Billy Pilgrim's Decisions In Slaughterhouse-Five

One of the great things of being a human is the ability to make your own decisions. Throughout the novel Slaughterhouse-Five we as the reader are able to take a glimpse of what life would be like without the ability to make any decisions. Billy Pilgrim, the main character, begins life not being able to make any decisions. His father made all of his decisions and never allowed Billy to be himself. This is just the start of Billy’s path. He is then drafted into the Army and has once again been told what to do. A scrawny man, with no real purpose in the Army or in war goes in and is told what to do and gets no respect from anyone. Even while in Germany at war he is forced to do things he does not want to and is humiliated for the benefit of others. …show more content…
Humans often take free-will for granted and are unable to see how great being able to make decisions is. However, Billy did not have this benefit as a human. During his childhood he was controlled by his father. While in the Army he was controlled by everyone else. And while held in the Prisoner of War camp he was controlled by the Germans. Billy did not experience free-will as a child. His father had a different way of parenting. “Little Billy was terrified, because his father had said Billy was going to learn to swim by the method of sink-or-swim. His father was going to throw Billy into the deep end, and Billy was going to damn well swim. It was like an execution… He dimly sensed that somebody was rescuing him. Billy resented that” (Vonnegut 55). Billy had no choice about being thrown into the pool and he had no choice about being saved from drowning. Billy does not have a choice in this and that frustrates him. He is just being pushed around and letting other people control him. Part of life is becoming your own person and that cannot happen if other people are constantly controlling