Hi! So I used to teach high school and I have taught this text several times. Yes, it is meant to be an allegory for McCarthyism, but it doesn’t HAVE to be about that particular situation, it can be anything where people are being accused of things because they are different and afraid to speak up to defend themselves or each other, any situation in which people are forced to keep themselves safe by hurting someone else or the community around them.
Also, consider that the way a story ends is what solidifies its themes. If Miller wanted to say something about the horrors of the literal (or allegorical) witch hunt, he would not give it a happy ending if he really wanted to get this message across. Tragedy hits harder. So he gave us sympathetic, morally gray characters that the audience would like and root for, and then had the type of behavior he was condemning (the witch hunting) be what dooms them. With John Proctor this shows really well because you really do see him try to do the right thing at the end and not lie, but that can’t save him from an inherently unjust and immoral situation.
No this is a valid point. The world of Brave New world is surprisingly chill for dissidents, at least the higher status male ones. That’s actually one of the more interesting points of discussion about it.
I do disagree on one thing, it IS a dystopia. At least academically, the most useful definition of a dystopia is an attempted utopia that went wrong, and the interesting discussions under that framework are often, who is the utopia for, and who is it not for? Is there a way to create a utopia that works for everyone, or will the attempt always result in some form of dystopia? When do cultural practices (or brainwashing) to make people happy and content cross the line into dystopia? That’s the good shit.