The Art of a Witch Hunt

12/13/2024

What is a witch hunt, but an excuse to bring out the inhumane in each other? What is it but make-believe on a grand, horrific scale? In The Crucible, written by Arthur Miller, he examines these questions and the factors needed to cultivate a witch hunt—both in Salem, Massachusetts in 1962 and all of the U.S. during the Red Scare of the 1950s. Miller states, as referenced in the introduction of Penguin Classics’ edition of The Crucible, the “Salem story has the virtue of being a highly individualized affair” (Bigsby, ix), something that allowed people to see the diverse personalities and people made victims of the Salem Witch Trials “and after you have studied their lives faithfully… you discover that if you really know the few you are on your way to understanding the millions. By grasping the local…it is possible to make a beginning at understanding the universal” (Bigsby, ix). Just like how The Crucible connected the cultures of fear and prejudice of the Salem witch trials to the Red Scare over the span of centuries, the dissection of a witch hunt is still relevant today— including in the case of LBGTQ+ people across the world, and in relevance to my own life, queer Pilipinos.
In The Crucible , the questions of what should be done for justice and truth versus power and conformity is what plagues the village of Salem. John Proctor, our protagonist, starts out as a man who appears to be honest and dependable around the village— but how can he truly be that if he, unbeknownst to the village, had cheated on his wife? He himself “has come to regard himself as kind a kind of fraud,” and “a sinner not only against the moral fashion of the time, but against his own vision of decent conduct” (Miller, 20). Soon, once the witch trials begin and it’s no longer the less reputable outcasts in Salem being persecuted, but the good Christian women like John’s own wife, John Proctor has a choice. Can he be honest to clear not only his wife’s name, but his very own?
We set the very first scene with young, seemingly ill Betty Parris, her father, Reverend Parris, and his niece, Abigail Williams (who should be noted to be aged up to 17 in the play, whereas her real life counterpart was only 11 at the time of the witch trials). Betty Parris, Abigail Williams, and some other young girls in Salem were caught by Reverend Parris in the woods at night, when they were dancing (something taboo in Puritan society). Reverend Parris desperately questions Abigail about what else happened that night to make Betty fall ill, given that this is tainting his already shaky reputation in the village and even making people suspect of something more nefarious: witchcraft. Even though, initially, Abigail tries to get Betty to snap out of acting “bewitched,” she and the other girls soon work together to keep up the lie, in fear of the consequences when Reverend Hale arrives and asks them if they’ve let the Devil into their souls— something Abigail especially fears given she didn’t only dance that fateful night.
Abigail also drank blood in a “ritual,” all in hopes to kill Elizabeth Proctor so she could have John Proctor for herself. She was the one John Proctor had that affair with (you see why she was aged up?), and this moment of dishonesty and callousness will be the catalyst to John’s life being thrown into disarray. The witch hunt has begun.
The key parts of the witch hunt are as follows: Prejudice and conformity, greed, hysteria, and at the core of it all, dishonesty.
Prejudice and conformity plants its roots deep in the very nature of Puritan society. Dancing’s a whipping error, as Mary Warren says on page 10. Many things considered sin were severely punished, and religion was something they thought should be involved in politics and social life (like how at a time Puritans banned celebrations like Christmas and Easter since they were Catholic invention that promoted impious behaviors). Reputation and conformity was deeply important in Salem. Those who do not conform, who are for whatever reason are not innately godly or have made choices that weren’t, aren’t good . Conformity is not a choice an individual makes based on who they are and what they need or want in life. It is a requirement to be moral. To be considered human . And the first people who are accused are those who already fail to conform based on how they are not subservient, are promiscuous, or, in Tituba’s case, not white. She knows that “as always, trouble in this house eventually lands on her back” (Miller, 3-4). She, and other women like her who do not fit in with Puritan society, are the scapegoats. Then, when even women who were considered “good” had “flaws” pointed out, signs of independence and noncomformity, they were next to be accused. When a comically innocent Giles Corey asks Reverend Hale about his wife’s habit of, gasp, reading (how scary) and how it seems to make him forget his prayers, it lays the foundation to her being accused of witchcraft later. Stepping out of line is a life sentence. The different are the sinful, and therefore the guilty where innocence is not an option.
