# Does Anybody Actually Find "A Handmaid's Tale" Remotely Plausible? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 27, 2017, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357 "2017-04-27T13:09:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Patx2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/73ab20/32.png) [@Patx2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patx2)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/81 "2017-04-28T00:48:22Z")
Damn, now I need to reread it because it was ages ago and I don’t recall. ---
**Author:** ![Arcite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/67e7ee/32.png) [@Arcite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arcite)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/82 "2017-04-28T00:51:08Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Does the name Jane Wyman mean anything to you? Yes, she was the first wife of our first _twice_-married Republican president. > [@madmonk28](#): > > White men dictating women’s reproductive rights based on their religious beliefs sure sounds a lot like a theocracy to me. Earlier I had missed your comment on page 1 indicating you believe that the United States of America is currently a theocracy. By your logic, it would seem that the United States of America has _always_ been a theocracy. That is the statement of someone who is not playing with a full deck. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/83 "2017-04-28T00:56:15Z")
So, you’re saying there’s a significant social distinction between being divorced once, and being divorced twice. Okay, then. ---
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/84 "2017-04-28T01:09:22Z")
> [@Arcite](#): > > Earlier I had missed your comment on page 1 indicating you believe that the United States of America is currently a theocracy. By your logic, it would seem that the United States of America has _always_ been a theocracy. That is the statement of someone who is not playing with a full deck. As an American Jew, I’m here to tell you that American is not currently a theocracy, but there are a lot of people who wish it were. ---
**Author:** ![Karen\_Lingel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karen_lingel/32/18649_2.png) [@Karen\_Lingel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Karen_Lingel)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/85 "2017-04-28T01:28:19Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > [Moderating] > So I would like to request that you’uns be self-policing Ooooh, there’s your frightening dystopia right there. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![raventhief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/raventhief/32/4_2.png) [@raventhief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raventhief)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/86 "2017-04-28T01:42:23Z")
It has been many years since I read it, but as I recall, what was so unnerving then, as now, are the elements that \*are \*plausible. Not necessarily the overall scenario, but the individual parts that ring true in different women’s lives. Do we always control our own fertility? Ask the pregnant teen who was only ever taught abstinence. Do some men see women as property? Ask the woman who only gets catcalled when she is alone, or with other women - the catcallers seem to respect the property of other men. Do some people think that Biblical law is and should be an integral part of secular law? Ask the lawmakers who feel the Ten Commandments should be prominently displayed on federal land. I also find it fascinating that the hue and cry that arose when the Handmaid’s Tale began to publicized - Trump supporters somehow that this decades-old book, that began production as a TV show before Trump even announced- this show was clearly meant as a slam against Trump. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Anconia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@D\_Anconia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Anconia)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/87 "2017-04-28T01:44:01Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > I read the book when it first came out, which was just after the Reagan administration The book came out in 1985, in the middle of Reagan’s administration, not after. ---
**Author:** ![Annoying\_Buzz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/eb8c5e/32.png) [@Annoying\_Buzz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annoying_Buzz)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/88 "2017-04-28T02:05:12Z")
Earlier this month, the Alabama State Senate voted 24-4 to allow the Briarwood Presbyterian Church to start its own police force. If this move doesn’t get shut down by the Supreme Court, it looks to me like a dangerous step toward police enforcement of religious edicts. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/89 "2017-04-28T02:13:45Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > I don’t know of many pro-lifers who are anti-birth control That’s the official party line of the Catholic Church. As just one example. ---
