A note from...
Catesby Holmes
Global Affairs Editor
Politicians who cry “witch hunt!‘” when confronting a purportedly baseless accusation are misunderstanding a dark chapter of American history.
Witch trials like those in Salem, Mass., rarely – if ever – hurt powerful men. They were all about keeping women powerless in the Puritans’ rigid, patriarchal society, writes Bridget Marshall, who teaches a course on colonial-era witch trials at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell. Of the 344 alleged “witches” in New England from 1638 to 1725, 78% were women. “When women stepped outside their proscribed roles” – by being too rich, too poor, or not having kids, for example – “they became targets.”
Seventy-eight percent of the people executed for witchcraft in New England in the late 17th and early 18th centuries were women.
Jef Thompson/Shutterstock.com
Hollee S. Temple, West Virginia University; John Temple, West Virginia University
The popular perception of right-wing patriot militia members is that they are racist, violent and crazy. The authors of a new book about them say that's not the whole story.
While selective universities may be elusive for many students, going to a community college first can represent an alternative way to get in, new research has found.
Anton Alexandrovich Toutov, Virginia Commonwealth University
Sulfur contaminates gasoline and coal. And when these fuels are burned, sulfur dioxide is emitted, causing pollution and respiratory issues. Now there may be a new way to remove it from fossil fuels.
Benzodiazepines, or benzos, are some of the most widely prescribed drugs in the US. They are meant to be used only short-term, but thousands use them long-term. That's a big worry.
Christopher R. Moore, University of South Carolina
Why did Earth's climate rapidly cool 12,800 years ago? Evidence is mounting that a comet or asteroid collision is to blame, with new support coming from the bottom of a South Carolina lake.
