Book 5: The Handmaid's Tale

This post will contain spoilers about the content of the book. If you haven’t read The Handmaid’s Tale yet, I recommend you do.

To mix things up, I decided to read something that’s been on my to-read list for a couple years now. The Handmaid’s Tale is about a dystopian past in which a religious war broke out. Society gradually fell into an existence dominated by strict submission to religious law under penalty of death. As usual in dystopian novels, there’s a perpetual war going on to stamp out the resistance. Our heroine gets in touch with the rebellion and gradually learns the extent of society’s hypocrisy.

Above the Law

Late in the book, the main character (we never learn her real name) has accompanied her husband / owner to a nightclub. The only attendees are the upper crust. To most people the dichotomy of “Do what I say, not what I do” will be familiar. It’s not uncommon for politicians to flaunt their own rules.

One of the main tenets of democracy in the US is that nobody is above the law. This is why we can have years long investigations of politicians. In The Handmaid’s Tale, though, breaking the law has become so commonplace in the higher circles that there’s no hesitation. There are no single standards, only double.

Dystopia

The dystopian classics (see Read Also below) are absolute wonders of world building, and as such they feel so far away. Unfortunately, they aren’t. It’s not difficult to find examples of authoritarian groups in modern times. We have many lessons to draw from in just the last 150 years:

The Handmaid’s Tale focuses on the flexibility of people. How over time we can get used to nearly anything, including a society with no freedom and strict laws under penalty of death. Incremental small changes over time can add up to a place where you can no longer speak your mind, however wrongheaded, raise your child how you see fit, because politicians know better than you how to raise your child, or even go outside your own home without government mandated clothing.

Horseshoe Theory

Authoritarianism takes many forms. I am personally a subscriber to the Horseshoe Theory, which states that the extreme ends of the political spectrum are closer to each other than they are to the centrist position. Not in motivation, of course, but in practical terms those who are most extreme tend to be the most controlling.

There’s a balance to be found, though I’m not sure where. Sliding one way or another is sure to get us to a place nobody wants to be. I can only hope that when people look back at this time they don’t judge us too harshly.

Read Also

Normally I have read most of the books I recommend, but in this case I haven’t finished The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich or The Forgotten Soldier.