A Handmaids Tale - Page 2

[mahdokht]

Originally Posted by Aquaduct

I doubt whether Atwood's book is particularly prophetic of the future. First of all, if you look at the most industrialised societies women are far more equal than in say, the third world, which is usually more patriarchal.

And while sterility or rather sub fertility in "modern" societies is definitely rising, due to environmental pollution (prevalence of heavy metals, xenoestrogens etc.), sub optimal nutrition due to depleted soils and consumption of overly processed foods, I think the evidence is clear this is happening in both men and women. Men's sperm counts are steadily getting lower, and that's a fact.
r.

Yes, but in the book, as often happens in real life men's infertility was never seen as a problem. If I remember correctly the General that .... I can't remember her name, but the main character worked for had never been able to get any woman pregnant. It's possible that his wife was fertile, and he wasn't.

[Aquaduct]

Well, I haven't read the book, so maybe I oughtn't be commenting. And I'm a guy.

But I have always felt that the potential for oppression based on class and race is far greater. You seem to feel that too. I mean if we look at what is happening already with the way in NO all the poor and the African Americans were left behind to face the hurricane....it's pretty indicative.

I think the Nazis were a good indicator of what could happen with their Aryan woman's homes which they ran, as a kind of stud farm to breed Aryan super people. But the women were still volunteers on the whole I believe. And Hitler's Government never built Extermination camps for women per se, ...they built them for minority groups, especially the Jews and Gypsies and Russians whom they regarded as sub-humans.

To me this race hatred seems historically more prevalent than sex hatred, while I don't discount the latter.

[mahdokht]

Originally Posted by Aquaduct

To me this race hatred seems historically more prevalent than sex hatred, while I don't discount the latter.

Naaa, it's just that men NEED women, so of course they aren't going to try to exterminate them. The next best thing, then, is control. You must admit that men across time and place have gone to extreme measures to control women.

[Aquaduct]

I consider extreme to be things like ball and chains, slavery, massacres etc. , such as happened to native Americans, Africans, Jews etc. I don't think women have been "controlled" like that.

I am probably going out on a limb saying this here, but while men have had the power historically, I think many women have benefited from their own power....the power of being more socially adept, more supportive of each other, and men being so in thrall to their beauty. It is very hard for members of the opposite sex to realise that each sex has it's special strengths, privileges, and weaknesses. We have a programme in my country that dresses people up differently and using wigs etc. sends them out into society as someone different. One recent programme showed a woman changed into a man for one day and a man as a woman. The woman was amazed what she found out, how differently she was treated. She said she was taken a little more seriously as a man (it was really well done), but she found it quite limiting. She felt all these expectations put on her, narrow boundaries of how she could behave. She said as a woman you are more free to be yourself. I should add that New Zealand is fairly macho, but nothing really bad.

Anyway, the upshot was she concluded that it was a privilege to be a woman, and was glad to be one.

Now I'd better look for an A-Bomb shelter.

[mahdokht]

hmmm, off the top of my head

Foot binding, FGM, purdah, women as war booty, rape, rape, rape....

[Aquaduct]

What about men always being the ones who get sent off to war, getting conscripted; men having their balls cut off so they would be eunichs; men going down with ships because the places on lifeboats were reserved for women; men being expected to be the major earner; men being abused and made fun of by some women for being puny or having a small penis; men having higher rates of suicide....those were just off the top of my head.

[RosieTook]

Wow, I haven't read HT since grade 9 I think, so I am giong to have to go to the library and pick it up!

Just for accuracy's sake though

There was a story from the bible that was very similar, (the basis for the story, I assume,) where Sarah couldn't conceive, so God instructed Abraham to sleep with Sarah's maidservant, Hagar.

Actually, it was Sarah who told Abraham to sleep with Hagar, they had Ishmael, and then later Sarah and Abraham had Isaac. Sarah thought she was too old to conceive, and in fact God punished both Sarah and Abraham for doubting him by bringing Hagar into the picture.

Anyway, it's interesting that in that case, the reason Sarah asked Abraham to sleep with Hagar was that any child born to the handmaiden was considered property of the maid's mistress, so it definitely parallels the HT.

I so have to read it again and refresh my memory. I'm glad I stumbled across this thread!

[LiamnEmma]

but

men having higher rates of suicide....

this is not for lack of females trying however (at least in the United States). It's just that women tend to use less effective means for their attempts, pills, etc., while men tend to use the more impulsive and efficacious firearm.

[Aquaduct]

I personally think that is a myth. I think it is often a "cry for help" and attention...not a totally genuine attempt. Of course there will be genuine attempts that fail too.


But men have more motivation,imo. Emotionally we are often not as resilient, and we don't support each other so much. There are also more pressures on us to be "winners", to be respected by making it. I think it is partly biological, and partly cultural conditioning. See, it is not just suicides we lead in, it is also in rates of imprisonment, drug addictions, alcoholism...

But like I said, it is very very hard for a person of one sex to really know how it feels every day to be a member of the other. It takes enormous sensitivity and intuition, and I am sure I don't know altogether what it must be like, in all it's implications, to be a woman. Guess you have to be totally psychic or enlightened to do that!

[the_lissa]

Originally Posted by Aquaduct

I personally think that is a myth. I think it is often a "cry for help" and attention...not a totally genuine attempt. Of course there will be genuine attempts that fail too.

This is actually a myth. The first thing you learn in psych is that past suicide attempts are a risk factor for actual suiide and not just a cry for help or attention like is commonly believed.

You're rigth that one sex cannot know what it is like to be the other sex.

[Aquaduct]

I'm sure it is a risk factor. That doesn't prove the motivation is as strong as in those who succeed though.

Anyways, men have higher rates of imprisonment, are more likely to murder, as well as self murder, to be drug addicts, alcoholics, workaholics, more likely to be autistic, ...the list goes on. I say men need some serious help!! So go easy on us ladies...

[the_lissa]

Yes and women have higher rates of eating disorders, etc, so go easy on us too.

[Aquaduct]

I certainly will! Where would we men be without women. I'd hate to think.

[lenore80]

...

[napless]

What a great book! I still think about it, although it's been years since I last read it.

Has anyone read her recent book - I think it's called Oryx and Crake?

[the_lissa]

Yes I love it.

[Cranberry]

A great book, I've read it a couple of times.

[Trinitty]

Yes! I've read both and I like Oryx and Crake better, it's one of my favourite books.

We have them on the shelf next to 1984, Brave New World, Animal Farm and Utopia.

[katebleu]

a handmaid's tale is one of my favorite books. i found it very eerrie from the first time i read it as i got the feeling i would be offred in that society. (i know i would now.) sometimes i feel like it's very prophetic and other times not so much. i don't think people would let things get to that point.

if you have only seen the movie, read the book! be prepared to be more creeped out. but the book is always better. i had read the book first and found the movie to be very dissapointing. (i was hoping to see one particular seen, which was not in the movie - probably a good thing.)

oh, the generals name in the book is 'fred' hence 'offred" (of fred). and the biblical characters shadowed in the book are rachel and leah. which makes me think i should reread handmaids tale and the red tent and write a compare and contrast paper for myself. (handmaids tale was the first book i read after college that made me want to write a paper. it would have been great it was all about the symbolism of cigarettes ar freedom in the store. i'm such a nerd. )