**Author:** ![Angel\_of\_the\_Lord](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/angel_of_the_lord/32/2949_2.png) [@Angel\_of\_the\_Lord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Angel_of_the_Lord)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/90 "2017-04-28T02:48:47Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > I read the book when it first came out, which was just after the Reagan administration, which means she wrote it while he was in office. You have to understand the book in that context. The religious right, which was a new entity, at least as a political movement, elected Reagan, ironically, over the genuinely religious Carter. Prior to backing Reagan, people didn’t generally “vote their faith,” and many ministers of very conservative congregations told their congregants to stay out of politics. I agree that the book should be taken within its historical context, but the scope of that context goes beyond just the religious right and ascendency of Ronald Reagan. It also comes on the heels of the Iranian revolution, and not long (within a decade, IIRC) before the rise to power of the Taliban in Afghanistan. In both of those cases, the role of women within society and the rights surrounding them changed in tangible ways. So the notion that things could quickly change given shifting power wasn’t completely implausible. Keep in mind, too, that the rights of women were relatively new and seemingly unsteady at the time. My mom–who’s a fair sight _younger_ than Atwood–remembers a time when it was uncommon for women to directly own property, particularly if they were married. Women universally getting the vote in the US is still within living memory, if only just barely. It was fully within living memory in the early 1980s. The Equal Rights Amendment failed to pass only a few years before the book was published; one of the cited reasons for that was horror at the idea that women could be drafted and forced to go to war. The idea that rights could be stripped in the name of keeping women “safe” was still very much a thing. Similarly, there were ideas within feminism that were contemporaneously present and more dominant in the 1970s-1980s. Some of these make it into the novel–namely, anti-pornography movements and strains of feminism that called for gender segregation–worlds of women, in other words. It therefore may have seemed more plausible that parts of the feminist movement could be co-opted to (at least initially) support Gilead’s ideas. This would weaken one potential area of resistance. Admittedly, parts of it feel less plausible now. Western countries as a whole are more secular than they were when the book was written; as a result, some of the theocratic stuff feels weird and unlikely, especially to those who were raised in more liberal-leaning areas. And the race stuff from the book–namely, the forced resettlement of black people and the forced emigration of Jews to Israel–are seemingly absent from the new television series, likely because a modern viewer might find them too implausible. I don’t think it’s entirely implausible, given that widespread infertility somehow becomes a thing (I can’t speak as to the plausibility of that, as I’m not a doctor/biologist); such a situation could surely spawn an epidemic of irrational thinking and religious zeal. Keep in mind, too, that the transition to power seems sudden, bloody, and incomplete. There are areas that are resisting. There are people who are resisting. The series itself does an even better job of showing this. (Spoilers for the series follow) In the series, we can plainly see that it’s a militia that seizes power. The enforcement in the series is done under the threat of violence. The Sons of Jacob are perfectly willing to fire on protesters. The laws are being enforced not through a judicial system, but rather through violent extra-judicial means. Ultimately, it’s unclear as to whether the government has shifted into its current form, or whether it’s been entirely replaced via violent, bloody revolution at the top tier. This particular manifestation I find entirely realistic; freedom of speech, of expression, of assembly, human rights, expression–they can all be taken away at the point of a gun or the prod of a bayonet. If the system supporting those rights falls, then those rights fail to exist. It doesn’t matter if you’ve always had them, if you expect them, if you think it’s the right way of things and that anything else is wrong, if you know that almost everyone else agrees with you; if the person holding the gun disagrees, then you don’t _really_ have that right. I think our resistance to considering the situation as remotely plausible (as opposed to likely; I don’t think anyone thinks it’s _likely_) is that we consider progress to be a continuing arc. We think it moves inexorably forward, and that backwards movement (if any) will always be small and quickly reversed. But that perspective only makes sense after the fact; history has shown that progress can be quickly and violently reversed, given the right circumstances. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/91 "2017-04-28T02:50:00Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > That’s the official party line of the Catholic Church. As just one example. Already addressed. Plus, the pope isn’t American. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/92 "2017-04-28T02:53:13Z")
It’s not so far removed from what happened to the women of Iran when the Shah took over. And there are women and girls on FLDS compounds who are living something very similar right here in the USA. When I was a kid, in the '70s,a woman couldn’t get a home loan or car loan without a co-sign from either her father or husband. ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/93 "2017-04-28T03:15:15Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > It’s not so far removed from what happened to the women of Iran when the Shah took over. Did you mean the Ayatollah? Iran was pretty liberal socially under the Shah (not very liberal politically, though(he was a tyrannical bastard, but he was OUR tyrannical bastard)). ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/94 "2017-04-28T03:17:22Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > Did you mean the Ayatollah? Iran was pretty liberal socially under the Shah (not very liberal politically, though(he was a tyrannical bastard, but he was OUR tyrannical bastard)). Yes, thank you for the correction. P.S. Best. Funeral. Ever. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 5:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/95 "2017-04-28T05:08:37Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > It’s not so far removed from what happened to the women of Iran when the Shah took over. Have you read the book? Because, actually it is far removed from what happened there. > [@](#): > > And there are women and girls on FLDS compounds who are living something very similar right here in the USA. This is a bit closer, but there is still no force of law behind what they are doing. In fact, quite the opposite. Even still, it’s such a fringe movement as to be irrelevant in terms of mainstream American culture. ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 7:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/96 "2017-04-28T07:55:54Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > You think I created a straw man, then compare Game of Thrones to Handmaid’s Tale??? > > George RR Martin is writing fiction. Period. It’s neither history nor a prediction. > > Atwood was plainly writing a dystopia based on fears of Christian fundamentalism in the USA. Martin is not writing “fiction. Period.” His characters act within their world from human motivations in ways the audience can identify with and discuss, even if the world they happen in are fundamentally different from our own, and possibly unrealistic even given the totally different underlying fabric. And me using hyperbole to point out the flaws in your reasoning is not as easy to dismiss as you appear to think. Your triple question-mark OP question and the following statement implies those who think there are important lessons in The Handmaids tale think it’s a potential of current religious conservatives’ power. That is a clear straw man. Atwood doesn’t write “and then they all voted for Ted Cruz and he instituted female slavery”, she writes of severe environmental upheaval with monumental consequences for society even without the central tenet of a catastrophic drop in fertility. And then power is grabbed, not through the power of today’s religious conservatives, but through a violent revolution and coup by a group that would undoubtedly vote for Ted Cruz, but that doesn’t mean Atwood thinks every religious conservative today is a hair’s breadth from grabbing an AR. Your opening post is a silly straw man presented without arguments, and I find it telling that you haven’t been back to defend it other than to bluster at this one taunt. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Sanchez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e19adc/32.png) [@Rick\_Sanchez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Sanchez)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/97 "2017-04-28T08:08:14Z")
> [@naita](#): > > Your opening post is a silly straw man presented without arguments, and I find it telling that you haven’t been back to defend it other than to bluster at this one taunt. It doesn’t appear as though he _needs_ to defend it. Pretty much everyone agrees that the scenario presented isn’t plausible. That’s not to say there aren’t important lessons to be learnt from the book and the show. Obviously there are. But there are lots of people online (links available on request) opining that the US is in clear and present danger of turning into the Republic of Gilead with the only necessary intermediate step being the continuing Presidency of Donald Trump, which I think we can all agree is obviously bollocks. ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 8:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/98 "2017-04-28T08:20:35Z")
> [@Rick\_Sanchez](#): > > But there are lots of people online (links available on request) opining that the US is in clear and present danger of turning into the Republic of Gilead with the only necessary intermediate step being the continuing Presidency of Donald Trump, which I think we can all agree is obviously bollocks. Only if they are opining that every detail of the Republic of Gilead is imminent, which I think isn’t the case. And I’d be surprised if the majority of such statements limit the danger to Donald Trump and ignore the election of all the genuine religious conservatives or if the majority aren’t using the rhetoric of hyperbole for emphasis, rather than believe Gilead will be declared after the 2020 election. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/99 "2017-04-28T08:42:46Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Margaret Atwood claims that everything in the book has actually been done IRL by some regime somewhere. “Getting the slave pregnant, counting the child as the masters’” hasn’t been widespread, although ISTR a famous story along those lines. “Taking a child from an unworthy mother and giving it to a Proper Family” has happened in multiple countries within just the last 5 decades. Go further, and one of the countries where it happened was the US. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2017, 10:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357/100 "2017-04-28T10:13:24Z")
> [@E-DUB](#): > > Books like 1984 and “Handmaids Tale” are attempts at what I call “self-negating prophecy”, written in the hope of preventing the very scenario they describe. It is a case of “see the end, resist the _beginning._”. Indeed. They also fall along the lines of “Black Mirror” - the scenarios portrayed in various episodes aren’t meant to be things that will literally happen, but rather are hyperbolic extrapolations from current trends, exploring what might occur should society follow a particular path without the mitigating factors that normally prevent such things. > [@Asuka](#): > > I mean if you look at some of the craziest rhetoric coming from the Anti-Trump camp (“White Men shouldn’t have the right to Vote” or “Gun Owners should all be declared Terrorists”) …you should give them about as much credence as you would the #Repealthe19th movement. Which is to say, none. > [@Barrett\_Bonden](#): > > The Iranian Revolution happened that quickly. As did the changes in Afghanistan once the Taliban took over. > [@E-DUB](#): > > And as far as left-wing dictatorship books go, “Not This August” is generally regarded as a classic in this sub-genre. I was thinking more “Harrison Bergeron”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-anybody-actually-find-a-handmaids-tale-remotely-plausible/785357.md?page=6)