The Fever That Repeats Itself
A monologue on manufactured madness and the human psyche
Every age believes it’s immune to madness… until the fever comes. It never calls itself madness, of course. It calls itself justice, patriotism, even truth.
In Salem, 1692, a girl stood trembling before the crowd. Accused, not because of evidence, but because fear needed a face. They called it righteousness. The devil was among them, they said. And so, midwives, teenage girls, dissenters… burned. They called it justice. They believed it holy. Twenty lives were snuffed out.
No evidence. Only panic. Because fear has a way of finding virtue in cruelty.
Salem wasn’t unique. It was merely a symptom. There is a fever that returns, not always with the same name, or wearing the same mask, but always with the same infection: fear disguised as virtue, suspicion sold as truth, delusion wrapped in patriotic silk.
It doesn’t matter what century, what cause, or what enemy… the fever always feeds on uncertainty. It always whispers suspicion. It always offers scapegoats. A group blamed for the storm. A person named the cause of the drought.
But history remembers. And if we listen closely, so will we.
When fear finds a stage, it demands a sacrifice. And the altar, real or symbolic, always waits for someone to blame.
“What starts as a whisper of fear becomes a roar of persecution when the crowd grows hungry enough.”
The real possession in Salem wasn’t demonic. It was psychological. It was the terror of difference, the need to control, and the ease with which we will burn our neighbors just to feel holy in a frightened world.
Salem’s flames dimmed, but the fever only retreated into shadow. It went underground, changed clothes, waited quietly for new prophets, new fears, new enemies. Because once a society learns to sanctify its fear, it will always find new fuel. And it didn’t take long.
This time, not in churches, but in courtrooms. Not witches, but communists. The names changed, the madness didn’t.
In the late 1940s, Senator Joseph McCarthy stood with a microphone, holding a list no one ever saw. And the country listened.
“The crowd will believe anything if the man at the front sounds angry enough,” wrote historian Richard Hofstadter.
Lives were shattered. Books banned. Minds bent by the pressure to conform, or be cast out. When fear finds a microphone, truth often gets drowned beneath applause.
McCarthyism faded… but the fever never truly vanished. It simply changed faces, waiting quietly in the shadows, reemerging whenever fear needed a voice, whenever power felt uncertain, whenever reality seemed negotiable.
Not every wave was famous or named. Some arrived quietly, unrecorded, unnoticed… yet always carrying the same poison, always ready to ignite another flame.
Another wave came the day a man of darker hue rose to power, and a new story was needed to justify old discomfort. The system didn’t break, but the illusion that it belonged only to one kind of man did.
So a new fever rose.
“He wasn’t born here,” they said. “He’s not really one of us.”
Birtherism was not about place… it was about permission. Permission to be in a position historically reserved for the privileged. And millions believed it. Because a lie repeated often enough begins to feel like protection.
They couldn’t deny the vote, so they denied the system. Rage put on a suit. Fear rewrote its slogan. And still, the fever spread.
In 2009, grievance became a platform. The Tea Party emerged. They said it was about taxes. But beneath the slogans, you could hear something else… a tremor in the collective voice. Fear of change. Fear of difference. Fear of losing a power that once went unquestioned.
“When people feel their status slipping, they don’t cling to policy, they cling to identity,” said Arlie Russell Hochschild.
This wasn’t a movement built on solutions. It was built on symbols. Flags waved louder than facts. Anger filled town halls louder than ideas. Grievance became gospel, and the performance of outrage became the new identity.
The energy of the Tea Party didn’t disappear. It only morphed. Energy cannot be created nor destroyed. Its fear found new language. Its symbols found new screens. Its grievances never sought healing… only amplification.
Surfing the wave of Birtherism and the Tea Party, another fever broke in 2020.
A man in a small town tore down his neighbor’s sign, not because of politics, but because truth made him feel erased. That’s the thing about delusion… it doesn’t need evidence. It just needs someone to say, “You’re right to be afraid.”
A man lost the election, by millions. But he said he won. And millions echoed, “Yes, you did.” Because the truth no longer mattered. Only the narrative.
January 6th wasn’t just a riot. It was the logical end of emotional allegiance. When politics becomes religion, facts become heresy.
Every era gives birth to its own prophet. Not always a man in robes or a preacher with a pulpit. Sometimes, just a screen name with a Wi-Fi signal.
But prophecy in modern times doesn’t require vision… just a vacuum. A gap between confusion and clarity, between fear and meaning.
And into that gap, something always rushes in. Sometimes, it’s truth. More often, it’s theater.
That brings us to the fever dream called QAnon… conspiracy with a halo.
A faceless prophet behind a screen, spinning tales of abuse rings, secret cabals, and promised saviors.
Absurd? Yes. But belief rarely asks for evidence. It asks for identity. For belonging. In a world unraveling.
“When meaning is lost, myth fills the gap,” I once wrote.
QAnon gave them myth… a cosmic battle between light and dark. It co-opted the language of awakening, only to lead its followers deeper into delusion.
And it worked. Because in the age of algorithms, you don’t need to be true. You just need to be loud.
The tragedy isn’t just what people believed… it’s what they abandoned to believe it: logic, relationship, reality.
Once myth becomes identity, facts feel like betrayal. And the louder the lie, the more comforting it becomes.
But history reminds us… what begins as fantasy rarely ends as fiction. It ends in families divided, communities radicalized, and a country unsure of how to come home to itself.
And still, the fever continues.
Each of these movements looked different on the surface, but beneath them all was the same root rot: the terror of uncertainty, the refusal to think critically, the rush to scapegoat, and the longing to belong, even if to a lie.
“In times of upheaval, the urge to believe is stronger than the urge to investigate.” - Eric Hoffer
What do we do when the fever rises?
We learn to be comfortable with discomfort. We teach discernment instead of dogma. We build communities on curiosity, not conformity.
We recognize the fever early. We resist easy answers. And we refuse to sacrifice clarity just for the comfort of belonging.
Because the fever will always return… but how it ends depends entirely on who stays awake.
“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” —Martin Luther King Jr.
Let us be the ones who stand with clarity, not on pedestals, but in presence.
Let it be said of us that we refused panic disguised as virtue. That we refused cruelty wearing patriotism. That we refused scapegoats offered as truth.
When fear screamed loudly, we chose to listen closely. When delusion demanded sacrifice, we chose empathy instead. When the world felt uncertain, we chose clarity over convenience, presence over panic, and courage over conformity.
Because history repeats itself… but our response doesn’t have to.
“Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” - George Santayana
The fever only controls those who forget they’ve felt it before. But those who remain awake, those who hold space for truth, those who stand rooted in clarity and compassion… they become immune.
