Faith

Something that I find remarkable about The Handmaid’s Tale is how much detail is packed into the novel. Take, for example, Offred’s room. I know exactly what it looks like: every little detail, from the lack of chandelier to the windows to the ceiling. One of the details that is particularly sticking with me, for whatever reason, is the cushion in Offred’s room that says “Faith”. It seems a bit out of place for many reasons, but it also got me thinking about the role of faith in The Handmaid’s Tale.

Faith, or lack thereof, plays an important role in this new society. People are forced to adhere to a faith that is standardized for the government’s purposes. Household duties, reproductive roles, even speech patterns are dictated by faith. An accusation of being unfaithful can get you punished, even killed. Having a variant of the same faith doesn’t work either, as Offred and Ofglen see on their walks.

The cushion is one of many reminders of the before that seem to have slipped through the cracks when the new regime took power. At a basic level, it is an unnecessary item in a world that seems to value function over anything deemed frivolous (like love and family). It is a word in a room where only women go, reminding Offred of times where women could freely read. It is also something for her to read, to help her remember the language.

Offred assumes that the cushions are Serena Joy’s doing: “I wonder what has become of the other two cushions. There must have been three, once. Hope and Charity, where have they been stowed? Serena Joy has tidy habits. She wouldn’t throw away anything not quite worn out. One for Rita, one for Cora?” (110). It makes sense that Serena would leave the pillow—she’s not fully bought into this new regime, bending rules where she can. And faith would be the most appropriate one to leave, after all, considering this society must have an abundance of faith, particularly the handmaids.

But Offred, and many others, unable to envision a good future in this new society, maintain faith that they will someday get the chance to go back to their old normal.  It’s a faith common to all the Handmaids, as demonstrated by some of their customs: “As long as we do this, butter our skin to keep it soft, we can believe that we will someday get out…” (96). When Offred describes her room and mentions the faith cushion, she often recounts a memory from before, with Luke and her daughter. She describes what could have happened to both of them, prefacing with “Here is what I believe” (104). Rather than buying into the society’s faith, Offred keeps her own faith in the people in her life and the idea that things will somehow go back to normal. She isn’t the only one: much of the household does not think that the society is the best, but they’ve accepted the position that they are in. Serena Joy has merely put the other cushions into storage, not thrown them away.

Going into the end of the book, do we as readers have faith that things are going to change? I don’t know. I don’t doubt that the society could be toppled. However, I hesitate to think that Offred could accomplish a total overthrow by the end of the novel. But I do have a lot of faith in Offred. What else would compel me to read?

Handmaids or Test Tubes?

Fertility rates have been dropping, and in some countries, like the US, they have dropped below the level needed to replace the population. So the concern is if they keep dropping, then will we end up creating a society like in The Handmaid's Tale? It seems possible as this book is "at once a scathing satire, dire warning, and tour de force" (taken from the summary on the back cover of my book). Would our society turn to the use of Handmaids if birth and fertility rates decline even further?

I think we would hope that we as a society have progressed enough to realize that we shouldn't treat women in this way, but have we? There is still fear that we haven't done enough to prevent this and that we would be easily overpowered and be forced to like in a society like the Republic of Gilead.
On the other hand, maybe we have and there would be enough push back to make sure we would find an alternate solution.

What would that solution be though? As much as Brave New World sounds like a terrible society, there are some elements that might be useful. The way they create humans in a kind of test-tube baby way and a conveyor belt that replaces gestation might be a solution for declining births and fertility rates. The other thing that BNW did is they figured out a way to get an egg to keep multiplying to create a bunch of twins. With this method you don't have to worry about if you will get pregnant or not because they fertilize the eggs outside of the body. You also don't have to care about will there be a miscarriage or a still birth or a birth defect because they have the system perfected. And with the egg dividing you can make multiple babies which would really help birth rates rise. Also, you wouldn't have to do the Ceremony once a month to potentially get pregnant. Clearly, Offred doesn't want to be a part of the Ceremony, she is more forced to (even though she said she made the choice to be a Handmaid). Also being pregnant kinda sucks so not having to do that is pretty fun.

The issue with this is that using BNW's baby-making method, it might lead society to become BNW. Then instead of living in dystopian The Handmaid's Tale, you live in dystopian Brave New World. What's better - the World State or the Republic of Gilead?

Soma.

Even in a seemingly perfect futuristic society like that of Brave New World, people feel sadness and despondency. It’s a human emotion that, no matter how far medical and technological advancements will get in the future, is bound to happen. So naturally, the government of this utopian realm tries to smother these emotions completely with their questionable new drug, Soma. “Euphoric, narcotic, pleasantly hallucinant”… that's what Mustapha Mond calls this powerful new invention the government has created, clearly made in an effort to control the population. people take it for the high it gives them; the drink tranquilizes & diverts the individual's mind from the things they think and feel, but most importantly from realizing that there is something more sinister is going on with the government. 

The government uses this drug to trap individuals in their own happiness, an attempt to make themselves look as least suspicious as possible and conceal their hidden manipulation of the people. What they don’t want the people to realize is that they are a part of a twisted scheme with population control and a caste system determined by synthetic birth.

The great aftereffects of the drink are emphasized by Mond and others, clearly to encourage people to undergo a consequence-free high.

But why do they insist on pushing people to submit themselves to this distraction? What secrets are they trying to hide?