I think comparisons to Salem are completely misguided. In Salem, people were being accused of an imaginary act defined as a crime by an imaginary being (or one with no evidence of its existence at the very least). 100% of those accused were actually innocent, and 100% of those accused were murdered due to the nature of the "trials" (do something generally lethal to the accused person; if she lives, it proves that she is a witch and is then executed; if she dies, it proves that she was innocent after all, and oops, too bad we killed her in the process of determining her "innocence).
In the current discussions of sexual misconduct, the act(s) do actually exist. The people accused of them publicly have, in most cases so far, acknowledged that the accusations were true. None of them have been executed nor are there plans to execute them. In those cases where there have been any consequences at all (note some have not had any, like Cosby), the consequence has been to remove the person from the position of power that they were using to prevent innocent victims from advancing in their careers unless they submit to sexual assault. In other words, they are being stopped from continuing to harm the careers of innocent people.
Comparison invalidated.
McCarthyism at least has more similarities on the surface, in that communism did exist and some people who were accused were, in fact, communists. The difference comes on the subject of harm. No reasonable person can claim that sexually abusing people in their place of work is harmless, whereas arguments could be made that lobbying for communism could go either way, depending on one's political/economic leanings.
So there too, the sexual misconduct outings are (a) addressing an issue that leads to unambiguous harm, and (b) actually being investigated prior to firings (e.g. Telsey says they investigated the claims against their employee before taking action; others have admitted their guilt publicly). And therefore, not really the same as McCarthyism, either.
Updated On: 12/2/17 at 06:47 PM
