In Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale,” American society’s fall into authoritarianism did not happen overnight. The internal disintegration of America manifested through a series of restrictive policies and an eventual attack on the Capitol which successfully overthrew the government. In a twisted way, watching this episode of the show felt eerily familiar.
Atwood’s esteemed novel and television series is set in the dystopian, post-American society of Gilead. This society is run by a group of religious extremists who stripped “unworthy” women of their autonomy; the lasting results of Donald Trump’s first presidency and the days following his second-term inauguration have felt like a similar decline to dystopia.
Gilead is a society that is essentially cut off from outside intervention, with no participation in international organizations and a complete shutdown of media corporations and news outlets. Censorship is rampant and leaders in other countries have little idea what occurs beyond Gilead’s borders.
Trump’s early actions, especially his flashy withdrawal from global agreements and skepticism toward international alliances, signal a similar trend — one that resembles the infamous Project 2025, a plan Trump claimed to have no association with during his campaign.
Despite these statements, a CNN report found that over 100 people who have previously worked in his administration were involved in its drafting.
His first day in office made waves on an international level, withdrawing the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement and the World Health Organization (WHO). The Washington Post found documented similarities and allusions to this order within the pages of Project 2025, where international organizations were posed as a danger and something that the United States “should not blindly support.”
There are very clear parallels between the policies taking form in the first weeks of Trump’s administration and those proposed in the 900-page document. TIME Magazine found that two-thirds of Trump’s executive actions from his first week in office are related to proposals made in the document.
These range from the explicit infringements on transgender rights to the abolishment of diversity, equity and inclusion practices to leaving WHO.
Atwood’s Gilead is an extreme representation – and a scarily realistic frame of reference – of how Project 2025 could look if completely implemented. It should be noted that the document also includes extensive language about restoring the natural, nuclear family, with explicit hope to “maintain a biblically based, social science-reinforced definition of marriage and family.”
Women in Gilead are incredibly stratified, as handmaids are fertile women who essentially act as involuntary surrogates to women who are married to the men in power. This dynamic is what makes everything about it so dystopian; the easily identifiable, infamous red cloaks and white bonnets adorned by the handmaids have become a symbol for feminism and the right to bodily autonomy as women in a modern, post-Roe world.
There is an extreme amount of uncertainty and fear amongst the country right now, with policies slowly closing in on multiple identities and restricting their freedoms. Books like “The Handmaid’s Tale” were written with a purpose.
While authors use books like this to serve as a warning, the words on the pages often end up ironically mirroring the worst in society. Atwood had a clear message in mind, and it holds truer every single day; “nothing changes instantaneously: in a gradually heating bathtub, you’d be boiled to death before you knew it.”
This story was written by Lilly Peacock. She can be reached at [email protected] or @lillypeacockMU on Twitter/X.
