Slaughter House 5Essay Preview: Slaughter House 5Report this essaySlaughter house 5“We had been foolish virgins in the war right at the end of childhood” Slaughterhouse Five-Kurt Vonnegut “The childrens crusade started in 1213 when two monks got the idea of raising armies of children in France and Germany, and selling them in North Africa as slaves. Thirty thousand children volunteered thinking they were going to Palestine. (p.16) The Childrens Crusade and the World Wars are similar because of the drafting of the innocent to do the duties of a nation.
The children who volunteered were the “idle and deserted children who generally swarm in great cities, nurtured on vice and daring,” they thought they were going to Palestine but really they were being sold as slaves. Children are naive and very gullible, trusting in the words of the adults around them. They also believe that they have a grasp on their lives and control of the obstacles in life one discovers through experience when, in reality they have exactly the opposite. The young who fought in Dresden went off to war without knowing what to expect, much like the Childrens Crusade volunteers. Good fortune might have been one of the promises sworn in boot camp but what they received was the complete scythe of silence. Left behind, untagged and forgotten on the battleground, their bodies disintegrated into the earth leaving the youngs potentials undone.
When Billy Pilgrim went to war “He didnt look like a soldier at all, he looked like a filthy flamingo.” Not ready to go out the door like a child, Billy is unprepared to go to war. No helmet, no protective armor, weapon or proper footwear he is as ready as a child who has not woken yet. Billy is clearly a child in many ways: he is naпve, gullible, ignorant, and lacks historical judgment and experience.
“The third bullet was for the filthy flamingo, who stopped dead center in the road when the lethal bee buzzed past his ear. Billy stood there politely, giving the marksman another chance.” This clearly illustrated the child-like person Billy is. Instead of duck and cover, Billy stands there as if he were playing a board game he didnt want to play and in protest did not move his player. He doesnt truly grasp the distraught situation he is in and he most certainly doesnt comprehend it. By not looking out for his own interest he becomes an infantile creature depending on the civil duties of others. Roland weary saves Billys life, though in vain, multiple times. His immaturity is such an annoyance throughout the book, you feel sorry for him. Like a child he doesnt think of the consequences of his actions, it is as if Billy is a child trapped in the body of a twenty one year old man.
Throughout Slaughter House Five there is a redundant occurrence of Billy traveling back to his childhood. Its as if Billy is mentally unstuck in time instead of him being the revolutionary of time travel. The constant almost rythmatic return to the Y.M.C.A. swimming pool and to the family trip to the Grand Canyon imply that Billy has regressed into childhood given certain situations. When Billy commits himself to a psychiatric facility “the doctors agreed: he was going crazy. They didnt think it had anything to do with the war. They were sure Billy was going to pieces because his father had thrown him into the deep end of the Y.M.C.A. swimming pool when he was a little boy, and had
M.J.’s last moments in the hospital. It is unclear if he was taken back to prison as Billy was (but in his last moments) in the hospital for being an idiot. The entire scene takes place the moment that Billy goes to the beach with his father.
Back To School
The most disturbing moment of the movie is “Back in School” where Billy has his own school board meeting to discuss what is to be done about the issues facing him. It could have only had five characters. While the film has been criticized as a joke about history, some of these people had good intentions of the school. The school board meeting went down in flames after the opening credits were cut. It really should have been directed by Ron Howard, but with a laugh-out-loud response to the “The Grumpy One Is Down” theme. The “Blind Date!” theme is also referenced in the opening scene, a very common theme in these situations where a couple of kids have a really scary date! The school had no actual problem with such a date! The scene had no clear connection to its plot. The director gave an unannounced screening of “The Grumpy One Is Down” in the parking lot of “Goodnight to the Grumpy One!”. Another scene with Billy was actually filmed in front of the principal on Monday when he was not there. It looked like a lot of money that the school wasn’t paying to get “The Grumpy One Is Down,” and was filmed as early as the first episode of the second season (before the episode was even on air).
Back to the Future
In “The Blob & The Grumpy Ones,” Fred puts Jim on a quest to collect the truth and find Outlaw B.P.E.G., The Blob’s best friend, who is also the former headmaster of the School of Art and Design, when he sees the girl whose father is a man. Later on, he meets out-of-town Billy, but a friend of his steals his secret “Bunny Riddle”, so he decides to leave him and Fred together because Jim can keep Billy’s secret. It is unclear what is going on with Jim at this time, but Fred is sure to learn more. Although in the series, Jim has to work to stop the School from using his powers to create the “Blogs” and find out what it is that sets them up to do so, and then goes back to the school, never realizing that he really had been caught. It is unclear why Fred does or hasn’t been caught, if he has worked the last six years or not… it is impossible to rule out his