Imagine sitting in a courtroom 400 years ago, forced to recite the bible because you have been accused of being a witch. You are stripped of your rights and your life is in danger unless you repent by selling out other witches. Now imagine your in the middle of the Cold War, the threat of a nuclear war is thick in the air and your accused of being a Communist. Again Your stripped of your rights to a fair trial, and being held on the account of accusation, with little to no evidence. It feels like the media and everyone you know suddenly hates you, and there’s no way out of this snowball effect. Play writer Arthur Miller used his playwright "The Crucible" to symbolize the similarities between the Witch Hunts and the Salem Witch Trials in the late 1600s and the threat of Communism, and The Red Scare, in the 1960s. Both incidents used scapegoats in order to relieve tensions and attempt to calm the people by creating a common enemy to take the blame. The lack of technology, unexplainable diseases, misfortunes back in the 1600s were blamed on the "Witches". The threat of war, falling economy, communism and spying for the Soviets were blamed on the "Communists". Both incidents display the power of the media, mass hysteria and the lack of independent thought. It became easier to blame all the misfortunes on a invisible enemy rather than acknowledge their failures or find the explanation. This effect also causes doubt in the community itself and raises suspicion on each other, causing more frenzy and with the government allowing this, fear, accusations, and false rumors continued to grow. In "The Crucible", everything started with the Salem girls running in the woods around the boiling cauldron. Coincidentally, a girl in the village fell sick with a coma, which was unexplainable at the time. While the cauldron represents The wildness of the girls and their desires, Its similar to the way the girls would fall to jealousy to accuse their enemies of being a witch, Senator Joseph McCarthy would accuse officials of being Communists to have them eliminated. McCarthy's desire was The people of Salem would eventually accuse each other to obtain land, money, possession and love. Abigail Williams says on page 40; "She made me do it, She made Betty do it!". This quote represents how people acted during the trials, and this was equivalent to being "Hard evidence", enough to destroy lives and cause even more chaos. Likewise, the primary targets of McCarthyism were government employees, entertainers, educators and union activists. This was to eliminate the possibility of spreading the truth and also allowing McCarthy to rise in power, by accusing his rivals. On page 97 of "The Crucible", A conversation between a lawyer and a State judge;
"How many names are there?"
"Ninety-one your excellency."
"These people should be summoned, for questioning."
In the playwright, Ninety-one people have to appear in court, Possibly endangering their lives, all because of accusations and their attempts to justify the accused. Normally evidence and eye-witnesses would help clear a case, but during the witch trials, the suspicions are based on religion and invisible accusations. Making it hard to prove their case, and their only way out is by creating more accusations. In both cases, investigators saw only one side of the case and its usually a one sided paradox. During the Red scare, many well known artists, entertainers and actors were "Blacklisted" by the committee, for many of them, their careers were destroyed regardless of past achievements and merits. Accusations destroyed their lives and neither themselves or the people could do little against it. Some notable people who were blacklisted include Arthur Miller himself, Charlie Chaplin, and W.E.B Du Bois.
This shows that during those time periods, accusations, whether true or false would negatively affect their lives.
