Better dead than RED!!!! (McCarthyism)

17/8/2012

READ p.245-255 in your Packet from HOA.
READ Howard Zinn, pages 424-442
Once you have completed the readings, blog a 200 word minimum response to those readings where you attempt to answer some (not all) of the questions below.

GUIDING QUESTIONS:

What did it mean to be "soft on Communism" in the 1950s? How did the fear of being so perceived influence politics at the federal level? What happened to those who were willing to take such a risk? Did anyone in power choose to do so? Why or why not?

Why do you think Congress supported HUAC for such a long period of time? Why was there so little opposition to HUACs?

A few basic Blog rules:
1. Be respectful.
2. Please type your full name, a creative title, and the page numbers or chapter your blog entry is responding to on the top line of your comment. This will help us keep track of who is responding to what.
3. You may write in the first-person, informally. That being said, please write in complete sentences and keep your comments relevant and appropriate.
4. 200 word MINIMUM!

13 Comments

Athavan Balendran

19/8/2012 09:38:12 am

McCarthyism and it's effects

Communism or “The Red Scare” was a very big issue during the 1950’s in the United States. Also it wasn’t enough to just not be a communist; you had to be tough of communism. Anyone considered “soft” on communism would hence be thought of as a communist or communist sympathizer even if no communist actions were performed. People who were considered soft on communism usually were against the process of communism but did not believe in the amount of violence and destruction that the accusations caused. Big federal leaders and business men also feared being accused thus they followed the social norm. McCarthy famously said that “If you’re not with us you’re against us” and this is something that really influenced people no speak out against what he was doing. They were in fear that he would then accuse them of being communist sympathizers. People like Harry Truman only fed into this by going to war with North Korea presumably because of McCarthy’s notions that he was soft of communism. Eisenhower also was famously accused for not doing anything to stop and stand up against McCarthy as he destroyed the lives of many with his accusations. People were generally riled up by the accusations and no one dared speak against them, even congress with HUAC for McCarthy has said that there many communists in the federal government, most feared he would accuse them if they spoke against HUAC.

Janelle Garrett

1/10/2012 10:39:10 pm

Athavan,
Do you think Truman only went to war in Korea because of McCarthyism and the fear of being perceived as being "soft on communism" or do you think he would have anyways? Was this Zinn's argument? Please remember that even though Eisenhower is criticized (rightly so) for letting McCarthyism continue to falsely accuse people and destroy lives in the name of anti-communism and was unwilling to take the political hit for standing up to him, it was ultimately Eisenhower who called for an end to McCarthyism once he started accusing the Army. However, it was very little and very late.

Gabriella Freeman

19/8/2012 11:34:57 am

The ''soft on communism'' movement was when the people were not communist themselves but did not care about stopping the spread of communism around the place. Back then, people were scared of acting against Mccarthy, because they were afraid that he would accuse them of being communist, as he did with many people for no particularly real reason. All this fear and anxiety cause much chaos - chaos which none of the presidents wanted to do anything about and which was causing a lot of people to lose their jobs and put families at risk. Basically, Mccarthy was paranoid about communism which scared everyone else and made everything go out of control, for unnecessary precautions.

Janelle Garrett

1/10/2012 10:40:49 pm

Gabby, while you seem to get the general gist of McCarthyism, you need to use details and facts when discussing history, and not just write in generalities. You didn't really answer the questions posed.

Thiago Gatto

19/8/2012 12:39:28 pm

If It's Red It Should Be Dead

McCarthyism was certainly that was necessary for the United States at the time where they were fighting Communists and the Soviet Union, but it was also fundamental for Harry Truman’s image. One of the main criticisms of the early years of Truman’s presidency was that he was too soft on Communism and his lack of control in the Congress certainly only made his appearance worse. With the new extreme policy against communism in the United States’ main departments and sections, McCarthy, who was a republican, fought in a very distinct and strict way the Communism infiltrations in the United States, turning the government’s policy into a much stronger on. McCarthyism was extremely dependent on publicity; if the people agreed that communism was a serious threat to the country and that it was really compromising foreign affairs and domestic policies, then McCarthy would’ve had all the support to continue on his quest against communism for years, and it was exactly his publicity that lead him to keep inquiring and investigating people from all departments of the government and even from Hollywood until 1953. McCarthy’s policy was very difficult to compete with because if he was attacked or if any of the investigations were contested, the people was simply accused of being a communist or that the ideas came from Moscow. Many people suffered with the McCarthy policies; people such as writers, screenwriters and journalists were often accused of spreading communist ideals and were forced to live another life in order not to be persecuted by government officials of to be deported. McCarthyism had and still has a major impact on American society. Anti-communism was associated with nationalism and patriotism in America and the freedom of expression of communist ideals were considered an act of betrayal. Even though his credibility wasn’t strong, McCarthy was able to shape the Way United States fought different ideologies and dealt with foreign affairs, and during the rest of the 20th century, the United States used a lot of different tactics to ensure the supremacy of capitalism and that no other country joined the “red” group.

