Hi, you've asked an incomplete question. Here's the remaining part of the question containing paragraph 3 (The Lessons of Salem by Laura Shapiro).
"He was right: even now the Salem witch trials haunt the imaginations of hundreds of thousands of Americans, tourists, and history buffs alike, who visit Salem for a glimpse of our Puritan past at its most chilling. This year "Salem is getting more attention than ever: the city is sponsoring an array of programs commemorating the Tercentenary, including dramatizations of the trials and symposiums of the legal and medical aspects of identifying witches in the 17th century. With the participation of such organizations as Amnesty International, the Tercentenary has placed a special emphasis on human rights and the role of the individual conscience in times of terror. In 1692, those who “confessed” to witchcraft were spared; only those who insisted on their innocence were hanged. Earlier this month a memorial to the victims was unveiled and on that occasion, the first annual Salem Award, created to honor a significant contribution to social justice, was presented to Gregory Allen Williams of Inglewood, Calif. In the midst of the Los Angeles riots last spring, Williams, who is black, risked his life to save an Asian-American attacked by a mob.
Explanation:
Remember, the term ironic situation is used when a situation where an action brings about an unexpected effect no one imagined would occur. In other words, the resulting outcome is different from what was expected.
For example, Shapiro stated, "Salem is getting more attention than ever: the city is sponsoring an array of programs commemorating the Tercentenary [three hundredth anniversisary], including dramatizations of the trials and symposiums of the legal and medical aspects of identifying witches in the 17th century."
This is an ironic situuation because we learned from the previous paragraphs that those accused of been witches or devils were killed in other to stop the spread of such actions or kind of thinking. However, the very actions that were once condemned have become the subject of attention, with dramatizations of the trials, etc.
