Dutch right-wing politician Geert Wilders was banned from a 2015 keynote conference in a five-star hotel. Despite his controversial opinions, it could be valuable to listen to him and others before judging their views. Both sides of an argument can have valid truths to contribute, but if one side is excluded because many fear offending others by uttering something politically incorrect, a plethora of information will be missed. Sacrificing the truth may become the solution to political incorrectness. Arthur Miller, author of the celebrated play The Crucible, writes this bleak work to challenge McCarthyism, an anti-communist ideology that exploded through 1950s American politics. Both The Crucible and McCarthyism embodied witch hunts that
“I saw Sarah Good with the Devil! I saw Goody Osburn with the Devil! I saw Bridget Bishop with the Devil!” Abigail screams. Evidently, she understands this concept. By confessing, Abigail gains the power to accuse without question: if anyone did, they risk her retaliation.
Equally, professions of sins are currently materializing. Andy Chu, an organiser of an anti-racism protest declares, “I am straight. I am male. I am white (mostly). I am comfortably middle-class. [...] It’s obvious. I am a racist. I am a sexist. I wish I wasn’t. But I am. I understand racism—not completely, of course, but I have a good idea of what it means, what it looks like. I know it’s wrong. But I’m still a racist.” He advocates for political correctness, running campaigns against racism, how can he be racist? Many others have also come out with similarly ridiculous claims on social media. Do they blame themselves so that criticism of political incorrectness is not validated? Chu goes on to say that he is racist purely because he is part of a social structure that is racist, effectively blaming everyone else for his racism. Like Andy Chu, the people who erroneously confess, after deflecting the blame, can pass the diatribe onto something
Joseph McCarthy was a Republican senator who did as much as he could to whip up anti-communism in the 1950s. In the time of his term, he didn’t attach his name to anything significant until February 9, 1950. On that day, he gave a political speech claiming that he had a list of 205 Communists in the State Department. Although nobody saw the list of names and it wasn’t clarified by anybody else, the speech made national news. Furthermore, this relates to The Crucible because Abigail, like McCarthy, made multiple false witch accusations on women in Salem. Arthur Miller’s historical play, The Crucible, portrays the historical events of the Salem witch trials through a number of memorable characters and a background based off of McCarthyism. While
Authors often have underlying reasons for giving their stories certain themes or settings. Arthur Miller’s masterpiece, The Crucible, is a work of art inspired by actual events as a response to political and moral issues. Set in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692, The Crucible proves to have its roots in events of the 1950’s and 1960’s, such as the activities of the House Un-American Committee and the “Red Scare.” Though the play provides an accurate account of the Salem witch trials, its real achievement lies in the many important issues of Miller’s time that it dealswith.
During Author Miller’s era of the 1950’s, the ‘cold war’ was happening. Senetor Joeseph McCarthy was completely against communism and began to arrest the communists and people assosiating with them. Those arrested were forced to either name names to identify those who were communists or thought to be, or else they would remain in jail. This was callef McCarthyism For many, being prisioned was a terrible frightening thought so they would name names including any that they could think of that could be innocent. Author Miller was arrested for associating with communists and refused to identify others, and wrote The Crucible, using it as an allegory to identify the problems of society and it’s flaws of the corrupt government.
It was easier for them to blame the devil for the problems of society than fix the problems of their own strict way of life. So the girls involved with Abigail, like Mercy Lewis and Mary Warren, named many people in the town as witches. These people were put in jail and would be hanged if they did not confess to the crime of devil worship or witchcraft. Another part of the developing plot is that John Proctor knows Abigail and her friends are lying, but he is afraid to say anything because eight months before he had an affair with Abigail and did not want to be seen by the town as a lecher, which means wife cheater. So, Mr. Proctor has to fight with himself to come out and tell the truth, or his wife might die because of Abigail saying she was a witch.
Firstly, Abigail is one figure that blatantly abuses her newfound power in the play. " 'You are charging Abigail Williams with a marvelous cool plot to murder,
The play “The Crucible” by Arthur Miller was written in response to McCarthyism in the 1950’s. In 1692 and 1693 the Salem witch trials took place in Salem Massachusetts. Girls believed to be involved in witchcraft were responsible for these trials. In the late 1940’s and early 1950’s senator McCarthy came to office. Senator McCarthy and some of his allies were responsible for hysteria in the United States of America in the 1950’s. The scare was also in result of a communist scare after World War II and leading to the cold war. The behavior of the people of the Salem witch trials and Americans in the 19050’s resulted in a big scare in reaction to hysteria.
