Witch Exoneration and the Perpetuation of the an Equal Rights Myth

I didn't think this was news worthy, but then I got to the quote:

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine gave an informal pardon Monday to Grace Sherwood, who 300 years ago became Virginia's only person convicted as a witch tried by water.

"I am pleased to officially restore the good name of Grace Sherwood," Kaine wrote in a letter that Virginia Beach Mayor Meyera Oberndorf read aloud before a re-enactment of Sherwood's being dropped into the river.

"With 300 years of hindsight, we all certainly can agree that trial by water is an injustice," Kaine wrote. "We also can celebrate the fact that a woman's equality is constitutionally protected today, and women have the freedom to pursue their hopes and dreams."

Odd statement. Witch prosecutions in the Anglican/Cavalier southern colonies was a fairly rare occurrence. Witch hunts were more a Calvanist/Puritan problem in the American colonies. Her statement also blatantly ignores that men were also persecuted as witches. I agree that they were persecuted to a lesser number, but they accounted for about 20% of the prosecutions overall. Of course, Kaine also forgets a little issue about who the primary denunciators of witches were:

Women were more prominent than men at witchcraft trials, both as accused and as accusers. Not only did Sprenger's image of women as the more lustful and malicious sex generate suspicions; the fact that women had a lower social status than men made them easier to accuse. In most regions, about 80 percent of the alleged witches killed were female. Women were then as likely to be accused witches as men were to be saints or violent criminals. That was because women typically fought with curses instead of steel. Although the stereotype did not always fit, the British witch was usually seen as irascible, aggressive, unneighborly, and often repulsive-hardly the gentle healer of neopagan fantasy. Her colorful curses could blight everything down to "the little pig that lieth in the sty." She magnified her powers to frighten others and extort favors. If she could not be loved, she meant to be feared.

No doubt that the primary prosecutors were men, but those accusing were more likely to be woman. Kaine's statement ignores historical perspective as well as fact. The times of the witch trials were substantially different that today, and societies had much different reactions to people out of the norm. One should look at the prosecutions for sexual deviance in the Puritan colonies to take a measure as to who was more unjustly prosecuted by sex. I'm not talking about adultery or bastardy here either.

Let's also not forget that witch persecutions was also fairly rare in the colonies overall. Europe had many more prosecutions and executions. The "Witch of Pungo" didn't die from her trial by water either.

But, let's just keep promoting a myth because it "feels like" it's the truth.