Witch-hunts were primarily created to invoke fear into
communities. Essentially, even if the
only evidence a community had against a woman was that she was “immoral,” she
could be tried and found guilty of being a witch. This practice caused paranoia
in society and hysteria amongst individuals. Witch-hunts caused up to 100,000
executions of women, many of whom were innocent of any crime. After the 1900s,
the term “witch-hunt” started being used to describe businesses and governments
seeking out and destroying perceived enemies in order to protect an idea or
uphold a value. This is done by creating societal moral panic and by directing
public opinion to the negative favor of those being sought out.
The idea of a witch-hunt might seem to be renaissance, but
it was a practice that was brought to America. The Crucible is just one sort of example of the Salem Witch Trials.
There is a deep, dark history that surrounds witch-hunts in the United States.
The term was not left in the past after the executions of witches. The first
example that comes to my mind is that it was used commonly during the 1950s Red
Scare in America. “Witch-hunts” created household panic and fear of communists
within the country. I next think of when the United States Government moved
Japanese-Americans out of their homes and into camps because there was fear of
their race, even though they were legally citizens of the country.
As for current witch-hunts, I think of a couple examples.
The first is society’s reaction to child sexual abuse in the 1990s. When this
came out as a public crisis, there was a great deal of fear amongst adults not
knowing who to protect their children from. There was also a large amount of
accusations being thrown at different people based on profession, such as
priests and male schoolteachers. Next, I think of after the 9/11 attacks and
the amount of fear that people had about Islamics and Muslims. As a CJ major, I
understand the need for profiling to a degree in order to prevent crime, but
that should be based on more than race. The paranoid witch-hunt for Muslims
created a great rift in the spirit of America as a place of freedom.
Well, I guess I'll start by re-typing me previous comment since it never posted.
ReplyDeleteI think that the child abuse cases between teachers/priests/boy scout leaders/coaches/what have you is an excellent example. These cases made people paranoid to leave their children with trusted public figures. Everyone was terrified for awhile that their priest/teacher/scout leader/soccer coach was going to turn out to be a twisted pervert and would have done irreversible damage to their child. It lead to a lot of persecution of innocent people all because they acted a little differently.
I have to agree with you. But I have to say that society does try to take matters into their own hands. With the child abuse cases yes you have to be very careful who your child comes into contact with but you cannot go around accusing everyone. With the 9/11 some people blamed all of the muslims which i believe is unfair because it is not their fault with what some of the people in their religion did. I did not think that all muslims should be attacked, everyone deserves a chance because not everyone was a terrorist.
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