Janelle Garrett

1/10/2012 10:59:05 pm

Nice title! You made some good points, however, I encourage you to use more SFI when discussing history and avoid large blanket statements without supporting evidence.

Pedro Paulo M.

19/8/2012 01:32:56 pm

McCarthysim or Anti-Communist Congressivism?
The ultimate ideological result of World War II was the division of the planet into zones of Communist or Capitalistic influences. Within this polarization of the world, the United States of America and the Soviet Union occupied the vanguard positions, as the Americans ultimately represented the liberal perspective of the world while the Soviets were the greatest exponents of Marxism and its anti-imperialist approach. As a consequence of this ideological antagonism, a world-wide scale war was ignited; it was the birth of the most apprehensive period of history, it was the birth of the Cold War. In the American society, an anti-Communist crusade instigated by the inexorable swing of the nation towards the political right was established. This communist persecution present in the early 1950’s, which was then compared to 17th century witch hunts, was highly influenced by the principles of McCarthyism. This anti-Communist paranoia had as its most prominent figure the Senator of Wisconsin, Joseph McCarthy. McCarthy was responsible for several demagogic attacks and accusations towards the American citizenry and officials, suggesting their links with the Soviet’s institutions of espionage, through his influence in the spheres of politics and media. For instance, on February 9, 1950, Joseph McCarthy falsely claimed that he had a list of 250 known Communists in the State Department. Still, the once Senator of Wisconsin and Chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Government Operations Committee of the U.S. Senate, was able to create a favoring public opinion to his harsh criticism towards known Marxists, and “soft” on Communism officials. In McCarthy’s perspective to be “soft” on Communism, meant to be not openly or eagerly against the proliferation of the Communist perspective around the world and, mainly, within the American boundaries. Therefore, McCarthy strongly criticized President Dwight Eisenhower alleging he had not done enough to expel subversives from the federal government or to pressure China in the Korean War. Coincidentally with McCarthyism there was a sudden desire of the American Congress to maintain in vigor this anti-Communist sentiment, as the Congress passed on bills such as the Smith Act (1940), which prohibited to teach, advocate, or encourage the overthrow of a government by the means of force, and reluctantly opposed the unfounded acts of the House Committee on Un-American Activities, the “theater of operations of the Cold War” (Pearson 249). This little opposition towards the HUACs was due to the reason that the United States had to suppress the radical opposition to the war efforts of the Cold War Period in order to develop its foreign policy of intervention and create a national unity to suppress the international wave of anti-imperialist insurrection. Thus, what seemed to be an isolated anti-Communist approach led by Joseph McCarthy was in fact a national necessity during the preambles of the Cold War.

Janelle Garrett

1/10/2012 11:03:00 pm

Ok, so your argument is that Congress is just as responsible for the anti-communist hysteria as McCarthy and they were contributing to it before and during the McCarthy era? Just clarifying... You're a great writer, Pedro Paulo, but sometimes just coming out and saying it is more powerful :-)

Sarah Godoy

20/8/2012 12:59:39 pm

Washington's Sky is Red Iinstead

McCarthyism dictated years of strong opposition to the communist infiltration in the United States of America in the peak of the Cold War, where the world was polarized between two ideologies- in one side, laid the capitalistic model of the US, whereas in the other, remained the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe`s communism- this, specifically, bothering McCarthy to an ample extent. He, as an officer of the Truman presidency and later part of the Eisenhower presidential terms, did not play "soft" in communism, as he considered it to be a characteristic of Eisenhower, who ultimately overruled most of his violent strategic plans to exterminate the communist threat from the American psique. Rather than playing "soft" on communism, McCarthy played it hard, and its effects mobilized even Hollywood. Over 300 Hollywood staff, either actors or directors, was interrogated by McCarthy and his men. 33 were sentenced. The communist infiltration was now present in the heart of America's capitalism: its dear Hollywood. Meanwhile, the HUAC operated in a way one can call by “under the covers” in order to further investigate communist infiltration. But why would Congress support it? Not a hard question to answer. HUAC was a way to ensure the loyalty of the Congress members in an inoffensive way, as it was not properly considered an organ of the US Gov. Truman himself announced in November 1946 the need to ascertain the loyalty of federal government employees and root out any security risks. Given the above, it is not hard to understand why wouldn’t people oppose the HUAC- if promoting strikes was already enough for one to be considered a communist, then, opposing the HUAC ASSURED one’s adherence to communist ideologies. Not even Hollywood was saved from the red psychosis. In the 1950, the sky that laid upon the White House was not blue. It was definitely red instead.

