The Crucible And Mccarthyism

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as worse than the other and saying one man 's suffering is more than someone else 's, “it is necessary to observe that the situation of our own time is more complex and therefore potentially more useful to the artist” (Popkin, 140). If people called McCarthy’s acted on communism “The Modern Day Witch Trials”, then could we say that The Crucible to be considered to be called “The Light of McCarthyism”? Could being accused of being a witch can be considered to be the same as being accused of being a communist? Both events had a person of power (or a person who gained power over accusations) who accused people of being either a witch or a communist (Abigail Williams in The Crucible, and Senator Joseph McCarthy during the Second Red Scare) (Bonnet, …show more content…
Both events, if you did not confess to your action, either witchcraft or being a communist, you were hung (The Crucible) or sent to jail (Red Scare). Even both had the similar question when you were being held in court. In The Crucible, the question was “Have you now, or ever been, seen with the Devil?” (Miller, The Crucible). In the communist allegations, the most famous question, “Are you now or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party of the United States?” (Popkin, 139). And finally, if we actually look up the definition of what “McCarthyism” is, it states “the practice of making accusations of disloyalty, especially of pro-Communist activity, in many instances unsupported by proof or based on slight, doubtful, or irrelevant evidence”. Both events were showed a lack of proof, evidence, and any intelligence that people accused were seen with the devil or part-take in communism. With this support, this shows that McCarthyism was used within The Crucible and Salem Puritans community, before when it was actually given its name almost 250 years …show more content…
Now, with Senator Joseph McCarthy being the so-called leader of the communist allegations, also having McCarthyism being named after him, and Abigail Williams being the “leader” (along with the group of girls with her) of the court of accusing people of taking part in witchcraft and being seen with the devil, we can argue that Miller, in fact, wrote to make Abigail Williams portray the Senator. Although they were not the same gender or were not close in age, both showed similarities during both events. Both accused many people of partaking in either witchcraft or communism. Both got people to stand with them and made them believe that they wanted them to think, either they were seen to be with the devil or a part of the Communist party. Both accused of higher parties to be involved, Abigail Williams accusing the court after the allegations of her and Proctor’s affair and the Senator for accessing the US army for taking part in the communist party. After this, both lost their credibility which then led to the end of both the witch trials and the Second Red Scare. Both Abigail and Senator McCarthy had bad reputations before both events occurred; Abigail was left go from her job which her name was spread badly around the village, as where Senator McCarthy was running for a second term, which his 1st term was unimpressive and no

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