XXI Century Americans or Modern Puritans

Many of the ideas contemporary Americans use now, come either from Puritans or are new from people, but morality has been in discussion for millennia and changed multiple times. Are people nowadays more moral than the Puritans in the 1600s? Well, the question is hard and difficult to judge, because morality has not only changed the meaning but adapted new ideas to it, such as microaggressions. Not only that, but we also evolved from Puritanism. Also, Americans nowadays have Puritan thoughts. Both Nathaniel Hawthorne and Arthur Miller describe Puritan ways negatively in their texts, yet today we are no better. In fact, justice has not evolved since day one it was introduced in America by the Puritans. 

When it comes to thinking about what morality actually is, people think ‘oh it is what is good and what is bad,’ and they aren’t wrong, but they are also not fully correct: “It’s what societies determine to be ‘right’ and ‘acceptable’.” (Morin) Nowadays we define morality as what is acceptable and what is not; there is no in-between. As a broad concept, morality is what is good and bad, but different cultures define it differently. Nowadays it’s different: ”Morality isn’t fixed. What’s considered acceptable in your culture might not be acceptable in another culture. Geographical regions, religion, family, and life experiences all influence morals” (Morin). The cultures around the world are different, so what might be right in one part of the US might be going to be wrong in another. It divides into two sections, legal and social. Legal is what the constitution says and the government demands, whereas social is based on people’s opinions. Today, society must contend with the new, twenty-first century, ideas such as microaggressions.

“It’s like judging a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with a jelly and peanut butter sandwich.”

Microaggressions are definitely not moral because people judge other people based on religion, the color of skin, and sexuality: ”These conversations are essential to affect change, but they’re hard and uncomfortable, and you’re bound to run into what’s known as ‘microaggressions.’ These are the thinly veiled, everyday instances of racism, homophobia, sexism (and more) that you see in the world.” (Limborg). In Puritan times having conversations or ideas about the microaggressions: racism, sexism, was there but compared to America for the last two years it wasn’t as common. Conversations in the world today are hard because there are many factors that might affect the opinion of one side of a conversation. Many people may have been raised and taught differently or born with a different tradition. With that, social morality has increased with what is acceptable and what is not. The fight against microaggressions has been going on for a long time but the repair started two years ago with George Floyd’s death, which initiated BLM, or equality movements toward LGBTQ+ people. In terms of the range of words that come with morality, the world now has more of them. Today, we can’t mention morality without talking about social opinion. Knowing people in the 1600s and 2000s, we really see how those two eras differ so there is no actual judgment of who is more moral. Contemporary Americans also left some of Puritanistic mistakes a function of a government.

Today’s American ideas are made from the basics of Puritanism. Whatever have Puritans thought of, we have modified it or left it as it was. ”Yet he [Alexis De Tocqueville] did credit them [Puritans] for the political system he admired in 19th-century America.” (Hall). The judicial system of the US looks very similar to how the Puritan system was. Since the Puritans arrived in America, they created their own government system where churches were at the top. Their court was like a modern court with a judge and lawyers, but with more reverends; however, if people are defending the victim or culprit then they are against the court, which can lead them to punishments. Lawyers now can defend them without any punishment. This is a result of people learning from their mistakes, suggesting that morality improved in some aspects but in some it didn’t. Punishments Puritans gave out were usually death penalties or the victims of the court had to wear a scarlet letter like Hester Prynne in Hawthorne’s work, or even brutality such as whipping. Three centuries have passed and in a multitude of states in the US, a death penalty still exists, therefore the world hasn’t changed we are the sa. Comparing Puritanism and the world now is hard if both sides are similar.

Americans in the twenty-first century have many qualities of the old Puritans. Even though that America might have been influenced by other factors, one thing is certain Puritan ideas are still in people’s minds and the way we operate things such as justice or churches is the same as we did three hundred years ago, which means America has not changed since the 17th century. : “Do present-day Americans still exhibit, in their attitudes and behavior, traces of those austere English Protestants who started arriving in the country in the early 17th century? It seems we do…” (Hutson). Hutson has found a researched experiment that proved how many Americans, with being in contact before the experiment with words like heaven or redeem, had Puritanism thoughts and answers to the experiments. There are many factors that could have influenced that thinking; “(…) ‘industrialization and imigration’ and other factors that have led to immense social change” (Hutson). Judgment of a place that has not changed in over three centuries is impossible. It’s like comparing a pencil to another pencil. It might vary in outside structure but inside is still the same.

Morality hasn’t changed it just has shifted it deeper categories throughout three centuries. Puritans believed in theocracy and Americans are democratic, but living in a way designed by the Bible can be confusing. The Crucible by Arthur Miller shows it: “You are pulling Heaven down and raising up a whore! I denounce these proceedings, I quit this court!” (Miller 120). This situation illustrates how the show of witchcraft done by Abigail and her ‘friends’, makes everyone crazy, which leads to a slaughterhouse. Proctor is calling Abigail a whore because he knows that it’s all fake; not only he but also reverend Hale realizes he has been living a lie and tries to stop the insanity. After the court does not listen to him, he decides to quit the court. This leads to a point where a more “popular” side is winning and the losing side can do nothing about it, but only quit. Nowadays we can see it with the social morality of people. If a famous star acknowledges and shares something not ridiculous and a fan rejects that something, it starts a whole battle in which there is an obvious winner from the moment it started, the star. If there is a rejection of a famous person’s idea, it isn’t going to go far. Arthur Miller spoke of Puritans negatively but in this case, he is also speaking about nowadays Americans. Legal morality shifted into social morality in just three hundred years and we can’t forget that people value opinions more than what the government says now. 

Throughout literature Miller is not the only example that proves this point, moreover Hawthorne in The Scarlet Letter has used another view on opinionated judgment for the people; “The unhappy culprit sustained herself as best a woman might, under the heavy weight of a thousand unrelenting eyes, all fastened upon her, and concentrated at her bosom.”  (Hawthorne 42). Hester is being shamed for her scarlet letter ‘A’, which stands for adultery, with comments from the audience. The ‘heavy weight of a thousand unrelenting eyes’ judging upon Hester for her actions, can be clearly compared to the same situations happening on the internet. People are dumb, they can post a lot of statements that will unconsciously offend them, and also there is the fact of views. Nowadays, everything will be done for them. With these posts being put on the internet, a huge audience is attracted and laughs at them. At this point, the poster realizes he also has embarrassed himself and wants to put down the video. Posting things on the internet is the same as Hester Prynne being on the scaffold, so the same has happened as in Miller; legal morality has shifted into social. 

Throughout three centuries there have been too many changes for us to judge who is more or less moral. Not only that, but based on events that happen in this world, the morality of a Puritan society is the same as the American morality nowadays. Legal Puritan morality shifted into social American morality. Many actions that happened in the 1600s found a way to live and survive for three centuries. Other are new ideas that can’t be compared to an old-world such as New England. It’s like judging a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with a jelly and peanut butter sandwich.