Scribal Terror

How a Moral Panic Ends

 

Ann Putnam was one of the witnesses who accused people of witchcraft during the Salem incident in 1692-3. She got people hanged, and she thought she was doing the right thing. Here is the public apology she delivered in 1706, once the moral panic had fizzled out, and the participants were left with nothing but their grief and their guilt:

 

"I desire to be humbled before God for that sad and humbling providence that befell my father's family in the year about '92; that I, then being in my childhood, should, by such a providence of God, be made an instrument for the accusing of several persons of a grievous crime, whereby their lives were taken away from them, whom now I have just grounds and good reason to believe they were innocent persons; and that it was a great delusion of Satan that deceived me in that sad time, whereby I justly fear I have been instrumental, with others, though ignorantly and unwittingly, to bring upon myself and this land the guilt of innocent blood; though what was said or done by me against any person I can truly and uprightly say, before God and man, I did it not out of any anger, malice, or ill-will to any person, for I had no such thing against one of them; but what I did was ignorantly, being deluded by Satan. And particularly, as I was a chief instrument of accusing of Goodwife Nurse and her two sisters, I desire to lie in the dust, and to be humbled for it, in that I was a cause, with others, of so sad a calamity to them and their families; for which cause I desire to lie in the dust, and earnestly beg forgiveness of God, and from all those unto whom I have given just cause of sorrow and offence, whose relations were taken away or accused."

The European Witchcraft Panic

One example of moral panic was the witchcraft craze in Europe:

 

"On the continent of Europe, roughly between 1 400 and 1650, hundreds of thousands of people-perhaps as many as half a million, up to 85% of whom were women-were judged to have "consorted with the devil" and were put to death. Much of Europe, especially France, Switzerland, and Germany, was in turmoil with suspicion, accusations, trials, and the punishment of supposed evildoers. A kind of fever-a craze or panic---concerning witchcraft and accusations of witchcraft swept over the land. Once an accusation was made, there was little the accused could do to protect herself. Children, women, and "entire families were sent to the stake .... Entire villages were exterminated ....Germany was covered with stakes, where witches were burning alive." Said one inquisitor, "I wish [the witches] had but one body, so that we could bum them all at once, in one fire!" (Ben-Yehuda 1985)

 

I want to come back to a Colonial American version of this, the Salem episode, which I think is even more typical of the idea of moral panic than the European manifestation.

Moral Panics

I've been thinking about this phenomenon a lot, for reasons that I would hope are obvious. But maybe they're only obvious to me. I'll keep coming back to this as the day goes by. See what you think.

At times, substantial numbers of the members of societies are subject to intense feelings of concern about a given threat which a sober assessment of the evidence suggests is either nonexistent or considerably less than would be expected from the concrete harm posed by the threat. Such over-heated periods of intense concern are typically short-lived. In such periods, which sociologists refer to as "moral panics," the agents responsible for the threat-"folk devils"-are stereotyped and classified as deviants.

Goode and Ben-Yehuda, "Moral Panics: Culture, Politics, and Social Construction"

Having Dostoyevskian Thoughts

“Imagine that you are creating a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end, giving them peace and rest at last. Imagine that you are doing this but that it is essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature...in order to found that edifice on its unavenged tears. Would you consent to be the architect on those conditions? Tell me. Tell the truth.”
― Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov

Lost My Damn Owl. Had to Make Do

Old terriers will understand.

A Short Story by Jonathan Webb

This is a short story Jonathan shared with us in 2005. He said it was a work in progress, but I like it the way it is.

A portrait of the author, right side up.

Bill Rossington wiped his wellingtons, grunted and straightened up painfully. Thirty-four well-tended acres trailed away in an indistinct haze of wheat and barley.

"Aye, Mum." he mumbled. "Snatched ye from yer big city to the dales, now, didn' aye? Forty years be comin' to whet now belong to we alone. E'en tho ye not be seein' er now nor again eh, lovie?" The can cap screwed down with difficulty but was done. "Well then." He moved forward slowly, boots clomping. "Two down, seventeen to go, I'll warrant. God save the Queen, me arse."

 

**********

 

"The same today as yesterday. And the day before and the day before that." Byron gave one last flick to his brows and marched to the tubes. God, he hated the Underground. Teeming masses, jumbling, skittering as one live organism going to make a "living" And he hated it. Same route day in, day out. All faces looked identical. Dulled. All on auto-pilot to slave away the day just to bring bread back home.

  He jumped into the flow. The tunnel walls blurred by monotonously. He'd be at the job site all too soon, he knew. Then what? "Why, work the bloody day away as yesterday. All for country and Queen," he grimaced.

