports and articles of insane asylums and the extremely harsh treatment of their patients such as locking them in dungeons, whipping them, beating them, hanging them, or even accusing them of witchcraft. This topic sentence throws me a little, since your intro states that the media tried to conceal these realities. You'll want to clarify this. There was both violence between the patients, and abuse from attendants to patients. They would use restraints on patients, such as a “waist belt” which essentially went around the patient's waist and around their chair so they could not get up, “leather mittens” which were mittens made of leather and had no thumb holes and were made to restrict patients from hurting themselves, a “camisole” which was made of canvas and restricted both the arms and hands, and the “muff” which was just a more sturdy version of the camisole (Rothman). Another unbelievable restraint used on patients was a “covered bed” (Rothman), which was essentially a crib-like bed made for adults except with a locked top so they could not escape. Another abuse by attendants that was revealed was a process called “bleaching out” (Rothman) in which after the patients are beaten, they are put in ice cold water so they would not bruise. The attendants taking care of the patients would even admit to not thinking the patients would get any better. A majority of the patients were immigrants and women. These two classes of people were treated as lesser, and essentially did not have any rights. Immigrants were not understood, and could not speak for themselves if they didn’t speak english, and women were controlled by men and had no rights, so these two groups were easily admitted. At this time. We did not know as much as we do know when it came to science and psychology and mental illness. The men who were in charge of these asylums were usually uneducated about mental illness and were not at all qualified to be diagnosing these patients. Again, the two last sentences here seem better served as framework for the rest of the paragraph – it gives a reason as to why these things happened in insane asylums. You might move these ideas up to the beginning of your paragraph to set up an understanding of its content.

As a 23 year old woman, Nellie Bly decided to pose as an insane women in order to be admitted to Blackwell's Island asylum to be able to expose the truth about this nineteenth century asylum and its treatment of its patients and corruption. Keep in mind the transition from the last paragraph to this paragraph – you state in the intro censorship was present, then explain the non-censoring of these practices, then go back to saying Bly wanted to get them uncensored. Your argument must adhere to a fluid logic. Bly “dressed in tattered second-hand clothes”, “stopped bathing and brushing her teeth”, and “practiced looking like a lunatic in front of the mirror” (Rothman). She posed as a cuban immigrant and changed her name to Nellie Moreno. She wandered around the streets of New York and checked herself into a temporary boarding house for women and acted crazy, resulting in “all of the other residents fearing for their lives” (Rothman). After this, Bly went to court and was sent to Bellevue’s psychiatric ward where she was ruled “undoubtedly insane” (Rothman) having everyone fooled. From there, she was sent to the infamous Blackwell's island. Blackwell’s island was known as the “Lonely Island”. At first this asylum was not terrible, but when its funding got cut, it turned into a scary define this world in the social context asylum that no one wanted a part of. Many writers had written articles about the terrible conditions of this asylum, but Bly was the first to go undercover and release a first-hand experience. 

As said before, at the time, science was not evolved enough to know a lot about mental illnesses, so the doctors who were admitting these patients were definitely not educated enough in mental illness to be able to diagnose these women. It is best to keep this info unified, so you might create one cohesive paragraph on this matter instead of stating 'as said before.' This will avoid jumpiness in your argument. Not only were they not educated enough about mental illness, they did not make the effort to go through careful examination of these patients to decipher if the problem really was a mental illness. They would not take the time to examine the patient carefully, and they would not care enough to listen to what the patients had to say or ask them questions. This was proven by Nellie Bly when she, a perfectly healthy young woman, acted insane and was admitted to a major mental institution without much doubt. This paragraph needs citations for its info – it is not common knowledge.

The most controversial issue when it came to the controversies of nineteenth century asylums was the reasons for these women being admitted. In this time, women had very little rights and were very much controlled by men and society. The purpose of women at this time was to have a domestic role and that was it. clarify this. Een such as husbands, brothers, or friends would make important decisions in the woman’s life for the woman. Women were even sometimes admitted by their husbands “for a break, to teach them not to disobey, to take them away from their children” (Pouba, Tianen, 100). The amount of reasons women were admitted was endless. Everything from depression, to religious ideas, to “suppressed menstruation” (Pouba, Tianen, 95), and even “insane by unknown reasons” (Pouba, Tianen, 101) were among the many diagnoses. Some of the diagnoses were actually just diseases but because of the lack of science and education, they were seen as “bouts of insanity” (Pouba, Tianen, 95). Some examples of this were women being admitted for depression after they lost a loved one, depression after childbirth, epilepsy after a seizure, and even sometimes nymphomania. There were seven major categories when it came to admittance, but often women were admitted for many more than what fell under those categories. “Insane by unknown reasons” (Pouba, Tianen, 101) was even used as a diagnoses to admit women who did not fall under any of these categories and had random symptoms that convinced other they were insane.

Women being depressed after the loss of a loved one or childbirth is normal to us avoid 1st person now that depression is a quite common disease and these two things are very likely to cause depression. However, then, they saw a woman who was not easily coping with their bodily changes after numerous births, now known as postpartum depression, as not normal. Also, if a woman grieved for longer than society thought appropriate, they saw this as not normal and grounds for admittance. Other diseases that were seen as bouts of insanity was epilepsy after having a seizure, and nymphomania. Science was not evolved enough to know about seizures and the effects of a seizure, so these epileptic episodes were seen as episodes of insanity. Nymphomania was seen as insanity because society did not expect women to have excessive sexual desires, however, this was a rare diagnosis. Citations?

