In this play a reference is made by a Chief of Police to the political necessity for killing people: a necessity so distressing to the statesmen and so terrifying to the common citizen that nobody except myself (as far as I know) has ventured to examine it directly on its own merits, although every Government is obliged to practise it on a scale varying from the execution of a single murderer to the slaughter of millions of quite innocent persons. Whilst assenting to these proceedings, and even acclaiming and celebrating them, we dare not tell ourselves what we are doing or why we are doing it; and so we call it justice or capital punishment or our duty to king and country or any other convenient verbal whitewash for what we instinctively recoil from as from a dirty job. These childish evasions are revolting. We must strip off the whitewash and find out what is really beneath it. Extermination must be put on a scientific basis if it is ever to be carried out humanely and apologetically as well as thoroughly.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Governments often justify killing as duty while avoiding honest examination of its moral cost.
- In plain terms
- States label killing as justice to avoid facing its moral weight.
- What can you take from it?
- Face the reality of state violence honestly.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- When is state killing justified?
- How do we face moral costs?
Another view
Some killing may be necessary to prevent greater harm.
More from George Bernard Shaw
You use a glass mirror to see your face: you use works of art to see your soul.
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