Janelle Garrett

1/10/2012 11:07:26 pm

Sarah, be careful! Joseph McCarthy was a Republican Senator from Wisconsin--he was not an officer of the Truman Presidency (in fact as a member of the opposing party he was definitely anti-Truman) and he wasn't part of the Eisenhower administration either (although they were both Republicans and he was serving as Senator during Eisenhower's presidential term. Good argument on why Congress would support HUAC and McCarthy with all of their excesses given the political climate in this era.

Anna Pearson

21/8/2012 12:46:19 pm

To Accuse is to Be Accused

The House Un-American Activities Committee fed off of people's fear of communism infiltrating the democracy of the United States. McCarthyism occurred during the Cold War period where the fear of communism escalated to the point that people were afraid of being blown up by the Soviet Union's nuclear missiles.No one tried to fight the HUAC's actions or Senator McCarthy's actions for a long time because if people tried to stand up against the committee than they would be the ones accused of communism. A result of being accused of communism would cause you to lose your whole life, including your accountability and your job. The HUAC thrived off of everyone's fear of having a communism in their backyard that is why it lasted so long. Many presidents also ignored McCarthy's actions because they were afraid themselves of being accused of communism. Their ratings and popularity would drastically decrease and one can only imagine the effect it would have on their politics. McCarthy even accused the United States government, so not even the president was safe. No evidence was needed, only an accusation could ruin your whole life. It wasn't until the whole senate came to their senses and banded together that McCarthy was put to a stop. Why McCarthy felt he could accuse innocent people without any support is beyond me. What caused him to want to find people to accuse? Did he find joy out of ruining people's lives? McCarthy used the accusations to his own advantage to gain political power and popularity, but the plan backfired on him eventually when his communist accusations caused him to be kicked out of office. McCarthyism overall did more harm than good to the United States and created a bigger fear and problem that was unnecessarily exaggerated.

Mari T.

1/10/2012 01:30:24 pm

During the Cold War there was a growing fear that communists would blow up America, at that time McCarthyism began. With that the House Un-American Activities Committee started to question everyone they thought could be helping the communists. The USA feared mostly the domino effect: if one country became communist more and more countries would too. So , not only were the focusing on extinguishing the communists they also worked on keeping as many countries as they could capitalist. The increasing fear of communist infiltrating in the government gave reason for the HUAC to keep with unreasonable questioning. Because Hollywood would impact so much people all over, the HUAC was very commonly focusing on questioning actors and people that worked there. The fear was so great of being caught that people would incriminate each other from fear of being caught. Being accused of being communist or helping communists was absurd in those days and everyone feared it, since that would completely end your life. At that time people kept list of those who were convicted communists, of suspects and all kinds of things related to communism, people in those lists were many times banned from places and could not go back to work. If one person in the family was convicted, so was the whole family, the tension and fear was growing continuously and friends were incriminating one another from fear of being incriminated too. The HUAC did various atrocities and because the tension was so much, were over looked by the people that feared the supremacy of communism. People, even though they saw the absurd actions of the HUAC, many time would not say anything fearing that if they did they would also be accused of being communists. McCarthy mostly was not, in my opinion, feeling superior and trying to incriminate innocent people, even though in that regime that happened, he was solely trying to help the American interest, preventing other countries and America of being infiltrated by the communists. McCarthy and his plans and actions we only motivated by fear itself, not the want of attacking innocent. He was submerged in fear and afraid he would be to lenient on communism and let it spread he was way too harsh.

Janelle Garrett

1/10/2012 11:19:26 pm

Maybe McCarthy was just acting out of his own fear of communism and out of his messed up version of patriotic duty, although I suspect there was something addicting about the power he derived from being able to inflict fear in people and the power he had over so many people's careers and lives and the fame and notoriety he received. It far surpassed the power of most Junior Senators from Wisconsin...

Better dead than RED!!!! (McCarthyism)

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