Why were Joseph McCarthy's charges so damaging to individuals?

Answer 1

That's a question that can't be answered without looking at the time in which it happened. In the early 1950s, the Cold War had begun, and Americans had deep suspicion of Russia and Communism as China was taken over by a communist regime in 1949, Korea became two in 1950 as the communists held what is now North Korea, and the Soviet Union was about test a nuclear bomb. Since the late 1930s, some members of congress had already been expressing concern about an alleged takeover of the USA by Communists, and Senator McCarthy capitalized on that fear and concern. FBI founder and head Herbert Hoover, an anti-communist fervor himself, also fanned the flames with names of people who were already dismissed, died, or did not exist. There was no internet yet, TV was still fairly new, and fact-checking was not a common practice, so if a congressman (and most were men) made an assertion, the press generally reported it without question. Until Edward R. Murrow took McCarthy on in the 1954 Army hearings, there was not much mainstream media critique of the claims he made, even though some members of his own Republican party (including President Eisenhower) were becoming more and more uncomfortable with McCarthy's accusations. But due to lack of a strong response, a lot of innocent people lost their jobs and their reputations.

In one televised hearings on CBS and the DuMont stations, McCarthy was seen as ruthless, arrogant, and a bully. The exchange between attorney Joseph Welch and McCarthy more or less ended McCarthy's career:

"Until this moment, Senator, I think I never gauged your cruelty or recklessness...."

When McCarthy resumed his attack, Welch cut him short: "Let us not assassinate this lad further, Senator.... You've done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?"

Prior to this exchange, McCarthy accused the army of harboring "pixies" and "fairies." His general counsel, who also had the tool to instigate, Roy Cohn, was himself a homosexual, something that is known today but was not known back then.

Prior to that hearing, McCarthy had a positive 50% rating and after, it fell to 34%. I am leaving links for you to review. The first link concerning "McCarthyism" has listed on the bottom members of the film industry who were "blacklisted." Joseph McCarthy was censored by the Senate and anytime he stood up to speak, very few senators were present. The media also stopped covering him. He died as a result of alcoholism in 1957.

*Because he was a senator, he could not be sued for saying these things

-Apex

Answer 2

Senator Joseph McCarthy's charges were so damaging because they labeled people as Soviet spies, which is something that you wouldn't want to have happen to you in their time, the time of the Red Scare. It mainly caused enormous social ruin for those individuals. Of course, questions on punishment for those individuals also arose.