At the beginning of part 3, Captain Beatty and Montag arrive at Montag's home after Mildred calls in an alarm on him. Before Captain Beatty forces Montag to burn his home and book collection, he gives Montag a speech regarding the importance of burning literature and censoring knowledge. As Captain Beatty holds onto the flamethrower, he says to Montag,

What is fire? It's a mystery. Scientists give us gobbledegook about friction and molecules. But they don't really know. Its real beauty is that it destroys responsibility and consequences"(Bradbury, 53).

Captain Beatty's comment reveals his ideology concerning the importance of destroying literature and illustrates the dystopian society's throwaway culture. Captain Beatty believes that it is easiest to simply burn and destroy anything that causes the slightest bit of discomfort. Similar to other citizens living in Bradbury's dystopian society, Beatty's comments correspond to the way that the citizens deal with adversity. One of the main reasons why literature became illegal in the first place was because citizens did not enjoy listening to authors critique their society and superficial culture. Rather than face the adversity, the government chose to censure all literature by destroying books with fire. Captain Beatty supports the government's stance and agrees that it is easiest to destroy problems and responsibilities rather than to develop as a society by facing adversity.

This quote comes at the first climax, when Montag faces Beatty. Beatty is forcing Montag to burn his own house and all the books he has stolen, and then Montag will be arrested and probably executed. Montag, still in the passionate grip of his new-found individualism, is resisting; Beatty, a master of language and words, is trying to convince Montag one last time that the future society's philosophies are correct:

"What is fire? It's a mystery. Scientists give us gobbledegook about friction and molecules. But they don't really know. Its real beauty is that it destroys responsibility and consequences. A problem gets too burdensome, then into the furnace with it. Now, Montag, you're a burden."
(Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451, Google Books)

Beatty is explaining that this philosophy is all about the immediate, the present time, without concern for the past or future. Anything that doesn't fit in with the present is a burden, and must be destroyed; historically, fire is the ultimate destroyer, cleaning the surface for the next event. After the fire, who is to know what was said, or done, and when, and for what reason? Beatty wants the books destroyed because it absolves him and everyone else in the society from their responsibilities as humanity; they can ignore everything except what happens on their television screens, and trust the fire of the firemen to keep all other influences at bay.

What is this quote from Fahrenheit 451 about? "Its real beauty is that it destroys responsibility and consequences."

This is at the beginning of Part III of Fahrenheit 451, "Burning Bright." Beatty is talking about the mystery and mythology of fire. Some say the discovery of fire is the beginning of technology. Fire has been used to power machines but it has also been a destructive force. Of the many applications of fire, Beatty is celebrating the power of fire to destroy responsibilities and consequences.

If ideas and philosophies in literature complicate life, Beatty would have them burnt. If the public is kept in the dark, kept from ever reading challenging ideas, they will stay passive. But as soon as the public is given access to knowledge and encouraged to learn, they will develop a desire for more knowledge and will want to be a part of making decisions that affect themselves and the society they live in. Taking part in those decisions, they will want to become responsible and they will want to face the consequences for their decisions. In short, a literate, free-thinking public will embrace responsibility. 

Beatty admires the "beauty" of fire to destroy all literature that would encourage the public to think for themselves. For Beatty, the beauty of fire is that by destroying literature, people become passive and mentally suppressed. 

Beatty also implies that people should be "burnt" or done away with if they, like literature, encourage others to think for themselves. In this same paragraph, Beatty says:

A problem gets too burdensome, then into the furnace with it. Now, Montag, you're a burden. And fire will lift you off my shoulders, clean, quick, sure; nothing to rot later. Anti-biotic, aesthetic, practical.