Scapegoats witches

Although Leschnitzer s assertion about Jews and witches alternating as society s scapegoats does not fit the facts quite as neatly as he makes it seem, his general thesis is sound. The witchcraft mania, ... 

It is consistent with the scapegoat theory of witchcraft, but not with the psychopathological theory of it, that the individuals persecuted as witches were often helpless and poor and that, in addition to witches, Jews, heretics of all sorts, Protestants, and scientists whose opinions threatened Church dogma, were also victimized by the Inquisition. In short, whereas psychiatric theory relates the belief in witchcraft and the persecution of witches to the mental diseases supposedly harbored by the witches, the scapegoat theory relates them to the specific conditions of the society in which such beliefs and practices occurred. Because of these different perspectives, psychiatric investigations of witchcraft concentrate on the witches and ignore the witch-hunters, while nonpsychiatric investigations of it reverse this focus. ... 

The psychopathological theory of witchcraft is, as we have seen, not the only available or possible explanation of the witch-hunts. The view that witches were society s scapegoats was held by Reginald Scot four hundred years ago, was articulated into a comprehensive and persuasive explanation by Jules Michelet more than one hundred years ago, and was massively documented from original sources by Henry Charles Lea more than fifty years ago. Why then do institutional psychiatrists and psychiatric historians ignore this competing explanation, and prefer instead the view that witches were madwomen An effort to answer this question will help to clarify not only the practical import of these two theories of the witch-craze, but also the nature of Institutional Psychiatry as a modern mass movement. 

All explanations fulfill a practical, strategic function. The psychopathological theory of witchcraft is no exception. Its principal aim is to authenticate, as enlightened medical scientists, the physicians who propound it. The effect, if not the intent, of this explanation is to sidestep the competing explanation of witchcraft, namely, that persons alleged to be witches were not mentally sick but were society s scapegoats. In other words, the basic function of the medical theory of witchcraft—and, in my opinion, its basic... 

Here Cide unmasks homosexuality as a socially stigmatized role, like witch or Jew, which, under the pressure of public opinion, its bearer is likely to disavow and repudiate. The homosexual is a scapegoat who evokes no sympathy. Hence, he can be only a victim, never a martyr. This is as true today in the United States as it was in France a half century ago. The same applies, moreover, to the mentally ill he, too, can only be a victim, never a martyr. 

The evidence presented thus far establishes, I believe, the basic similarities between the social situation of witches and involuntary mental patients. At the same time, although, as scapegoats and victims, witches and madmen resemble Jews and Negroes, there are also some important differences between them which deserve some brief remarks. 

In this book, I have tried to display the forms in which the perennial scapegoat principle manifests itself in the modern world. To this end, I have traced the transformation of medieval ideas about witches and their persecution by priests into our contemporary ideas about madmen and their persecution by physicians. 

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