The Role Of Sexism In Pygmalion

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Should there or should there not be a social class system? That is the question at hand in George Bernard Shaw’s play Pygmalion; even though Shaw does not directly state this question, nor the answer to this question in the play’s five acts. It is blatantly made clear, though, that one of Shaw’s primary goals was to influence society to question itself for what it had developed for a social class system. Shaw himself states:
I am, and have always been, and shall now always be, a revolutionary writer, because our laws make law impossible; our liberties destroy all freedom; our property is organized robbery; our morality is an impudent hypocrisy; our wisdom is administered by inexperienced or malexperienced dupes, our power wielded by cowards
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During the setting and the publication of Pygmalion in 1912, sexism was slowly in decline; however, just the idea of sexism existing in the first place was what prompted Shaw to criticize all of society in his play Pygmalion. And it is quite clear that he was calling “attention to questions of femininity and gender” because of how “the title of Shaw’s play is taken from the myth of Pygmalion” (Fredericksen, Femininity and Gender Roles). Similarly, in both the play and the myth, the protagonist is seen creating their own “perfect” ideas of what a woman is and how a woman should act (Fredericksen, Femininity and Gender Roles). In Shaw’s doing so of this, he is trying to show society how “unrealistic and even unnatural the expectations that society has for women are” (Fredericksen, Femininity and Gender Roles). Additionally, society’s expectations are mirrored by Higgins’s expectations of what the ideal woman should be like. Which is quite disturbing considering Higgins is an anti-feminist. In the play, Higgins goes out of his way to exclaim, “I find that the moment I let a woman make friends with me, she becomes jealous, exacting, suspicious, and a damned nuisance. I find that the moment I let myself make friends with a woman, I become selfish and tyrannical. Women upset everything” (Shaw and Bertolini 394). So, at this point, it is plausible to …show more content…
It is a commonwealth in which work is play and play is life: three in one and one in three. It is a temple in which the priest is the worshipper and the worshipper the worshipped: three in one and one in three. It is a godhead in which all life is human and all humanity is divine: three in one and one in three. It is, in short, the dream of a mad-man. (Shaw and Bertolini Introduction 10)
In more simplistic terms, Shaw is trying to make society realize a society with true equality in every way is undeniably a heavenly world. But society, in all records of time, is too foolish to grasp this and inevitably establish themselves as not worthy of this world. If this world did exist, though, there is no reason to not consider the idea that “true morality would reveal itself” (Criticisms). So, is Shaw really a madman for having this dream of

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