Illegal immigration is the one topic you see frequently in the news nowadays. As I’ve been searching for a current topic that demonstrates some common behavioral features and characteristics of the European Witch Hunts, I began to think back to a conversation I had once had with my 12 year old daughter. She was asking me about the illegal immigration. She had heard stories on the news about how the illegal immigrants where taking over our jobs, and became very concerned that this might as well happen to me and my current employment. I spent a few minutes reassuring her that this would never happen to me and that the types of jobs most illegal immigrants are taking are those that many Americans do not want in the first place. Reflecting back on this conversation I started to observe similarities between the current topic of Illegal Immigration and the Witch Hunts that took place in Europe in 1600s. I believe people to have similar fears and thus to behave in similar ways in both mentioned situations.

I have recently found a curious article in The New York Times, telling about a crime committed by two white teenagers: they were charged with the cruel and eventually fatal massacre of an illegal immigrant from Mexico. The fact was they actually beat him up to death. One of the young men faced “the most serious charge, criminal homicide”, because, according to the prosecutor, “he kicked Mr. Ramírez in the head as he lay unconscious on the ground after being punched by another of the six youths. That kick proved to be the fatal blow”. The mere cruelty of the crime committed by two young men shocked me. What was initially regarded as a street fight eventually transformed into the intense national debate over immigration. The lead prosecutor Mr. Frantz declared that “They called Mr. Ramírez a spic… They told him to go back to Mexico. They told him: ‘This is Shenandoah. You don’t belong here”.

If looking at these statements superficially, they seem to be plainly related to the issue of racial discrimination. At first glance the conflict is all about hatred to the representatives of other races, to immigrants with different color of skin. However, if looking a little deeper into the essence of the conflict, if analyzing the subject and considering the history of this particular area, another picture seems to emerge. What if the mentioned quarrel is a sort of culmination of the economic problems the communities in the area are having? An article in the Northern Virginian Daily Newspaper of January 2009 states that the Unemployment in Northern Shenandoah Valley has spiked to 5.1 percent, which is the greatest since 1996. Many of the unemployed are in the process of applying for seasonal jobs. Naturally, the seasonal positions are as a rule occupied by temporary labor that is mostly represented by illegal immigrants. The fact is they often have no other choice but to hold down jobs that only provide seasonal earnings. If analyzing the situation, it is no wonder the relations between natives and immigrants are rather strained, sometimes even transforming into hatred.

Recollecting what we have learned about the economic problems and strains the community has been going through during the times of witch hunts, as well as the anxiety the society has been experiencing, I can’t help observing similarities between social moods typical for both situations. In the current case the illegal immigrant from the Shenandoah Valley is the victim of cruelty provoked by social unhappiness and economic distress. If looking at the data provided by statistics, we can only imagine how great a dissatisfaction of the natives is. The young men “charged in the fatal beating of an illegal immigrant from Mexico” probably heard their parents frequently discussing at home how the illegal immigrants are depriving local community members of the possibility to work and to earn their living by taking at least temporary jobs, especially in case they have just been fired. Similarly, in 15th century midwives came under much the same community’s scrutiny for delivering the newborns and providing healing, which signified their being in control of human’s life and death.