Witch Trials and Bathroom Bills

I can't shake this feeling...

“You are pulling down heaven and raising up a whore.” ~The Crucible

I taught American Literature for years and often see the world through the lens of literature…likely more often than I should. I make inferences from my years in the classroom — time spent in books.

Here is something I think about – something I can’t shake: witch hunts are working through our society today. They just look different.

Did you read “The Crucible” in high school? In Missouri, it is always taught in 11th-grade American Literature. It was included in the huge textbook I used with my students. We always read the play in the first semester — it sort of set the tone for a lot of the literature we read through the rest of the year, but especially related to the Puritan and Colonial Literature of early America.

God and the Devil. Saints and witches. Fear.

The play, written by Arthur Miller, is set in Puritan America during the 1690s, and centers around the witch hunts in Salem, Massachusetts. But we all know what the play is actually about – McCarthyism and the Red Scare.

Senator McCarthy (R-Wisconsin) experienced a meteoric rise to fame and power in the U.S. Senate when he charged in February 1950 that “hundreds” of “known communists” were in the Department of State. In the years that followed, McCarthy became the acknowledged leader of the so-called Red Scare, a time when millions of Americans became convinced that communists had infiltrated every aspect of American life. Behind closed-door hearings, McCarthy bullied, lied, and smeared his way to power, destroying many careers and lives in the process.

Joseph McCarthy was power-hungry, and his outrageous claims and committees ruined lives. And for what? It wasn’t a battle against Communism. It was a battle to consolidate power.

Arthur Miller was one of McCarthy’s victims. He was called before a congressional committee and questioned about his own involvement with the Communist Party. Miller admitted to going to a Communist Party meeting years earlier. He was cited for contempt for failing to implicate others who were suspected Communists. Miller refused to turn his friends in and he paid for it.

Arthur Miller wrote The Crucible as a warning to the country.

The play is about terror and hysteria. The play warns about mob violence. The play pleads for freedom and tolerance.

I see the connections today.

In Puritan America, there were several instances of witch hunts and paranoia — the biggest was in Salem.

There were several “tests” to prove a witch. They would bind the hands and feet of a suspected witch and throw her into water to see if she would sink or swim. They would prod moles to see if she would bleed. They could place stones on a suspected witch’s chest to get a confession.

But, here is one that I find quite relevant and haunting:

Witch examiners often had suspected witches (mostly women and girls) stripped and publicly examined by a roomful of men — ministers, doctors, and lawmen. The witch hunters were looking for signs of any blemish that witches were said to receive upon making their pact with Satan.

A “Devil’s Mark.”

It was easy for even the most minor physical imperfections to be labeled as the work of the devil. Moles, scars, birthmarks, supernumerary nipples, and any sort of “malformed sex organ” could qualify as a Devil’s Mark.

The men who acted as examiners were often lifted and promoted in society. They were sought out for their wisdom in seeking out witches. They became powerful members of society. They often consolidated power through these witch hunts.

And they ruined lives.

Young women were often accused and one of the only ways to counter the accusation was to be stripped in a room full of men. To be touched and pricked and prodded for anything that looked out of the ordinary. To be humiliated and tortured.

Made into witches for their differences. Hanged or burned at the stake for the crime of divergence from Puritan norms.

Related: 2024 was a record-breaking year for anti-trans legislation. 617 bills were introduced nationwide. Most of these bills are aimed at children…at girls. Bathroom bills. Trans athlete bills.

It feels like a witch hunt.

Nationwide, politicians looking to fill their campaign coffers or get their names in the news are writing bills and legislation against trans kids and trans athletes. These politicians are power-hungry. These politicians hope their outrageous claims and obsessions over a tiny fraction of the population will consolidate even more power.

Behind closed-door hearings, these politicians bully, lie, and smear their way to power, destroying the lives of students in the process.

Sound familiar?

A divided House approved legislation that aims to bar transgender women and girls from participating in school athletic programs designated for female students, as Republicans seek to wring political opportunity from a social issue that helped them win the 2024 elections.

Did you catch that last part? Republicans are pushing a bill that impacts almost no one to score points politically.

What could really score some points? Writing legislation to fund schools. Legislation to ease housing costs. Legislation to strengthen unions and close the wage gap. Legislation to curb gun violence.

But instead, they go after a tiny minority of student athletes.

Folks say that “girls shouldn’t have to compete against boys” in sports. Why? Because hypothetically, girls could lose out on college scholarships.

I would argue that we should make college free so students don’t have to play sports at an elite level to pay for college, but for the sake of the argument…how many trans athletes are playing at the college level according to the National Collegiate Athletic Association?

“NCAA President Charlie Baker told the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee there are fewer than 10 ‘transgender athletes’ currently in college sports out of a total of 510,000 total athletes.”

That is fewer than .00002% of all NCAA athletes.

And how do we know if an athlete is trans? How can we get to the bottom of it?

Could we bind the hands and legs of athletes and throw them into water to see if they sink or float? Could we prod a few moles to see if they bleed? Could we place huge stones upon their chests until they confess their crime?

Or, could we gather examiners and have them strip young women bare to look for any sort of “malformed sex organ” that could qualify as a Devil’s Mark…

The Red Scare was a witch hunt and not the least about Communism. The trans panic is a witch hunt and not the least about girl’s sports. Both were set in motion to consolidate power.

We are pulling down society and raising up the careers of power-hungry politicians.

As Joseph Welch once asked: Have we no decency?

Have we learned nothing from our past?

~Jess