Starkey points out that none of these women attend church. Sarah Good and Sarah Osborne claim to be innocent of any witchcraft all the way up until when they were hanged. When Tituba is on trial she explains that the devil made her do it, and that Sarah Good, Sarah Osborne and the three others where involved. Two others are accused of being witches; Martha and her husband Giles. When the trials began, many accused others of witchcraft and this lead to them accusing even more.
By comparing the periods of the Salem Witch trials in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible and the era of McCarthyism in the film Good Night and Good Luck, I can say that these two periods were essentially the same, only the name of the threat was different. Also I can draw some parallels between the relationship between the Estonians and the Russians during nowadays. First similarity is the spreading of paranoia and terror among the society. In Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, people were afraid, that their fellow members of the society were witches. Terror and panic rose in the Salem community as the paranoia and terror about the communists did in the era of McCarthyism during the late 1940s to the late 1950s.
She was arrested and tried for practicing witchcraft because of her American Indian decent. Seen as “Devil worshipers” American Indians were perceived as being familiar with occult practices (536). This stereotype left Tituba with no control of her situation and fearful for her life. Tituba’s ethnic background left her victim to stereotypes that previous to her confession, would have most likely only sealed her dooming fate. Luckily, Tituba was able to use her knowledge of African, American Indian and English folklore to her advantage, diverting the attention away from her socially and geographically.
The Salem Witch Trials, The Crucible, and the Red Scare all relate in one major way; groups of people all accused for actions that most of them never did. During the Salem Witch Trials at least two hundred people, mainly women, were accused of practicing witchcraft (Salem). The court had no actual proof of witchcraft against them except, they were still sentenced to jail or execution. The Crucible takes place in the same time period of the Salem Witch Trials and very closely mirrors the trials with a few liberties taken by Arthur Miller to make the stage production work with the space of a stage, and make the plot more relatable. Written in the early 1950’s and published not long after that, many believe that Miller wanted to connect the Salem Witch Trials to what was happening with McCarthyism.
Logan Cornett English 11 A Ms. Long 18 January, 2013 The Crucible and McCarthyism In the play The Crucible, Arthur Miller tells a story about the Salem witch trials. He writes about a group of girls who get caught casting spells and dancing naked in the woods. The girls deny that they were seen doing such things and began to blame it on innocent people. This imaginary piece of writing may seem farfetched however it does have real life parallels to a dark time in American history. Although The Crucible is an artistic creation of brilliant play write, it reflects the real life drama created by Joseph McCarthy and the HUAC.
In the 1950's, however, people were terrified of the red Communists coming to take over their beloved country. Senator McCarthy was the one taking out other people in the govornment that he suspected to be a communist via inprisonment. The witch trials and McCarthyism started differently as well, for one started with a group of young girls' voodoo practice and the other started when senator McCarthy was trying to win an election and took advantage of the peoples feelings toward the "Red scare." A lot of the evil things McCarthyism did were private and behind closed govornment doors. During the Salem Witch Trials the accused people were forced to make a public confession and be killed in front of their family and friends.
Norton’s argument for that case supports a conflict of traditions thesis to a very big extent. Prior to the 1692 Salem witchcraft cases, many other related cases had been reported and the accused taken to court but there was no form of punishments given to the accused instead, they were acquitted. The reason for why the magistrates behaved in that manner in dealing with the 1692 witch cases is based on the fact that, the magistrates were at that time the outpost’s councillors and also martial leaders in addition to being the judges of the unique court that was founded by the ruler in May that year to deal with the witchcraft cases. In the previous witch cases, the judges were intensely occupied with the war against the Wabanaki Indians and then afterwards the insidious New England in 1988 and thus did not have much time to spend on court trials (Norton, 2003,
When Hale comes and visits John and Elizabeth Proctor; he wants to investigate the people who are accused in court. Elizabeth and Proctor are astonished when Hale mentions that Rebecca Nurse has been accused of witchcraft. In the Crucible Rebecca Nurse is pictured as a saint throughout the play. The first clue that shows Hale is beginning to notice something wrong is when Rebecca’s been charged by saying “God forbid such a one be charged” (Miller 1210). Towards the end of Act II he starts to have some suspicion on what is going on because now Elizabeth Proctor is accused of witchcraft.
Who weeps for these, weeps for corruption.” says Danforth to the crowd because John Proctor was standing up to him and he ripped up he confession and speaking of the truth. The vindictive trait that is present in McCarthy, who distorted evidence and manipulated people. An example of a person who was innocently accused is Rebecca Nurse from “The Crucible” who represents Lillian Hellmann. Rebecca was as woman with up holding morals, which is evident when she refused to confess the names of other “witches”. She does not want to get caught in a web of lies.
In the United States, there were worries of Communism infiltrating the government; however, in the Salem community, there were worries of witchcraft being practiced in the town. Secondly, McCarthyism was used within both communities since, in the 1950’s, the United States were on the edge for Communism and accusing citizens without any proof; moreover, in Salem, the townspeople were very alert for any sign of witchcraft, which led to following any accusation that were said, even if there wasn’t any proof. After World War 2 ended in September 2nd, 1945, the United States were scared that Communism was supported by their citizens, even by people in the United States government. Arthur Miller describes the United States’ paranoia as that, “it [fear]” has “always” been “with us, “this anxiety, sometimes directed toward foreigners”