Parallels Between Mccarthyism And The Crucible

The Crucible is a play written by Arthur Miller in 1952 and first performed in 1953. It’s a partially fictional story based on historical events: the Salem witch trials that took place in Massachusetts in 1692. As seen in the online videos attached to the play, it’s an allegory for the intolerance of McCarthyism and for the persecution of communists who were blacklisted and banned from employment in the late 1950’s. In 1956 Miller himself was summoned before the HCUA (House Committee on Un-American Activities) questioned and blacklisted for refusing to denounce others.

There are lots of parallels between the play and the McCarthyism events. In both people were summoned before an authority, interrogated, intimidated and frequently forced to

betray others in order to protect themselves from being persecuted and accused.
Indeed during the McCarthyism era the Senator led a witch hunt against supposed communists among celebrities, government officials, and even writers.

There were false accusations of artists and Hollywood figures. Many of them were blacklisted because of their alleged ties to the communist party. Further, as with the alleged witches of Salem, suspected communists were encouraged to confess their crimes and to betray others.

In the world of The Crucible set in a theocratic society that repressed individual freedom there is no room for deviation from social norms. Witches are also summoned, questioned and accused without any proof. Everyone is looking over their shoulders and lives in fear of rumors or of being accused of witchcraft. Lives could be ruined with a simple point of finger. REPUTATION

So both witches and communists were accused without any proof and blacklisted. Obviously people commit the same mistakes ever again.

But what is really relevant here today is the role that mass hysteria can play in tearing apart a community; the speed with which gossip and rumors spread, and the inability of people to stop accusations once they have started.

Indeed these accusations without any proper evidence or trial like during McCarthyism era recall recent cases in the United

States:
A few months ago the New York Times and New Yorker accused one of Hollywood’s most powerful movie producers Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment and assault.
A growing list of women in the film industry came forward with assault allegations against the producer. The scandal quickly expended throughout America but also abroad and in France. It soon became a global scandal.
Today accusations abound: across the media and social networks, on television and in newspapers, the allegations against Weinstein or other celebrities are growing and treated as truths almost as final judgements without any evidence or trial. Suspected actors are eliminated and replaced in films or series in order not to risk losing audiences.
It’s like a new blacklist, some kind of witch hunt just like with the McCarthyism or in The Crucible. Both refer to any act of making accusations of treason without proper evidence. But media trials are “dangerous”. Medias shouldn’t act as judge or executioner even if it’s respectable. This is no longer about individual justice; it becomes collective vengeance or media lynching.