Halloween pardon sought for executed British witches

When we talk about trauma it's easy to understand what it must have been like to be accused of being a witch just because someone decided to say you were one. That is what all of this was about. Someone saying something against you without having to prove one bit of it. How would you defend yourself when no one was asking for the claim to be proven and people you thought you knew were condemning you?

That is what is happening right here and now in this country. People are making all kinds of claims against others without offering any evidence. People are begin held by this country in other nations, like Iraq and Afghanistan without trials, without evidence, but some in this country see nothing wrong with that. People are making all kinds of false claims against Senator Obama without any evidence to prove it is true. How many times do you have to hear a McCain supporter repeating what they heard without any proof? This is the selection of the next president of the United States of America and some people have taken it so lightly they will believe rumors without evidence?

When the claims are proven false by some in the media, McCain and Palin just go on repeating the lie no matter what the truth is and they break the Commandment about bearing false witness, yet their supporters find nothing wrong with any of this? It would be one thing if they said something they thought was true then stopped saying it when it was proven false, but they just keep repeating the lie. Didn't they understand what happened in our own history with the Salem Witchcraft Trials? I often wonder how traumatic it will be for the people who have believed McCain and Palin when they find out they were lied to. Fear is a powerful thing but a lie is only powerful when no one is asking for evidence.

picture from About.com

Halloween pardon sought for executed British witches
Story Highlights
Petition seeks pardon for UK witches hundreds of years after their deaths

Around 400 people were executed in England for alleged witchcraft

The Witchcraft Act of 1735 put an end to trials of accused witches


LONDON, England (CNN) -- Campaigners in London planned to petition the British government Friday for a posthumous pardon for the hundreds of people executed for witchcraft between the 16th and 18th centuries.



They said Halloween is a good time to highlight the "grave miscarriage of justice" suffered by the men and women falsely accused of being witches.

Their petition asks Justice Minister Jack Straw to recommend that Queen Elizabeth issue a pardon.

"We felt that it was time that the sinister associations held by a minority of people regarding witches and Halloween were tackled head-on," said Emma Angel, head of Angels, a large costume supplier in London.

"We were gobsmacked to discover that though the law was changed hundreds of years ago and society had moved on, the victims were never officially pardoned."
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http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/10/31/britain.witches/index.html