Greed and pride are personified through the actions of Thomas Putnam and Reverend Parris. Specifically, the greed for power . Putnam’s a “a man with many grievances“ (Miller, 13) that holds a deep bitterness towards how “his wife’s brother-in-law, James Bayley, had been turned down as a minister of Salem. Bailey had all the qualifications, and a two-thirds vote into the bargain, but a faction stopped his acceptance, for reasons that are not clear” (Miller, 13). He wanted his influence and word to have more weight in the town, but since it was denied, the witch hunt provides an opportunity ripe for eliminating those he bears grudges towards. In Parris’ case, he seeks to protect his own reputation as he says “have fought here three long years to bend these stiff-necked people to me” (Miller, 11). His whole role in the Salem witch trials is to make sure the truth never surfaces so his reputation is protected, as shown in Act III. In reaction to Mary Warren saying that she was acting that she was being afflicted by spirits of those she accused, Parris says “surely Your Excellency is not taken by this simple lie” (Miller, 100). There are people who take advantage of fear in to further their own power, to elevate themselves so judgement is beyond them. Even the court system itself is corrupted by this. Judge Danforth, when faced with the possibility that the witchcraft accusations were false, says that “postponement now speaks a floundering on my part; reprieve or pardon must cast doubt upon the guilt of them that died til now” (Miller, 119). He wants the court to be perceived as mighty and righteous, even it comes at the cost of lives that may have been taken in vain, when he says “while I speak God’s law, I will not crack its voice with whimpering” (Miller, 119). Protection of the status quo and the desire to elevate themselves is what drives people to protect dishonesty and injustice.
Then, hysteria is what feeds into prejudice and provides the tools for the greedy to take advantage of. People are scared, especially when well-respected women of the village begin to be accused. “Martha Corey, there cannot be a woman closer yet to God than Martha” (Miller, 67), but she’s a witch because she reads. Rebecca is a very well-respected woman, because “if Rebecca Nurse be tainted, then nothing’s left to stop the whole green world from burning” (Miller, 67). If “good” people are witches too, if people who conform are witches, then who isn’t? Anything is proof of sin now. Even a mere doll with a pin in it, or girls crying “I feel a misty coldness… and all at once I remember everything she done to me” (Miller, 54-55) is “undeniable” evidence that a person must be hanged.
Yet none of this would have happened without dishonesty. If the girls, if Abigail hadn’t lied and accepted the blow to her reputation for her affair with John Proctor, then no cries of witchcraft would have been heard. If John Proctor was a faithful husband, or at least taken responsibility for his affair and come forward with the truth of the girls’ night in the woods sooner, his death could have been avoided.
But this is how the tragedy of the Salem witch trials is also resolved.
When John Proctor has the choice to say the names of his friends, to confess that he himself and others are witches in order to avoid death, he does not. He will not give up his name for something he didn’t do “because it is my name! Because I cannot have another in my life! Because I lie and sign myself to lies!” (Miller, 133). He finds reconciliation for the sins he committed against his wife, for his dishonesty that bloomed into Abigail’ motivation for accusing Elizabeth Proctor and other women. He clears his own name by not bringing down others, by protecting them.
These darknesses rear their faces in the Red Scare. Prejudice and conformity takes the form of suspecting left-leaning people and immigrants for being communists seeking to overtake the U.S. government. Greed and pride in the book represents McCarthy taking power in the Senate through his accusations of people for being communists, ruining their reputations and leaving them without a job. It’s seen in the House of UnAmerican Activities Committee zealously investigating alleged communists and pressuring them to confess. Hysteria grows as people suspect more and more people, even their neighbors, of being Communist spies. Dishonesty is seen as people sought to protect themselves by accusing others. Yet like John Proctor, Arthur Miller himself took a stand through honesty. When he was brought before Congress because of the criticisms he made about the Red Scare through The Crucible, just like John Proctor, he was demanded to give the names of friends and colleagues who were also potential communists. He did not.

