Desperate remedies Essay

They say, desperate situations need desperate remedies. The leaders of the feminist movement think on these lines. Several feminist groups sprouted all over the world, and used the word equality like a fighting soldier uses the sword. 70s and 80s saw this kind of upheaval in the society. In countries like USA, it appeared as though every household had a spokesperson for the cause of women. Atwood was a prominent part of this movement. Being a hardcore individualist, she did not join any group, but remained as the one-woman army. In USA, Feminist movements advanced like waters during the high tide, but all of a sudden, they met with several roadblocks like, the defeat of the Equal Rights Amendment, the election of Ronald Reagan as President, the assertion of religious rights etc. The fear of possible defeat in their cherished objectives alarmed the leaders of the feminist movement and the specter of the dawn of a new era of victimization seemed to be on the cards. Next, utter confusion prevailed among the feminist groups with regard to sexuality and pornography. The most forward thinking of the women said everything was fair, others cried a halt to such demeaning trends. Serious disagreements among the votaries of the common cause surfaced New alignments took shape like the one between the anti-porn zealots and the religious groups. The issue of protection of â€Å"good† women surfaced. Islamic women had heir own problems with the outward show of body curves. Many women reacted with repulsion for the writings and descriptions in Atwood’s novel. Satire is the strong point of the novel, but it carries the bitter taste with it. It hurts and wounds. This approach makes you condemn her, and she fails to win appreciation of many. Her biblical references look as if the Satan is quoting the Bible. Yet, the cause of women is dear to her and she pricks and penetrates the hearts of the readers, both men and women, in style. One feels extremely sorry for the characters she has created, the psychological labyrinth she has weaved, and the way she has depicted how two women are happy for a wrong cause. In patriarchal Hebrew era, it is the accepted social norm for a man to have sex and produce children by his slave servants, more so when his wife is infertile†¦and how a infertile woman embraces the fertile maidservant as she gives birth, with the bonus of legal transfer of rights on the baby to the woman who can not conceive. The establishment of a totalitarian theocratic state, the rigid dress codes for women, the themes of women subjugation and the related descriptions kindle the fire of revenge in women to raise the voice and fight against the tyrannical social norms. The hostility Atwood faces is not for the basic cause for which she fights, but for the anti-religious content and sexual references. The story is told from the viewpoint of Offred, a Handmaid. She is a patronymic which describes her unique and rigid functions in the Republic of Gilead. As one reads the entire story, even in the wildest imagination one feels that the sequence of events detailed and described can not be true. But Atwood has succeeded in her basic objective. To make women hate the society for which the rules are drafted by men, how men protect their dominant interests- and sex is the most dominant of them. To protect the interest, rules are framed, reframed, twisted and violated, all by men without any consideration for the feelings of women. The Handmaid in the novel with whom she is ordered to have sex, must be thinking to murder him, as he does the sexual act in the most inhuman and debasing manner like a robot. She has none to defend her and can not utter a word of protest. This is worst than hanging an innocent individual without trial, just because the King wishes so. The legal wife supports and co-operates in the act. Does she also do it willingly and with happiness? Some brutal force and the set of rigid rules of governing the society must be guiding her actions as well. She too is a helpless victim, though the privileged one. Look at the way how Offred describes the ceremony relating to producing the desired child. â€Å"My red skirt is hitched up to my waist though no higher. Below it the Commander is fucking. What he is fucking is the lower part of my body. I do not say making love, because this is not what he’s doing. Copulating too would be inaccurate, because it would imply two people and only one is involved. Nor does rape cover it: nothing is going on here that I haven’t signed up for. † (Atwood, pg. 116) The height of perversion goes to such an extent that once a Handmaid is pregnant, she is venerated by her peers and by the Wives. After her baby is born, it is given to the Wife of her Commander, and she is reassigned to another household. The plight of the women is more critical than the characters in George Orwell’s â€Å"Animal Farm. †