World’s (Not) Finest
By Wyatt Wolfman
Imagine that you are one of the most powerful people in America. You have been going against your morals, but you are riding the high life of power. Then, everything comes crashing down on you. People are exposing you for your wrongdoings, and you have two options: admitting you are wrong and living the rest of your life in shame, or trying to cover up what you did and attempt to stay in power. What would you do? There’s a catch. Both options have the same result: you get caught and become a disgraceful person. It all ends the same, but people will still attempt to heighten their reputation by doing whatever they possibly can to stay in power, even if it is wrong and against their morals. Throughout history, people will do anything to obtain more power. They do this by fear mongering, scapegoating and lying in an effort to preserve their power and reputation. In The Crucible, Reverend Parris is an extremely selfish man who puts his own reputation before everything and anyone else because of his greed, selfishness and his desire for power.
This works until John Proctor starts becoming vocal about his distrust for Parris. More and more people are beginning to catch on because of his recurring deceitful and selfish acts. Parris is fuming with this so called disrespect that had been brought upon him. “The salary is sixty-six pound, Mr. Proctor! I am not some preaching farmer with a book under my arm; I am a graduate of Harvard College… Mr. Corey, you will look far for a man of my kind at sixty pound a year! I am not used to this poverty; I left a thrifty business in the Barbados to serve the Lord. I do not fathom it, why am I persecuted here? I cannot offer one proposition but there be a howling riot of argument. I have often wondered if the Devil be in it somewhere; I cannot understand you people otherwise,” (The Crucible, p. 51, ). Parris is described by John Proctor as “a broken minister.” He is supposed to be a minister, but instead, he just wants gold. Parris is outraged when he and John Proctor have a dispute about his payment. He is an extremely entitled, hypocritical man, and he refuses to give up on his claim. He is dead set that he is being underpaid, even though it can be inferred by the following events that he wrong. Instead of admitting that he is wrong like an adult, he instead whines until Proctor walks away. He blatantly lies and goes back on a previous agreement to save his reputation. To an outsider hearing the story, it seems like he is standing up for himself while in reality, he is wailing until he gets his way. This proves that his reputation in his number one priority. He truly is a broken minister. Parris is also corrupt in the mind. As a minister and a Puritan, everything is supposed to be God first. It is faith that drives their society. Reverend Parris also kisses up to Judge Danforth 24/7. Whatever Danforth’s views are, Parris will pretend to agree. While doing this, he becomes trusted by Danforth. The whole colony see’s the affection Parris is receiving from Danforth, Parris becomes trusted as well. Parrus becomes unofficial right hand man of Judge Danforth. After multiple atrocious requests, such as gold candle sticks, Parris’ clout is becoming a major issue in the town afflicted by the false accusations of witchcraft. Reverend Parris’ reputation first attitude towards life is extremely comparable to Joseph McCarthy.
The McCarthy Era was a heinous act of scapegoating and false accusations by Joseph McCarthy in an effort to gain power and heighten his reputation. Joseph McCarthy enjoyed a short time of his highet of power and respect before he became a pathetic excuse and drank himself to death. Not only were his pitiful ways discovered, “When reporters asked to see the list, McCarthy said he left it in his other suit, which was still on the plane. In fact, McCarthy did not have any list. He was basing his claims on a letter that had been written more than three years ago,” (McCarthyism, p. 43) McCarthy’s power made him a major influence across the country. He was a power hungry man who only cared about himself and his reputation. McCarthy eventually pit neighbors against neighbors and friends against friends. He didn’t care about the grief he was causing as long as he stayed in power. This went too far, and McCarthy knew it. How would somebody so narcissistic and so greedy let go of that power and become the laughing stock of the country by admitting his wrongs? Joseph McCarthy certainly wouldn’t. There were two possible ways to get to the same outcome: becoming an ignominious piece of garbage. He chose riding the high life for as long as possible. After eight years, he drank himself to death from all the humiliation. It was a fitting end to this dismal mans life. McCarthy’s greed and narcissism was extremely harmful to many people. Just like Donald Trump today, his attitude is making countless people live in fear. Donald Trump is an egotistical maniac who is extremely similar to Joseph McCarthy and Reverend Parris because his ego and reputation are more important to him than anything else. Instead of admitting his wrong doings, he blatantly lies and moves on, often literally leaving millions of people in awe.
