Americans have always been terrified of one thing: losing their country. Losing their country to Communism has been a worry since the 1940’s and ‘50’s. A man named Joseph McCarthy helped escalate this paranoia. The sense of paranoia, among other similarities, is clearly present in The Crucible more than any other work of modern literature.
The most obvious way The Crucible relates to McCarthyism is how the residents of Salem are afraid of witchcraft taking over their village the same way that Americans are fearful of Communism taking over their country. Communism and witchcraft are both taboo ideas in society. In The Crucible, the “higher power” of the village took major steps in trying to stop the spread of witchcraft just as the government took major steps to stop the spread of Communism. Many innocent people were convicted, and some were even executed…show more content… Joseph McCarthy finally accused the wrong person and got what he deserved. In 1954, he accused the Army’s Secretary of being a Communist. McCarthy took him to trial, and it was televised around the country. He failed to provide any evidence, so this resulted in the public’s distrust in McCarthy and made him an enemy to other powerful Senators. Although John Proctor did nothing nearly as bad as McCarthy, they were in the same situation. Proctor could not prove the girls were lying about witchcraft, so he went to trial and was convicted of witchcraft himself. His name was almost ruined like McCarthy’s was. Proctor was put to death at the end. This symbolizes the death of McCarthyism and Americans’ fear of Communism forever. The Crucible compares in many ways to McCarthyism, the Red Scare, and Communism in general. Some of the evidence appears as clear as daylight, and some is buried deep in the play’s meaning waiting to be found. One thing is clear though: Society does not like to accept taboo ideologies and will do whatever it can to strike them
