A Modern Day Witchhunt

Finn Hermanson

In the 1980's, the case of the McMartin preschool, was very much like the Salem Witch hunts. At McMartin’s, day care workers were being arrested under the charges of child molestation. The teachers and care takers were accused of being Satanists as well. There was never any evidence to support this claim. However, accusations of Satanists were very common in the 80’s. The media was constantly worried about the spread of Satanism so, it constantly appeared in the papers in a very negative way. Years after the accusations and arrests, those who were arrested were set free after a mother who accused the care takers was found to have paranoid delusions and was mentally unstable. Not only were the accusations false, the psychiatrists who examined the children asked "leading" questions, while repeating things, until the children said what the authorities wanted to hear.

Much like in the movie “The Crucible” and the Salem Witch trials, the ‘Satanic Day Care workers’ and ‘devil worshipping witches’ were normal people, whom the entire community trusted. Then one person happens to be divinely informed that, these specific people in the community are somehow involved with the devil. This leads to arrests, false imprisonments, and, in Salem’s case, deaths. The use of leading questions is evident in both Salem and in McMartin. At McMartin, child psychiatrists would ask question after question, all leading to a specific answer. This leads to false statements and the imprisonment of the entire staff of a daycare center. In Salem, leading questions were a little bit more ‘hardcore.’ The accused would be whipped/tourtured and questioned at the same time. Most of the time, the questions involved confessing as to stop the whipping. So if a ‘witch’ wanted the whipping to cease, all they had to do was say they did it. That may have stopped the pain for the time being. However, a confession like that would either mean rigorous atonement or death by hanging.