----- Original Message ----- From: Alison Page alison_page@becta.org.uk To: 'blakes7@lysator.liu.se' blakes7@lists.lysator.liu.se Sent: Tuesday, February 06, 2001 10:48 AM Subject: [B7L] The handmaid's tale
Crikey, I've got to step in here.
Basically one of the points Atwood seems to be making is that there are
sinister similarities between the hardliners on both fronts, and raising
the
question of whether a feminist utopia would have been better than (or even different from) the Christian one shown in the book.
Well, I think point she is making is the reverse of what you say - that people can start from very good motives that we as feminists and liberals (well, I am anyway) might agree with, but that by using oppressive
*methods*
to acquire these ends they end up committing evil acts.
I'm not sure about this. I don't think the Christians in that book had the same motives, or even the same interests, as the feminists but became evil through using oppressive methods. I think that it was just that the two groups had similar positions on certain issues, which stemmed from totally different ideological backgrounds.
But the main issue in the book is to satirise the way we in the west turn
a
blind eye to the oppression of people (in particular women) by other cultures in the name of cultural relativism or respect for religious differences. The point of the handmaid's tale is to say - look, it
suddenly
doesn't seem so acceptable when it is white middle class western women
being
oppressed. Attwood has given numerous interviews on this subject.
I know, and agree with that-- I just think she's making multiple points (and even some of which she may not be aware, as we have noted), like any good writer.
trying to stop you taking away any message you like from it, but I thought people might be interested to hear another perspective.
I agree, and esp. as you're touching on aspects of the book which I didn't discuss.
The indoctrination techniques in the story are actually startlingly
similar to those used in feminist consciousness-raising groups as well.
Whoah!! Now this is something I have got an informed opinion on. In the handmaid's tale women are beaten to unconsciousness, raped, imprisoned for months on end, tortured, have their children taken away and so on.
Ahem. I have an informed opinion on it too, having spent the early nineties in feminist groups myself. I agree that this is far from what happens in such groups, but this wasn't what I was referring to. I was referring to the long sections of the book about Offred in the indoctrination centre (I forget the name, and don't have my copy handy), in which the women seem to spend a lot of time being shown films about the evils of illegal abortion, the mechanical and dehumanising nature of medicalised childbirth, etc, and sitting around in groups holding moderated discussions-- both things which I recall happening a lot at my university women's centre.
In fact, I recall an exact scene in the book in which the handmaids-to-be are encouraged to share stories from their lives (although Offred notes cynically that most of them are made up) and the oppression that they have suffered at the hands of men (an oppression which the new regime promises to take away, like the feminist movement did/does).
And to be honest, I was uncomfortable with some of this sort of thing in the feminist movement. I got involved with my university's feminist group at the time because I did have a strong sense of women's oppression, and wanted to do something about it. Unfortunately, after a while with the group it occurred to me that what the feminist group seemed to want to do was to substitute one lot of oppression for another-- men's oppression on political, racial or class grounds was never even discussed, let alone linked in with women's oppression on gender grounds. And I felt that getting emotionally worked up about the horrors of medicalised childbirth etc. achieved little beyond causing people to (not unreasonably) hate its practitioners for emotional, irrational reasons, which is not a good starting point from which to change the system.
Additionally, I got a real "Handmaid's tale" feeling at rallies and the like. Getting a crowd worked up to walk on the parliament buildings shouting "No more patriarchy"-- well, I began to remember other, similarly worked-up crowds shouting "Juden raus."
And before anyone accuses me of being antifeminist: I'm not. I believe in the feminist movement, I just also believe in moderation, in effective and reasoned communication, in seeing the whole picture, and in building links between oppressed groups. Which is why I agree with Neil on Deliverance, when he points out that the episode's sexism can't be considered in isolation from its colonialism, racism etc.
Fiona
The Posthumous Memoirs of Secretary Rontane Available for public perusal at http://nyder.r67.net
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