A Witch Hunt of Today

Prejudice and conformity are the foothold that those seeking power grasp in order to preserve the society they deem “safe” and “moral.” But for those who’s mere existence defies this, they are once again the first to be executed.
Queer Pilipinos, especially those who are trans, face persecution for their identities. But it wasn’t always like this.
Prior to Spanish colonization, trans women or feminine men were known as babaylan. They were shamans and served as healers, mediators, and highly respected spiritual leaders. Yet when the Spanish and Catholicism arrived, Pilipino society changed and babaylan people were persecuted, which led to the cultural discrimination they face today.
The Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Expression (SOGIE) Equality Bill was proposed in the national government, but failed to pass. Gay men are shunned for being too feminine, being called “bakla” or effeminate as an insult. Lesbian women are “tibo,” too masculine. They are harassed for their gender or who they are attracted to. More devastatingly, queer Pilipinos are murdered— and they receive no mention nor protection.
According to The Fuller Project, at least 50 transgender or nonbinary individuals have been murdered in the Philippines since 2010– but the real death toll is likely much higher. Their deaths are swept under the rug, just like their existences were. And out of those 50 deaths, the Philippine National Police has only confirmed investigations into 8 of them. When there is coverage of their deaths, no one knows who died. Victims are dead named in social media and in the press, their true identities an afterthought or framed in quotations. It undermines and dismisses why they were killed— they were trans. In the southern region of the Philippines, Mindanao, Islam similarly is used to justify attacks towards Pilipinos like in the Catholic regions. According to a translated media quote from Amnesty International, “various attacks of hate crimes and gender-based violence directed towards Muslim LGBTQI+ people in the Bangsamoro region are not new nor isolated…We are used to being caught in the middle of unlawful raids, as if they were witch hunts, in places where the LGBTQI+ are often seen – in Karaoke bars, or salons and other establishments managed by trans women, often to instill fear by setting these places on fire or drive-by shootings.“
This is a witch hunt— but a hunt that goes swept under the rug. The government may not endorse it, but they protect it. The church preaches loving thy neighbor, but want queer rights taken away. People may not be against LBGTQ+ people, but they don’t remember the dead as they wish to be remembered if at all. As Rocky Rinabor says in Amnesty International, the deaths of queer Pilipinos are seen as “justified because it is the life we choose, thus, we must accept it and just live with the consequences it brings.”
The persecution queer Pilipinos face today is made up of the same insidious factors that led to the witch trials of The Crucible . Those who inherently can’t conform to society will not find peace. More comments on their character will be made, more assumptions on their actions will be pushed, and it will all culminate until every demand for them to conform will reveal its true face: a demand for their execution. People like Tituba or LGBTQ+ Pilipinos mere existences defies what is normal, and therefore what is “good”, and therefore their existence cannot be tolerated. Poor women, literate and well-read women, women of color, and then anyone who doubts the accusing girls or the court shall be hanged. Queer Pilipinos are a moral corruption, a sin that challenges the sacred binary of man and women, and just like how Danforth is so against the mere suggestion that the accused could be innocent, the legal system and police investigations do not bring justice to murdered victims. Prejudice is what makes them turn a blind eye. Like Putnam, it’s their opportunity to utilize the fear and disgust towards LBGTQ+ people to ensure they’re silenced or rid of. Like Parris, the legal system does not properly record these cases or investigate for it isn’t a tragedy— it’s a stain on their reputation. Even if the situation hasn’t reached the full bouts of hysteria that consumed the town, it’s what provoked the murderer of the late Madonna “Donna” Nierra, a trans woman who was found dead near her home. It’s why Muslim Pilipino lesbians commonly are subjected to “curative rape” in order to be “corrected.” It’s why queer children are bullied outcasted not just by their peers, but by their own families. These stories are not made by the minds of the rational. It is not sensible, in any way, to look upon the face of someone in your community and wish they were “fixed,” or worse, no longer here. While there isn’t spectral evidence and screams of how they’re being cursed, there is seeing someone go to a gay bar and seeing a person happily transitioned as damning proof.
This is an issue with deep, corrupting roots from Spanish colonization and religious beliefs twisted to serve ignorance. It’s ingrained into Philippine society and the scope can be overwhelming— how can anybody do anything for the queer Pilipinos who’ve passed on, and for the ones still here?
It isn’t an insurmountable task. It takes learning. It takes knowing the facts of discrimination against LBGTQ+ Pilipinos, knowing how and why the violence occurs, and the measures being taken to create change. This site, MMPride (Metro Manila Pride) , is an invaluable source for this. This site provides a list of organizations that serve to help and protect LBGTQ+ Pilipinos, including treating HIV, promoting legal literacy, and providing necessities to those in need. However, the most important thing of all: No matter where you are, or what you believe in, there are queer people in your community. They may be your neighbor, your friend, or even your family. For Pilipinos, our culture is something we all share. It is a celebration of us, of Pilipino strength and family, not an excuse to rid the world of each other.
I ask you to remember these names:

• R. Soriaga
• D. Quintela
• R. F. Jr.
• Alyas
• J. A. Lanogan
• N. Barilla
• Jelwin Tolentino
• Lalie Cabrera
• C. Canlas
• Jenny
• Nieves Toledo
• Luningning Alsade
• H. Lidoma
• M. V.
• S. Bernal
• Nathalia Anne Gonzales
• J. Ganito
• Cielo Mercado
• Jennifer Laude
• Mary Joy Anonuevo
• Glydel Libranda
• Jaja Canlas
• Simeona Eva
• Ali Macky Ramos
• Jordan Borabien
• Andong Apolinario
• Joice Florano
• Barbie Ann Reilly
• Kitkat Mae Fermin
• Mayla Gonzales
• Heart De Chavez
• J. R. P. Mangalili
• Charlotte Oquias Lapasaran Logronio
• Jheayn
• J. R. P. Mangalili
• Shanaia
• Rica Reyes
• Heart Pontanes
• Jessa Remiendo
• Donna Nierra

These are some of the names of the 50 trans Pilipinos who’ve been murdered since 200. There are more. There will be more.
Remember them.