The Crucible and McCarthyism
In the late 1600’s, a tragedy fed by lies and personal grudges swept the town of Salem, Massachusetts. This tragedy was called the Salem Witchcraft Trials, where 20 innocent people were put to death based solely on the accusations of others. These others were also just girls who tried to save themselves by blaming others. After the injustice had been done, another “witch hunt” wouldn’t occur until about 250 years later. However, these new “witch hunts” weren’t for witches at all, but for the modern-day threat of communists in our government. Just like the old witch-hunts in Salem, the hunt for communists in the government resulted in many innocent people being wrongly accused and arrested. Though these events are separated by 260 years, the accusations and trials that followed are very similar. In The Crucible, the accusations were made based on feelings of greed, vengeance, jealousy, and fear. In addition, most of the people accused were people who were different from the group, or who looked different in some way. Also, if anyone dared to speak out against these charges, they were likely to be accused of witchcraft themselves. In the McCarthy-era, The kind of people targeted were likely to be left-inclined me
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 852
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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