Margaret Atwoods message about women is bleak. At the same time as she condemns Offred, Serena Joy, the Aunts and even Moira for their complacency, she suggests that even if those women gathered strength and stopped complying, they would likely fail to make a difference. In Gilead the tiny rebellions of resistance do not necessarily matter. In the end, Offred escapes because of luck rather than resistance. As for Moira, she is the only one to try and escape the enclosure of the patriarchal regime, but ends up no better off for it. Offred describes her ‘irreverent, resourceful’ feminist friend from earlier times, who actively rebels against the Gilead system. Despite the horrible foot punishment Moira suffers after her first attempted escape from the Red Centre, she remains undaunted. ‘I left that old hag Aunt Elizabeth tied up like a Christmas turkey behind the furnace. I wanted to kill her, I really felt like it.…’, Moira later tells Offred , as she describes, in her feminist-dialogic speech, her second escape attempt. After her disappearance from the Red Centre, Moira becomes a fantasy for the other Handmaid’s. Because of her rebellion, the Aunts are ‘less fearsome and more absurd,’ for their power is somehow flawed. And yet the Handmaids also find something frightening in Moira’s freedom. ‘Already we were losing the taste for freedom, already we were finding these walls secure. In the upper reaches of the atmosphere you’d come apart, you’d vaporise, there would be no pressure holding you together’. Although Moira seems like the female heroism in such a regime, J Brooks Bouson suggests that the narrative, while typecasting Moira as a feminist rebel, also dramatises her defeat. ‘Caught, tortured, and then forced into prostitution, Moira ultimately loses her motive and becomes indifferent.’ (Brutal Choreographies). ‘I don’t want her to be like me. Give in, go along, save her skin,’ Says Offred. ‘I want gallantry from her, swashbuckling, heroism, single-handed combat. Something I lack’. Another feminist in the novel is Offred’s mother. A ‘wiry, spunky’ feminist, Offred’s mother disappears soon after the Gileadean Coup; branded an Unwoman, she is shipped to the Colonies where she is forced to sweep up toxic wastes – a certain death sentence.
Complacency in a totalitarian state, as Atwood suggests, is that people will endure oppression willingly as long as they receive some slight amount of power or freedom. Offred remembers her mother saying that it is ‘truly amazing, what people can get used to, as long as there are a few compensations.’ Women in general support Gilead’s existence by willingly participating in it. While a woman like Serena Joy has no power in the world of men, she excersises authority within her own household and seems to delight in tyrannising over Offred. She jealously guards what little power she has and wields it eagerly. In a similar way, the women known as Aunts, especially Aunt Lydia, act as willing agents of the Gileadean State. They indoctrinate other women into ruling ideology, keep a close eye out for rebellion, and generally serve the same function for Gilead that the Jewish police did under the Nazi rule.
As for feminism in The Handmaid’s Tale, there are two separate opinions. One opinion is that it is a feminist novel, and the opposing opinion is that it is not.
Feminism: this topic is prevalent in this novel. Margaret Atwood spends most of her time featuring women in her books, novels and poetry that examine their relationships in society. In this book, Atwood centres her novel on a girl whom happens to be one of the Handmaids. The feminist ideas that are expressed in the book are necessary. These women do exist not only in the novel but also in real life. The women are treated as property instead of human beings. The one and only purpose in their lives is to have children.
Many readers have questioned the novel’s character as a feminist critique. The Handmaid’s tale delivers a conservative interpretation of women’s ideal social actions, advocating what looks more like traditional femininity, rather than revolutionary feminism.
Atwood’s main character, Offred, has fantasies of being free. But Offred’s vision of freedom is very un-feministic. For instance, at the beginning of the novel, Offred dreams of helping to bake bread. ‘Or I would help Rita make the bread, sinking my hands into that soft resistant warmth which is so much like flesh.’ Baking bread is said by critics to be an epitome of the traditional household and is not very feministic.
Another example of this anti-feminism is the night of the ceremony. The commander is preparing to read form the bible to Serena Joy, Cora, Rita, Offred and Nick. ‘He’s like a man toying with a steak, behind a restaurant window, pretending not to see the eyes watching him form hungry darkness..’ Atwood has the man of the house in charge of the entertainment for the evening. The Commander gets to sit in the big, manly, leather chair while Offred kneels on the floor and the Martha’s stand. Serena is lucky enough to be seated but she is uncomfortable. The man has the typical position as the leader of the household.
In The Handmaid's Tale women are supposed to be more secure then they have ever been. Their bodies and their ability to reproduce are worshipped by society. Crimes against women have been erased. There is no longer rape, or domestic physical and mental violence against women. There is also no abortion. For women to exist in a space like this, one would think that they had the freedom to be powerful, strong women. Yet they are enslaved to this idea of being "protected." The novel also portrays a space where a woman’s body is something to fear and hide. "My nakedness is strange to me already. My body seems outdated. Did I really wear bathing suits at the beach? I did, without thought, among men, without caring that my legs, my arms, my thighs and back were on display, could be seen. Shameful, immodest. I avoid looking at my body, not so much because it's shameful or immodest but because I don't want to see it. I don't want to look at something that determines me so completely." Women fear their own bodies, as they are the source of their persecution
The women in this novel are told that they are different and more intelligent than men are but yet, that men cannot control themselves around women. They still have to fear for their lives and their bodies and tiptoe around men. Aunt Lydia states that "Men are sex machines...They only want one thing. You must learn to manipulate them, for your own good." Just as in present day society, the Handmaid's Tale still keeps women oppressed through their body images and fear for their safety. When love for oneself, whether it be a man or a woman, is taken away, the strength of the individual is lost. In a society where both genders are truly equal, men and women would work together on creating a safe space for everyone, not just the women.
Therefore, there are many issues in The Handmaid’s Tale concerning women and feminism, which are mostly didactic. . The dystopic novel that Atwood created isolates certain social trends in real communities and exaggerated them to make clear their most negative qualities. Instead of proclaiming her feelings out loud, Offred suppresses them. The result is a series of recordings, which describes her life, and the things she wishes she could change. Through these examples, it is apparent that women in Gilead cannot resolve their problems because of outside circumstances. This then links back to what the female gender would have to lose if the feminist movement failed, because once in a situation like Gilead, it would be extremely hard to escape. Therefore, Atwood’s message is that women should not be complacent within their society and should try to change it for the benefit of future generations.