"So you think they'll be missing us for half a day then?" It was Harry, his coworker. They had taken this same route together all these days, weeks, years - who knew how long?  Acknowledging one another, yet rarely speaking.

"I say, mate. Will they be missing us for a bit? I mean, what with all the other workers about the site, who would know?"

Ah, Harry. Always the free spirit. "But this leg takes us direct to the job," Byron said. "We'd be seen skipping."

"May'nt be the case, lad. Aways up and to the right is a new excavation for a tube spur to the downs. Not far now. Whadya say. Offboard and scamper out to God's green fields, a bit 'o sunshine and clean air - no crowds. Think fast!"

Byron saw a darker splotch on the tunnel walls ahead approaching quickly. Yes, he thought. Why not, indeed? Who would miss us? We're hard workers. They owe us.

"I'm in!" Byron said.

"We're out!" Harry yelled.

They swayed alone in the darkness as the masses faded into the blackness of the underground. Slowly, as Byron's eyes became accustomed to the darkness, a faint light was noticeable.

"This way, mate," Harry said, pushing him forward. "Next stop, freedom!"

They slowly picked their way towards a pinprick of light that grew with each passing step. "New earthworks for the Bywater Terminal juncture, this," Harry said.

On they went, never given notice by the teams of excavators, backs bent, asses busting to meet the deadlines for the new tube station opening.

Finally! They were above ground. Fresh air washed their faces and they laughed, scampering a distance to a patch of wonderful heather beneath skyscraper trees. They collapsed on the ground laughing. "Gawd almighty in the mornin'," Harry said. "#[email protected]! the bosses and #[email protected]! the job!" He took a bit of grass between his teeth and grew somber. "What ya suppose it's all about, friend?"

Harry and Byron spoke of many things yet nothing at all that afternoon. Byron dreamed of owning his own plot of land, away from the city crowds, working only for himself. Harry said his antennae were pricked for the first eligible damsel that would give him hearth, home and kiddos, be she ugly as the gawdawful Queen Mother herself.

"But who are we kidding, mate?" he asked Byron. "We're just working stiffs, born to our class and probably to die in it."

"No, Harry. I'm sure you're wrong," said Byron. "We work hard and keep our noses clean, get the attention of the bosses, show them what we can do. We climb the ladder. Fuck the Queen and those born to favor. We can make our lives count with hard work and succeed in the bargain. The royals will eat our dust!"

"Yes. Yes, I believe you. We must have a goal. We'll show the bosses. We can do 'er. But, er, first we must make sure we still have bosses. Off we go now to the underground. To the tubes and to work before we're missed and fired. . .or worse."

 

Sweaty but happy, Byron and Harry rejoined the throngs on the underground. Indiscriminate faces, dulled by the workaday world, all looking identical. Except two. Two who smiled with new purpose and a goal.

"Aye, we can do 'er Harry. We can. And we must." Off in the distance, a faint light grew at the tube terminus. Soon they would vomit out onto the work site with all the other dour faces - but now they didn't dread it. They would not be just any other workers. They were going for the prize.

 

But traffic slowed abruptly. The crowds ahead looked back, brows raised in question. Behind, workers strained to see what the slowup was about. "What's that?" said Harry.

There was a dull tremble. Soon it became distinct. Whump, whump, WHUMP - then fumes, noxious, choking! Panic - bodies flailing and banging. Harry was down and still. Byron choked, eyes streaming. He fell beside his friend. Sloshing darkness. His last thought was, "Why? Why me? Why now?"

 

********

 

Bill Rossington wiped his wellingtons, grunted and straightened up painfully. "Aye, my land now, free and clear. Ain't no swarmin' beggars to be gettin' naught off it but me."

He screwed the gas can cap down with difficulty, but it was done. Hand shading eyes, he spotted another brown mound by the fence on the hill.

"Well, then." He moved forward slowly, boots clomping. "Three down, sixteen to go, I'll warrant," he said. "And God save the Queen my arse."

 

 

 

*******

Pumpkin spice muffins, reduced fat/sugar

 

Modified from Cooks.com

 

Cranberry scones

Martha Stewart Cranberry Scones

He ran away to join the cavalry

My great grandfather William Meyers ran away from home several times, starting at the age of fourteen, intending to enlist to fight for the Union in the Civil War but each time his parents dragged him home. Finally they gave up and let him enlist at 15. He survived the war and was discharged in the state of Tennessee in 1865.This is his certificate of discharge from the 10th Ohio Cavalry following the general order to demobilize [click to enlarge]. He was eighteen at the time of the discharge and had served since 1862.

Here is a picture of William wearing a very small hat. He was my maternal grandmother's father and all the women in his family were members of the Grand Army of the Republic Ladies' Auxiliary.

Murphy's yard