Similarities Between The Crucible And Mccarthyism

The Crucible Essay Izabel Ureta Per. 4 10/19/15 The Crucible by Arthur Miller was written to warn Americans about the propaganda and misleading information that the McCarthy Era advertised in the 1950s. Miller compared McCarthyism to the Salem Witch Trials in order to demonstrate how both events enabled hysteria by promoting prejudgement and the lack of morality in society.

This time period was known as McCarthyism because U.S Senator Joseph McCarthy started to excuse people of being communist. They all the following things in common: false accusations, lack of evidence, and resistance. One parallel of McCarthyism is that they both gave out names in order to save

McCarthyism was a period in America where there was an intense suspicion of Communists in the Government Department. McCarthyism was named after U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy, a Republican of Wisconsin. McCarthyism took place during the Red Scare in the 1920s. The Crucible and McCarthyism are parallels because both of them lacked evidence, people were blaming each other, and some people were resisting

Joseph McCarthy claimed to have a list of 205 people they were in the state department that were communist. President Truman received a letter from Joseph McCarthy saying “ he posse 57 communist in the state department” , In the following weeks the number of pele rose to 81and then it shave down to 10 (Doc C). In relation to the story about the lack of evidence of Joseph McCarthy’s list of people the story in Document D can relate to to the topic of lack of proof which was also in the times of The Salem Witch Trials. Basically, during the times of the Salem Witch Trials the court relied upon spectral evidence.

People were terrified of communism spreading to the United States, so when accusations started floating around everyone would believe them. McCarthy accused people of communist behavior, although many were falsely accused, no one knew better than to think they were guilty because of how scared they were of communism spreading. This resembles how certain characters were accused of witchcraft in The Crucible. The Red Scare caused nationwide hysteria just how the Salem Witch Trials caused hysteria to the people of Salem.

The Salem witch trials and McCarthyism have an uncanny relation to one another. In Salem people were afraid of not appearing christian enough, meanwhile during the 50’s Americans feared of being accused of communism. Also during the McCarthyism era and the witch trials innocent lives were ruined when people were forced to accuse others or be accused themselves. Though The Crucible is an allegory for McCarthyism, it focuses some of its attention on the question what is more important, your honor and reputation or your life?

However, during the time of McCarthyism, people suddenly believed if a person went against the government thoughts, they were a communist. Similarly, this is like a time in The Crucible when a mass amount of women were arrested for witchcraft. After Mary Warren comes home from watching the witchcraft trials, John Proctors asks if it is true if only fourteen women arrested. Instead Mary Warren replies, “No, sir. There be thirty-nine now” (Miller, Act II).

The Salem witch trials proved to be one of the most cruel and fear driven events to ever occur in history. Many innocent people were accused of witchcraft, and while some got out of the situation alive not everyone was as lucky. Arthur Miller the author of The Crucible conveys this horrific event in his book and demonstrates what fear can lead people to do. But the reason as to why Arthur Miller felt the need to write The Crucible in the first place was because the unfortunate reality that history seemed to have repeated itself again. In the article “Are You Now or Were You Ever”, Arthur Miller claims that the McCarthy era and the Salem witch trials were similar and he does this through his choice of diction, figurative language, and rhetorical questions.

Mass hysteria was present in both The Crucible and McCarthyism. Mass hysteria is when people went crazy because people were accused of being communists and or witches. Mass hysteria was however started by specific people in both scenarios. In Mccarthyism Joseph Mccarthy a United States Senator and in The Crucible Abigail Williams who was accused of having an affair with John Proctor her employer were the specific ones who accused people of being communists and witches. Even though the Salem witch trials happened in the late 1690s and McCarthyism in the 1950s they paralleled each other.

McCarthyism is a political attitude as The Salem witch trials were just a hunt for witches. Both McCarthyism and and The Salem witch trials were big mass hysterias Mccarthy had accused three hundred and twenty people of being communists versus the two hundred that were accused of being witches during The Salem witch trials. They both had to deal with attitude in a way mostly, because everyone was terrified they were all trying to find someone guilty as the fear consumed them, they wanted to feel safe in their community safe from the Soviet union or safe from the devil, and they were not going to feel safe until all the ¨communists¨ or ¨witches¨ that are guilty were found. But in all reality these were innocent people in the McCarthyism era and during The Salem witch trials, the innocent didn't deserve to die during The Salem witch trials nineteen innocent people were hanged during The Salem witch trials simply because of other people's fear and falsely accusing them, because they didn't like the person or that other people longed for what they had. The Salem witch trials were quite the tragedy and many suffered from this

In the Crucible those who were accused of being guilty, put on trial, and who are expected to confess. Unsuccessful to that led to death. In McCarthy, the media were not disposed to stand up to Senator McCarthy for the fear of being accused of being a Communist. Fear is the main factor playing in both situations, terror of being accused or what people might say, or think.

McCarthyism was a vociferous campaign against alleged communists in the US government. Many of the accused were blacklisted or lost their jobs, although most did not in fact belong to the Communist Party. In these two events, many similarities

In the play, The Crucible, Salem, Massachusetts, along with the United States during McCarthyism, is engulfed with paranoia. Although both situations include different causes, their effects are strikingly similar. For instance, throughout The Crucible, Abigail Williams is being shown repeatedly accusing innocent people of witchcraft. Her actions begin sending the small town into a panic as they throw people into jail and hang them in an effort to try and cleanse the town from any aspect of evil. Similarly, throughout 1950-1954, Joseph McCarthy falsely accused people within the United States Government of being a member of the Communist party.

In Arthur Miller 's play The Crucible, false accusations and fear are used to imprison and kill many people accused of being witches. In this way, The Crucible stands as an allegory for McCarthy 's communist hunt, during which many people were also killed and imprisoned due to accusations of communism. By comparing McCarthyism to the Salem Witch Trials, Miller is able to communicate that people should not conform to societal trends because these trends may be misleading and cause innocent people to get hurt. Many characters in The Crucible serve as allegories to McCarthy 's communist hunt, specifically Abigail Williams, Giles Corey, and Betty Parris.

Arthur Miller constructs his play upon the famous Salem witch trails. Miller's Crucible was written in the early 1950s. Miller wrote his drama during the brief reign of the American senator Joseph McCarthy whose bitter criticized anti- communism sparkled the need for the United States to be a dramatic anti- communist society during the early tense years of the cold war. By orders from McCarthy himself, committees of the Congress commenced highly controversial investigations against communists in the U.S similar to the alleged Salem witches situation. Convict communists were ordered to confess their crime and name others to avoid the retribution.