The Crucible is the 1953 play, written by Arthur Miller. Based on the witch hunt in salem, the mass hysteria based on false accusations (and even true accusations) caused mass murder. The accusations and yelling of the devil are very similar to the cries of how evil the gender non-conforming are.
Personally I have seen students, in our class even, say that those who don’t identify as they were born, are fake. I’ve dealt with this many places. Internet, indirectly, and my friends also have. I could tell you endless stories about how trans people have been targeted, killed, suicide bated, so on and so forth. It happens to all LGBTQA+ people. Non binary, agender, asexual, aromantic. If it’s non-conforming, it’s bad to the bigots out there. It doesn’t fit the norm, so they need to hunt it down. Thus is the same way in the crucible. Witchcraft is not normal, or accepted, so they must find out who is a witch. In 2017 alone, there were 28 unlawful murders of gender non-conforming people in the US alone. And that is 28 too many.
My personal experience is that I myself, identify outside of what I was born. I identify as male and go by Timothy or Tim if preferred. Using he/him pronouns and supporting everyone in a similar state. I’ve seen at least 2 trans women at our school as well. I’ve also heard teachers comment on the plethora of gender non-conforming students. I am out as trans to very few people so that I may hide from ridicule. I am also not going to stand by the multiple murders of trans folks, ESPECIALLY POC. Looking into trans murders, a MAJORITY of them were BLACK TRANS WOMEN.
To those who go out on the internet yelling that trans men and women aren’t real, to those yelling and protesting those gender non-conforming. To the ‘feminists’ who claim for equality, yet suicide bait trans women. To the conservative families who say they will glady shoot or kill trans women / men in their preferred bathrooms, consider this a formal attack. Every day I face these people, online, or otherwise. There’s more of them in the world than you think, and some of them are even in control of our country.
I want this to be an eye opener to my peers, and to those around us. There is so much ignorance about murder nowadays and I plan on solving that. These murders are important, and we need to fix them. We need to PROTECT our peers instead of fighting them. Instead of calling them ‘invalid’, why don’t we just give up and respect each other. We need to stop fighting over something so wide, humans haven’t grasped the entire concept of gender, other than the fact that it is a SPECTRUM. There is more than 2 or 3 genders, and we need, as a society, need to recognize this. Instead of battling them for their identity and worsening their mental health, we need to protect them and defend them. If you’re a cishet white male and you’re tired of being “”attacked for spreading the truth””, maybe stop being oppressive and accept that your truth, simply isn’t truth.
With the hysteria and constant finger pointing fingers in the crucible, it’s easy to recognize it in todays society too. In the crucible, they fear what they do not know. They fear witches and the devil, and they fear acts that they consider unholy because they think it to be of the devil. In todays society we fear gender non-conforming folks because they don’t take the time to learn. Not to say that old witchcraft and murder is relatable to gender non-conforming but rather the thing that they fear is considered evil and they seek out who is and who isn’t. And this ends in senseless murder and wrath.
