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Lying In The Crucible Essay

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People are often told that lying is the wrong thing to do; it is evil, inhumane, and overall terrible. Despite this fact, lying has been shown to hand people multiple benefits. These benefits can be anything from getting out of doing house chores to looking cool in front of classmates. Because of this, many people use this form of deception to remove themselves from unwanted problems in the community. The Crucible, a play written Arthur Miller, portrays a disrupted society where people are accused of witchcraft for any abnormal activity. The accused witches are either forced to “confess” to their involvement with witchcraft or be executed in the gallows. The characters in the play display to the readers that lying provides protection towards people in different ways. The Crucible takes place in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. During this time, a girl named Abigail Williams forms people’s belief in witchcraft when she claims that her slave, Tituba, bewitched her. When Tituba was given the choice of “confessing to her sin”, which means to lie about being a witch, or be whipped and executed, she chose to protect herself with dishonesty. After this event, many people began to accuse one another of witchcraft and were forced into Tituba’s situation: lie in a “confession” of their sins or be executed. With numerous accusations running around town, the people in fear of being accused would lie about their involvement with witchcraft as well as their reputation, since people with

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