Even though The Crucible is not historically correct, nor is it a perfect allegory for anti-Communism, or as a faithful account of the Salem trials, it still stands out as a powerful and timeless depiction of how intolerance, hysteria, power and authority is able to tear a community apart. The most important of these is the nature of power, authority and its costly, and overwhelming results. “But you must understand, sir, that a person is either with this court or against it,” says Danforth conceitedly. With this antithesis, Miller sums up the attitude of the authorities towards the witch trials that if one goes against the judgement of the court they are essentially breaking their relationship with God. Like everyone else in Salem, Danforth draws a clear line to separate the world into black and white. The concurrent running of the “Crucible” image also captures the quintessence of the courtroom as Abigial stirs up trouble among the people that have good reputation and loving natures in society. In a theocratic government, everything and everyone belongs to either God or the Devil.
Arthur Miller’s The Crucible is a play that was first performed in 1953 in the United States of America in the midst of the persecution of alleged communists during the era of McCarthyism. Although the play explicitly addresses the Salem which hunt, many find that the play is an analogy to McCarthyism due to the striking similarities in which the people behaved. Miller highlight the different groups of characters in order to reveal overlying ideas of the play such as: Self preservation, power, and hypocrisy.
As a whole, racism is largely focused on individual people and very specific acts of oppression against very specific groups of people. But how do you define race? Omi and Winant (1994) argue that race and racism definitions as a whole are limited because they “neglect the institutional and ideological nature of race in America” (p. 10). Race relations are so ingrained in American culture that a 'true' definition of race has never been properly established. The narrow focus on individuals fails to note the impact racism has on society as a whole, especially in politics (Omi and Winant, p. 15). The authors also quote Glazer and Moynihan (1963) stating that ethnic groups are not solely bound by skin color or even by place of origin, but more commonly by “ties of interest” (Omi and Winant p. 18). By defining race and ethnicity by biological means, the fact that these ethnic and racia...
In The Crucible, the mass hysteria surrounding the witch trials caused paranoia amongst the people of Salem. Miller uses the Salem Witch Trials of 1692 as a symbol and allegory of the fear surrounding the spread of communism during the 1950s in America. The community’s sense of justice was blinded by the mass hysteria and for some, a desire for vengeance and personal gain. The Putnams
Shelby suggests that Jorge Garcia presents an inadequate conception of racism, hence a new, more nuanced concept of racism is necessitated. Garcia contends that “racism is always wrong” and that it is an “individual moral vice” (479). Garcia’s “infection model” explains that an “act is racist insofar as a racist heart infects the conduct of the racist; and an institution is racist insofar as it is rooted in the racist attitudes and the resulting racist-infected actions of its founds and/or current functions” (479). Shelby’s response to this is that an action can be racist even if it is separate from racist intentions. Shelby perceives that Garcia holds the idea that “racist beliefs are a secondary and an inessential feature of racism” since “race-based non-cognitive attitudes are the key ingredient, an...
Events have played out in history that made people realize the inhumane acts of people and the Salem witch trials and the McCarthy era were two of them. The Salem witch trials in 1692 were almost 260 years before the McCarthy “witch hunts” in the 1950s yet there are similarities between them. The Crucible, written by Arthur Miller in 1953, is about the Salem witch trials and is an allegory to the practicing of McCarthyism during the Second Red Scare in the United States, which Miller was a victim of. Although there may be differences between “The Crucible” and McCarthyism, ultimately the anger, lack of evidence, and the people were alike in both events.
...able they really are with overtly racist stereotypes; and even with all the “human right”’ movements that spring about there is still the need for long-lasting solution against combating prejudices. By displaying stereotypes jokingly, especially ones that pertained for the Asian population, Yang proves not only do people hold prejudice against other groups with his examples of Asian stereotypes, but that stereotypes are still prevalent in today’s society.
The witch hunt in the crucible is initiated when Abigail and her friends fear the consequences of their ‘dancing’ in the forest. This connects to McCarthyism as the HUAC is represented by the judges and the ‘accuses’ (the girls) are representatives of Elia Kazan and others like him. The theocratic society of Salem is what the girls fear as the forest is seen as the devils resting place and the puritan nature of the town forbid dancing as it was seen as ‘vain enjoyment’ which as Miller himself states at the beginning of the novel to not be allowed. The character of Mary Warren begs the girls to just admit they were dancing as “…you’ll only be whipped for dancin’…”, but as Abigail is questioned and Parris mentions the kettle and how he believed “…there to be some movement- in the soup…”, the devil becomes prominent in the conversation. This is due to Abigail fearing that she will be blamed for devil worshipp...
The Crucible is a famous play written by Arthur Miller in the Early 1950’s. It was written during the “Red scare, when McCarthyism was established. Many anti-communists wanted to prevent communism from spreading just like in The Crucible many wanted to get rid of witchcraft. Many would accuse others of witchcraft in order to not be accused just like many would accuse people of communism. In The Crucible witchcraft would be punishable by death. Many were scared to be accused; therefore many would admit practicing witchcraft in order to save their lives. The Crucible is considered a good play because it is based on real life events during the Salem witch Trials and shows how fear played a role in the individual’s life just like during the “Red” scare.