This crusade, inititated by the government, spread rapidly and produced mass hysteria. Government workers had to take loyalty oaths and there was a massive attack with ill-founded accusations towards people, based on the suspicion that they were communist spies. Also, homosexuals were smeared as not being able to fight the communists. In general, people that were not ready to pledge loyalty to anti-communism were subject to many deprivations, from not having a driving license to being despised upon and smeared in newspapers.
Black and white cultures developed separately from each other, the separation created a stigma for either race toward the other, as a subject of the taboo. There was a constant tension, a relationship that bred whites to feel superior and blacks to feel inferior. It also heavily affected literature, music, and art for both races - leading to "White Man's Burden", "Uncle Tom's Cabin", as well as the explosion of new styles of music coming from the black newly freedmen/women of the south. It was a terrible and but extremely influential and creative period for black culture. :)
