What is the moral of

By 1692, Salem had become a fairly established community. Many of the dangers that united the town in its years before have gone, while grudges over property, religious offices, and sexual behaviour have begun to bubble beneath the theocratic surface. These tensions, combined with the paranoia about supernatural forces, pass through the town’s religious sensibility and provide the hysteria needed for the witch trials. This can relate to some situations today such as the Iraq war. Ever since the first President Bush went to war with Iraq there have been many investigations into weapons of mass destruction (this can be represented as the witchcraft in Salem). Then when no one found anything they suddenly declared war on Iraq (this can be represented by the witch trials). Some of the reasons for the war are unknown to the public just like the witch trials.

This point brings us to the idea of McCarthyism. I believe this is why Arthur Miller wrote this play. In The Crucible there are wild accusations to do with people and witchcraft this can relate to the paranoia about communism that pervaded America in the 1950s. There are many similarities between the rooting out of suspected communists during the 1950s and the 17th century witch-hunt that Miller portrays in The Crucible. This includes the narrow-mindedness, the eccentric eagerness to find the people responsible for the alleged crime. As with the supposed witches of Salem, suspected Communists were encouraged to confess their crimes and to “name names,” identifying others sympathetic to their radical cause. Some have criticized Miller, while there were no witches in Salem; there were Communists in 1950s America. However, the argument being that Miller’s concern in The Crucible is not with whether the accused actually are witches, but the unwillingness of the court officials to believe that they are not witches. It is seen that the courts were not there to see if there were witches in Salem town, they were there to prove that there were witches. I believe that this is because they wanted the Bible to be right. If the Bible says there are witches in a theocratic society there must be witches. It is just who finds them. In light of McCarthyist extremes, which wronged many innocents, the idea was felt powerfully in the time that Miller lived. I feel that Miller had many of his own feelings in the play because he was himself brought forth and accused of being a communist.