How does the crucible relate to mccarthyism

Another congressional group called the House UnAmerican Activities Committee played a similar and, some would argue, even more dramatic role at the same time. HUAC was a congressional committee originally established in with the primary goal of investigating communist and fascist organizations that had become active during the Great Depression. Members of the committee were convinced that disloyal communists had managed to infiltrate the US government, educational system, and entertainment industry.

Anyone deemed suspicious was issued a subpoena by the committee and subsequently questioned about their political activities and the activities of other potential subversives. People who refused to answer these questions or name any names were arrested for contempt of Congress and even sent to jail.

Many were subsequently denied employment opportunities in their industries because they were universally "blacklisted" or shut out by employers who feared that hiring them would be a public relations nightmare. How did McCarthy come up with his catalog of commies? He asked everyone in Congress if he could borrow a pen. The ones who said yes were on the list. He had become fascinated with the environment of paranoia and how it affected society as a whole.

When he stumbled upon the story of the Salem witch trials, he finally came up with a way to express those themes on stage. The Crucible was also a reaction his personal disappointment at the decision of his friend, director Elia Kazan, to name some former colleagues as communists in in front of the House UnAmerican Activities Committee. He was suspected not incorrectly of possessing close ties to the American Communist Party.

Miller did in fact write communist theater criticism and was a greater private supporter of communism than he portrayed himself to be at the time, but he never actually joined the party.

When he appeared before HUAC, Miller refused to name anyone else who was involved in "subversive" political activities. Because he worked mainly in theater, he didn't have to worry as much about the effects Hollywood's unforgiving blacklist policy would have on his career.

Miller was found in contempt of Congress for refusing to betray his peers, but the ruling was overturned two years later as HUAC lost power and relevance. Many professionals in the entertainment industry found themselves jobless in Hollywood after falling out of HUAC's good graces. The government's influence on movies at this time was much greater than it is today.

The abandonment of reason in the face of hysteria is a clear common theme. Miller writes, "There was magic all around; the politics of alien conspiracy soon dominated political discourse and bid fair to wipe out any other issue. As communist hysteria built, Miller was even more convinced that he wanted to write a play based on this form of collective insanity. He was especially fascinated by people who disagreed with the communist "witch hunt" but chose to keep their heads down and go along with it to avoid their own persecution.

He writes, "But by , when I began to think of writing about the hunt for Reds in America, I was motivated in some great part by the paralysis that had set in among many liberals who, despite their discomfort with the inquisitors' violations of civil rights, were fearful, and with good reason, of being identified as covert Communists if they should protest too strongly. For example, John Proctor hesitates to expose Abigail as a fraud because he fears repercussions from the court, and Parris is eager to turn on others to preserve his reputation.

In another relevant quote, Miller writes, "The Soviet plot was the hub of a great wheel of causation ; the plot justified the crushing of all nuance, all the shadings that a realistic judgment of reality requires. Danforth claims that there is "a moving plot to topple Christ in the country!

Danforth also insists that "a person is either with this court or he must be counted against it, there be no road between" pg. Nuance cannot be tolerated because the people in charge feel that the stakes are too high. Miller, however, says he viewed the analogy as perfectly sound. He argues that, in the 17th century, "the existence of witches was never questioned by the loftiest minds in Europe and America" because the Bible spoke of their existence.

Witches were just as real to people in the s as communists were to people in the s. He adds, "The more I read into the Salem panic, the more it touched off corresponding ages of common experiences in the fifties : the old friend of a blacklisted person crossing the street to avoid being seen talking to him; the overnight conversions of former leftists into born-again patriots; and so on.

Apparently, certain processes are universal. Act 1 of The Crucible commences with Reverend Parris, praying and weeping over his daughter, Betty, who has taken sick. Parris is a grim, stern man suffering from paranoia. He believes that the members of his congregation have formed a faction and are trying to get rid of him. Sit you down. Do you understand that? The quote shows Parris to be a paranoid individual, afraid of losing his reputation within the community. To save his reputation and his job, he confronts Abigail about the forbidden activities she participated in the previous night and whether she conjured spirits.

He asks this because in the Puritan society witchcraft is not just a sin; it is a threat against their way of life and God. From the first act, it is prevalent that witchcraft is a major theme. When the unexplainable event of Bettys illness arises the people of Salem start to think it is witchcraft, and with this presumption it is unsurprising that the whole town falls into mass hysteria.

It is not entirely clear to the audience at this stage whether Betty is feigning her illness or if she is genuinely sick, perhaps not from witchcraft itself but from the excitement of the events that she has participated in.

It may have just been a psychosomatically induced illness brought on by the belief in witchcraft, but is never fully explained. From this the audience watches as the whole town is caught up in paranoia and witchcraft hysteria is ensued. People start to suspect others and the citizens become increasingly concerned with the spread of Witchcraft and consequently increasingly scared and suspicious. Similar events occurred during the McCarthyism era. Joseph McCarthy, U.

S Senator, took advantage of the mounting fear and started accusing government officials with the act of Subversion — the act or an instance of overthrowing a legally constituted government.

This led to the ever-accumulating threat of communism and the fear it held over people. Parris can, to some extent, be a representation of Joseph McCarthy.

During the Red Scare, there was a hunt for communists and spies in the United States. This is similar to the witch hunt that took place in Salem, Massachusetts in The Crucible is a play by American playwright Arthur Miller.

It is a dramatized and partially fictionalized story of the Salem witch trials that took place in the Massachusetts Bay Colony during — It is regarded as a central work in the canon of American drama. During the McCarthy era, hundreds of Americans were accused of being "communists" or "communist sympathizers"; they became the subject of aggressive investigations and questioning before government or private industry panels, committees, and agencies. Communism from Latin communis, "common, universal" is a philosophical, social, political, economic ideology and movement whose ultimate goal is the establishment of a communist society, namely a socioeconomic order structured upon the ideas of common ownership of the means of production and the absence of social.

HUAC was created in to investigate alleged disloyalty and rebel activities on the part of private citizens, public employees and organizations suspected of having Communist ties. Citizens suspected of having ties to the communist party would be tried in a court of law. A " Red Scare " is the promotion of a widespread fear of a potential rise of communism or anarchism by a society or state. The First Red Scare , which occurred immediately after World War I, revolved around a perceived threat from the American labor movement, anarchist revolution and political radicalism.

The infamous Salem witch trials began during the spring of , after a group of young girls in Salem Village, Massachusetts, claimed to be possessed by the devil and accused several local women of witchcraft. By September , the hysteria had begun to abate and public opinion turned against the trials.

Miller's defiance of McCarthyism won him a conviction for contempt of court, which was later reversed by the Supreme Court. Despite McCarthy's acquittal of misconduct in the Schine matter, the Army— McCarthy hearings ultimately became the main catalyst in McCarthy's downfall from political power. On December 2, , the Senate voted 67—22 to censure McCarthy , effectively eradicating his influence, though not expelling him from office. How does McCarthyism relate to the Crucible?

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