Having different religious views than society was not accepted and therefore also grounds for admittance. This is very vague as a functioning topic sentence. 'society' should be avoided as it is way too vague for this paper. Women who had religious views that contradicted what the rest of society believed, were deemed “delusive on subjects” (Pouba, Tianen, 98). It was said that they had “religious fantasies” and “foolish romantic talk about the devil and Jesus” (Pouba, Tianen, 98). “Putting a label of insanity on these women was an extreme attempt to quiet them, or make their beliefs less credible” (Pouba, Tianen, 100). Other reasons for admittance included overexertion and “insane by heredity” (Pouba, Tianen, 100). Overexertion was common among women because society made them to be domestic beings, therefore they would care for the children, cook, clean, and do everything around the house. It should have been obvious that these women would be exhausted because they worked hard all day, but society did not accept that and thought this was abnormal. “Insane by heredity” was one of the more unbelievable diagnoses. Doctors would admit some women because they believed they were insane just because someone in their family had been diagnosed as insane, even when their actions showed symptoms of another category. 

Historically, there was a very common connection between a woman’s reproductive organs and insanity. Doctors were not very educated about the woman’s reproductive system back then, so women were commonly admitted because of ignorance of the women’s body. Doctors would think the symptoms of periods such as moodiness were “attacks of insanity” (Pouba, Tianen, 99). However, when a woman didn’t have her period, they would diagnose her as insane for “suppressed menstruation”, when actually they were just pregnant or going through menopause. This is a good idea, but the paragraph feels underdeveloped – can you use it in another paragraph with a topic sentence that prefaces the idea of using women's natural state against them towards 'insanity'?

Considering all the reasons women were admitted to asylums in the nineteenth century, as we look at Nellie Bly’s “Ten Days in a Madhouse”, we can see examples of some of these reasons with some of the women Bly met through her time in Blackwell’s. The first example was a woman named Tillie Mayard. Bly wrote how Tillie tried to plea with the doctors as they were diagnosing her, saying that she was not insane she was just suffering from nervous debility. “All her remarks were as rational as any I have ever heard, and I thought no good physician could help but be impressed with her story.” (Bly, 282) Bly wrote. But the doctors did not listen, and she was “committed without ample trial” (Bly, 282). This shows how diseases not related to insanity were commonly diagnosed as insanity because the doctors were not educated enough and they did not give the patients the respect to listen to what they had to say. Another woman in Blackwell that Bly mentioned was a woman named Louise Sanchez. Louise was a German immigrant and was admitted to the asylum because nobody could understand what she was saying. “Thus, Louise Sanchez consigned to the asylum without making herself understood” (Bly, 282). Immigrants made up about half the population of asylums because they could not argue or make a case for themselves because they could not speak english and people looked down on them as a lower class. They, like women, had fewer rights and were given less respect and therefore were admitted more easily and frequently. 

The corruption of these asylums was caused mainly by the people who ran them. Doctors were not educated enough, and board members, superintendents, and even attendants to the patients were not qualified to do their job. They were not educated in mental illness, and were only interested in the money they got from being involved in the running of these institutions. The board members, superintendents and doctors all had a sort of alliance which made it okay for them to overlook the terrible conditions these patients were living in and the brutal treatments they were given. They formed these alliances because they were all rich men in the same social class so they had the same rights and same goals which was basically money. It was rich powerful men against women and immigrants, so it was not difficult for them to get away with this type of control. As an example, in Bly’s experience, she was the victim to this type of disrespect and dehumanizing behavior. The doctor that examined her, Dr. Kinier, diagnosed and admitted Bly without serious and sufficient examination. He laughed and joked with the nurse throughout her whole examination and did not listen to Bly when she tries to speak or answer questions. “He took no notice of my remarks, and having completed his writings, as well as his talk with the nurse for the moment, he said that would do” (Bly, 284). This shows just how uneducated and ignorant these doctors were because Bly was a perfectly healthy woman and they just assumed that she was insane without many good reasons to believe so. You might use this paragraph earlier, since it seems to explain a lot of the questions I was having earlier about censorship, misdiagnosis, etc.

In the nineteenth century, there was much controversy and articles written about these asylums. There was skepticism and criticism about these institutions as more and more articles came out exposing the reality of them. The underlying issues of this corruption within the institutions was as explained above, the false admittance of women due to doctors being uneducated and unqualified. Nellie Bly was the first to go undercover and reveal how these institutions were from a very real and first-hand experience from one of the most well know New York asylums. This caused un uproar and much controversy in New York which eventually resulted in an investigation and the state of New York giving greater funds, $1,000,000, to the institutions in hope of reforming them and making the treatment of the patients better. Citation? Bly's work ended in great success in that it exposed these asylums from not just a secondary source suspecting harsh treatment and inadequate doctors, but a first hand experience revealing the harsh truths of Blackwell’s island. 
