According to Wikipedia, A witch hunt is “a search for people labelled “witches” or evidence of witchcraft, often involving moral panic or mass hysteria.” Whereas, the definition of a modern day witch-hunt is “an intensive effort to discover and expose disloyalty, subversion, dishonesty, or the like, usually based on slight, doubtful, or irrelevant evidence.” Many theories come about when people think of the causes of witch hunt. Back in the day, witch-hunts were fueled by greed and fear, but also had a huge motivation from jealousy. Modern day witch-hunts are fueled by fear of the unknown. The witch hunts nowadays may not be the same as they used to be in the 15th century, but they still exist. During the 1950’s witch-hunts, people who were …show more content…
Abigail Williams and her friends were caught dancing in the forest, and words of witchcraft began to go around. In order to save themselves, they went around and falsely accused nineteen men and women of making deals with the devil and practicing witchcraft. In some instances, accusations were made on behalf of fear. The girls feared what would become of them, or what could happen to them. Abigail, in a sense, was their "leader", and anything she began to say or do, the other girls would follow along. Other times, the accusations were made on behalf of greed. Out of spite, Abigail accuses Goody (Elizabeth) Proctor of being a witch, due to the fact of a previously failed "relationship" with John Proctor. Though Abigail was the main character calling all of the shots, other characters, too, were driven by fear and greed. Mary Warren, another girl caught dancing in the woods, is on Abigail's side when word of witchcraft first comes about. But she later goes against her word because of John Proctor. When asked if her previous implications were true or not, Mary cracks under pressure and says that everything she had confessed under John Proctor was false. All of the accusations were made on a simple basis of fear of difference throughout the