Salem Witchcraft Trials Essay, Research Paper

Salem Witchcraft Trials

If one person believes something, all the rest will follow. Modern day people

learned this in Salem, Massachusets during the witchcraft trials. Hysteria is a main cause

for people losing their reasoning. Sensible people s pleas were ignored because they had

been accused of witchcraft. No one wanted to listen to what he/she wanted to say.

People were afraid to speak out because he/she was afraid they would be accused too.

No one should ever be afraid to speak out what he/she thinks or feels no matter what the

consequences are. The AIDS virus gripped Americans with hysteria. The idea of being

thoughtless on a matter causes hysteria in any group of people.

The pleas of sensible people were ignored for a few different reasons. People in

Salem believed that there were witches in Salem, and he/she were not going to think

anything different. Once a few people said there were witches, it turned into a huge

hysteria of witchcraft. During the witchcraft trials people would give good reasoning

why he/she pleaded innocent, but the people of the court would not listen to their pleas

of innnocense. If he/she pleaded innocent, he/she would be hung. If he/she pleaded

guilty he/she might have been taken to jail and they would of had to switch to

(christianity) and go to church every Sunday. It would be better to plea guilty than it

would to plea innocent. Many people plead guilty just, so they would not be hung.

Many inteligent people were just pushed to far, which made them go crazy and

lose their reasoning. It did not even really matter what their testimony was. He/she was

almost alway guilty no matter what they said or did. Almost every person just pleaded

guilty so they would not be hung. That is why everybody in the Salem village really

thought there were witches. Nobody took in consideration that he/she pleaded guilty so

they did not get hung. He/ she could be on trial and in just a few minutes the whole

court would just turn on he/she. The judge would just keep asking questions. He would

ask who helped . He would just try to drag more and more people into the court. Many

people were scared to testify against or with somebody because they were scared they

would be brought into the court too.

Many people were afraid to speak out against the girls. Because by the time

anybody took in consideration that the girls could be lying the witch suspects were

already pleading guilty. Nobody had taken in consideration that the suspects were

pleading guilty so they did not get killed for something they did not do. By the time

people started realizing that they were too scared to bring it up. If they did there would

be a good chance he/she would get tried for witchcraft too. Many people just sit back

and did not say anything. Most everybody was going to church at this time because

people were being considered as witches if they weren t going to church on a steady

basis.

Hysteria can be a major problem in society today. A major hysteria that struck

the U.S. a few years back was the AIDS virus. It was not really big for a while, and then

it just hit real bad and people were dying from it everyday. And there was and still isn t

no cure for AIDS. Many people got very scared when this started going really bad.

Thats, how it became a big hysteria in the U.S. In both cases the people should have just

calmed down and tried to solve the Salem witch trials in a sensible and organized way.

The modern-day people should have found a way to help or cure AIDS.

Modern day society can all learn from the events that happened in Salem, Mass.,

in 1692 had no lasting impact on the course of American history. It certainly

demonstrated the intolerance and stiff-necked sanctimoniousness of the New England

spirit. It also proved the real danger of a church state. along with friends and neighbors

turning on each other everyday. The judges did not have a clue what they were talking

about and doing. The trials should have been takin a lot more serious by the court

instead of just convicting everybody for doing witchcraft. After one or two people

started beliving the witch hysteria like that the whole town started beliving it. It was like

a mob rule. Things in Salem are not really all that much different to today s society.

Many similar things go on everyday like they did back then.

Everybody should have learnt why people were losing there reasoning. Things

were going so wrong that the peoples testimonys were being ignored, and they were just

being accused of witchcraft no matter what. The people were so scared to speak out

against the court or anybody else in fear of being brought into the court for questioning.

It was all just a big hysteria. He/she reallly did not know what was going on and he/she

did not know how to solve it. He/she should of taken more time to organize a good set of

trials to solve the witchcraft cases.