Essay On Salem Witch Trials And Mccarthyism

Salem Witch Trials and McCarthyism Throughout history, society as a whole has experienced many different tragedies. All around the world negative events have taken place that affect large groups of citizens. Mass hysteria is one of many examples. Mass hysteria can be defined as a large group of people whose behavior exhibits overwhelming or unmanageable fear or emotional excess (Merriam Webster 613). Mass hysteria caused and contributed to many life changing events, including the Salem Witch Trials and McCarthyism. The Salem Witch Trials began in 1692 in Salem Village, Massachusetts. Many believed “that the Devil could give certain people, known as witches, the power to harm others in return for their loyalty” (A Brief History of the Salem Witch Trials 1). This began a craze for witchcraft in Europe, including a wave of hysteria, which led up to the Salem Witch Trials. Elizabeth Parris and Abigail Williams
In America, Senator Joseph McCarthy made public a list of over 200 people who were accused of infiltrating the government and who showed communistic actions. McCarthy’s “zealous campaigning ushered in one of the most repressive times in the 20th century American politics” (McCarthyism 1). Those accused were mainly writers and entertainers who then suffered many consequences from the public's paranoia. Arthur Miller, one of the 320 artists accused and blacklisted of communism, went on to write The Crucible. This work traced back to the hunt of communism due to McCarthyism in 1953. Miller described, “we were living in an art form, a metaphor that had suddenly, incredibly, gripped the nation” (The Salem Witch Trials and McCarthyism 2). Eventually, those against Joseph McCarthy’s actions were powerful enough to remove him from office in 1954. The idea of McCarthyism still haunts the United States government and society