Getting Married · Chapter
The Pathology of Marriage explained
Shaw addresses the pathology and criminology of marriage, acknowledging the existence of disease and contagion but choosing to focus not on obvious horrors but on the ignorance of normal, respectable people.
What happens
Shaw addresses the pathology and criminology of marriage, acknowledging the existence of disease and contagion but choosing to focus not on obvious horrors but on the ignorance of normal, respectable people. He criticizes the willful ignorance that refuses to face the facts of venereal disease, noting that the innocent often suffer as much as the guilty, and argues that once people understand this, their self-righteous indifference will turn to concern for themselves and their families.
Themes in this chapter
Hypocrisy and Social Pretense
Shaw attacks the self-righteous attitude of those who refuse to know about marriage pathology, calling it a 'wicked and foolish' spirit that hides behind a 'righteous air'.
Population and Social Consequences
The discussion of contagion affecting innocent children and parents touches on the social consequences of disease and the need for public awareness.
Key passages
“I shall also say as little as possible of the pathology of marriage and its kerbstone breakwater.”
Shaw intends to say very little about the pathology of marriage and its superficial protections.
Shaw signals his focus away from obvious horrors toward hidden evils.
“We who do not want to know also do not want to go blind, to go mad, to be disfigured, to be barren, to become pestiferous, or to see such things happening to our children.”
People who claim they don't want to know about these diseases also don't want to suffer their consequences or see their children suffer.
Shaw exposes the contradiction in willful ignorance.
“Once knock this fact into people's minds, and their self-righteous indifference and intolerance soon change into lively concern for themselves and their families.”
Once people understand that the innocent suffer as much as the guilty, their smug indifference turns into genuine concern for their own well-being.
Shaw argues that knowledge will overcome moral hypocrisy.