How were Salem witch trials different to McCarthy trials?

Answer 1

they were similar because they both involved government sponsored persecution of innocent peoples using circumstantial, fabricated and fragmented evidence. they were both occurring in times of panic and mass hysteria, and lead to the destruction of hundreds of lives.

Answer 2

Answer: There really were Communist spies operating in the United States... while there is no such thing as witches. ============================= At least McCarthy didn't actually burn his victims alive at the stake, although he did so in a figurative sense to many.

Answer 3

The people in Salem were afraid of something that doesn't exist, yet McCarthyist were afraid of something that did exist... and had nuclear weapons.

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That "something" was Communism as espoused by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, which made no secret of wanting the rest of the world to become Communist too, preferably by subversion rather than invasion. It did indeed have nuclear weapons, but so did (and do) the NATO countries in what became known as The Arms Race. The USSR had strong but behind-the-scenes links with Left-Wing, USSR-sympathising trades-union leaders in Britain and other countries, and more obviously with national Communist Parties including that of Great Britain. So while the first answer is correct, there is a similarity between Salem and the McCarthy era: mass hysteria.

Answer 4

The most notable difference is that the former was intended to root out Communists in positions of political power in the US government during the 1950s whereas the latter was intended to root out witches in 17th Century Massachusetts. It would be far easier to look at the similarities between the two events - ie; widespread scapegoating, paranoia and hysteria - that resulted in the former being referred to as witch trials in the first place.

Answer 5

In both cases, the proponents were looking for people to blame their own fears and lack of certainty on.

As with any kind of political dispute, whether over property or the right to believe in certain things, the dominant party of the day writes the history of the event. So it was with the Salem witch trials; women from one side of town were accused of being witches, not because they had done anything related to witching, but because they or their families occupied valuable land that the accusers or their masters or friends were seeking to purchase at low prices. By associating the land with witchcraft, the value of the property was proportionately devalued. If the woman was found guilty of witchcraft, they and their families could be stripped of their property rights (they acquired the property through witchcraft, so they have not fairly earned the right to own it), making it easier to be acquired by those seeking to own it.

McCarthyism, is so-called because of Senator John McCarthy's search for Communist sympathisers in all walks of American life. He managed to form a senate commission to investigate the spread of communism in the USA, putting particular focus and emphasis on the entertainment industry. Former president Reagan was an avid supporter of McCarthy's and named several actors, writers, directors and producers and other associated people in the movie industry as communist sympathisers to McCarthy's commission. This effectively ended their ability to perform or earn a living under their own names, as they were blacklisted by the industry to assuage McCarthy's perceived political masters. recent evidence suggests that McCarthy was just another man looking for boogey-men under the bed to blame for his own fears and sense of inadequacy. How this related to Arthur Miller's play the Crucible, I leave to you to research.

Answer 6

They're basically the same execept that one is caused by fear of witches in Salem and the other is caused by fear of communists and soviet spies in congress. One could count that people were executed in Salem, if one wanted.