“[Donald Trump] Spent five years refusing to admit that President Obama was born in the U.S.—and still hasn’t apologized,” (https://www.hillaryclinton.com/feed/things-donald-trump-has-said-and-done-that-in-a-normal-election-would-disqualify-a-nominee/).
Donald Trump’s false, discriminatory comments led to five years of repeatedly making false claims that President Obama was not born in the United States of America. After Obama providing proof that he was born in America, Trump had two options: he could apologize and move on, or deny he ever made those false claims when there is video proof and multiple tweets that HE wrote stating that President Obama was not born in America. This proves what kind person Donald Trump is. Instead of being a good person and admitting his mistakes like a grown orange man, he put aside basic values and denied he said it all. This led to a hilarious press conference when President Obama took shots at Trump by playing The Lion King, jokingly playing along with Trump’s claims that he was born in Kenya, not America. Donald Trump doesn’t have basic values that almost everyone has. It goes past Republican and Democrat. He’s so bad that he has an approval rating under 40%, setting new records each day. In other words, he lost the approval of 10% of people that should approve of Trump. That’s more than three million people, which is more than people than Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by. Donald Trump is trying to use his reputation to take advantage of scared, hysterical people. The biggest difference about Trump is the time. This is 2017, and people have recourses to fact check Trump. There are reporters who ask him questions that he cannot answer because he is unfit to be president, but that is an argument for another time. The biggest difference about Trump is the time. This is 2017, and people have recourses to fact check Trump. There are also reporters who ask him questions that he cannot answer time and time again because he is unfit to be president. When people are hysterical, it is short lived these days. People are scared of terrorism so they scapegoat all Muslim’s, but there is always another side. When there is hysteria, people will always jump in to defend those being targeted by the hysterical. Hysteria cannot become as widespread as it once was able to, but it can still have a big effect. Donald Trump created hysteria with his campaign, and he was able to capitalize on what he created to win the election and become the president of the United States.
Reverend Parris, Joseph McCarthy, and Donald Trump all display this perfectly. They put aside their morals and they do things that they know are wrong just for their personal benefit. These types of selfish, narcissistic people take advantage of widespread hysteria to gather even more people behind them, greatly heightening their reputation in the process. During the Salem Witch Trials, Reverend Parris sided with Abigail Williams and the rest of Salem. Doing this, he got the entire town behind him and eventually became the unofficial right hand man of Judge Danforth. Joseph McCarthy took advantage of the hysteria surrounding communists and quickly rose from a nobody Senator to leading of multiple committees and becoming a major influential figure. Today, Donald Trump takes advantage of disempowered people everyday in an attempt to satisfy those who voted for him. People can fact check in the 21st century, and people definitely do. Donald Trump constantly makes false, discriminatory claims about everyone that is not exactly like him. History never fails to repeat itself. Throughout American history, people like Reverend Parris, Joseph McCarthy and Donald Trump keep popping up. This keeps happening, even in today’s world. Hysteria always brings out to worst of us, but in the Trump Era, it is not affecting all of us. More than 60% of America disapproves off him and they will not be fed his false, atrocious comments. It is impossible for everybody to believe when we have the internet and mobile phones. If someone hears something that seems off, as things Trump says often do, they can pull out their phone and find the answer in a matter of seconds. Lies do not spread like wild fire anymore, but hysteria does. Less and less people each day stop approving of Donald Trump, but he is the president. He was able to fear monger and capitalize on the scared people whose emotions he created to get himself in the top political position in the world. He is not just marginalizing a small group of people, he is marginalizing religions, countries and genders. That includes Muslims, Mexico, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Yemen, women, lesbians, gay people, bisexual people, transgender people, queer people and disabled people. That is an uncountable percent of the world population, and this outrage must be put to an end.
I really enjoyed writing this. I loved finding textual evidence and analyzing it. This essay is a good representation of my second trimester learning.