I think that John Proctor is both a hero and a stooge depending on where you look at it. For us looking at him in the 21st century America he is a hero. He is risking his own life just to stand by his principles. In modern day society your principles is something that people often use to define you. This means that our principles and whether or not you stand by them will effect they way you are viewed in the society. John Proctor has good principles and the fact that no matter what he is standing by them makes him a hero from the view of modern society.
However in the Puritan society of Salem at the time of this play he seems like a stooge. They seem to think that it is best to just keep their heads down and blame the problems on others or lie to get that lesser sentence of jail time. This makes his actions that go against the general opinion of how to deal with this situation if it arises. He would have been looked at as foolish or straight stupid by his fellow puritans.
Whether John Proctor is a hero or a stooge is an idea that changes through time with people in one time period having a totally different opinion then even the next generation.
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