Margaret Atwood s Handmaid s Tale - 3732 Words

Imagine a world where our basic freedoms are taken away from us; a world where we are not free to say what we want; a world where we are bound by the chains of oppression, and are at the mercy of an elite ruling class government, where even the slightest negativity expressed towards them is strictly prohibited. In this world we would have no identity, no names, and no communication. This obscene idea would ultimately be the dystopian world from our worst nightmares. Margaret Atwood’s Handmaid’s Tale paints a vivid picture as to the nature of such a dystopia, a world which is ruled by a small wealthy ruling class, and where everybody’s rights have been stripped away from them. This dystopian society is situated in what was once the†¦show more content†¦The relevance of the dystopian society is that it has always been entrenched in the way we live and is evident through male oppression and how it is ironic that the women are in this predicament. It is also shown how religious justification has attempted to justify the oppression, and the acceptance and submission that the citizens resort to in this unideal world. The strict religious fundamentalist government of Gilead is a shocking resemblance to â€Å"the ‘strict theocracy’ of the ‘fundamentalist government’ of the United States’ puritan founding fathers† (Neuman 138). This former operation of government involved white males having a strict grip over the rest of society, particularly women. Society has always functioned in this way, in the sense that men have always ruled women. The Gileadean society is not radically different from the Western world as it once was, and how many places in the world that still are today, specifically in the Middle East. Women as they have always been â€Å"are two legged wombs. That’s all† (Atwood 157). Margaret Atwood is widely known as a feminist writer, saying she is â€Å"an observ er of society? Yes! And no one who observes society can fail to make observations that are feminist. That just is†¦ common sense† (Jamkhandi, 5. Quoted in Neuman 139), and if practical, hardline, anti-male feminists took over