Quote:
Originally Posted by Levin
This reminds me of War and Peace, and Tolstoy's theory of free agency. I'm sure you read it, but Tolstoy's essay on War and Peace explains that his primary aim was to show that over large events, people have little choice. That is, a person born in Russia during the Napoleonic wars was likely to be a part of those wars; no choice. But the Russian soldier in the war did have a choice at the minute level; he had a choice over what kind of soldier he'd be. So free agency expands and contracts based on the level of generality or specificity.
Contemporary Mormons would provide a good example for Tolstoy's theory. They can't help to be caught up in the gay rights battle at the moment; it's beyond their powers. But they have a choice how they are going to wage that battle.
Of course the freedom of agency depends where you place in the heirarchy, which is what the SS officer is appealing to: he was in the SS, and so his freedom over how to wage the war was less than someone working in a munitions factory. A Stake President or Bishop has less freedom to oppose Prop 8 than a deacon. What if an apostle disagreed with the Church's position on Prop 8? What are his choices? Probably the same as if one of Hitler's generals who disagreed with the invasion of Poland.
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I have read and re-read War and Peace throughout. Tolstoy is more arguing against the great man theory of history, and one thing that makes the novel so long and unusual is he has essays of this sort all through it though the narration is third person. There are editions that eliminate them, but I love them.
The unrepentant SS officer addresses your point. He meticulously shows that the ones who were placed in the hierarchy such that they had some degree of choice were a miniscule percentage. On the other hand, had they not been aided by millions of hard working citizens manning the trains, the trucks, the cement factories, the pharmaceutical labs, etc. etc. who knew what was happening they couldn't have accomplished what they did--i.e., kill something like 30 people a second for four years (the 30 people may be off but he arithmatically some horrific figure like that).