Applonie 1

Brady Applonie

Professor King

English 1A

1 October 2017

Real Life Lessons from The Handmaids Tale

Some of the most significant issues on the forefront of the world stage today are climate

change and income inequality. Many people understandably fail to recognize or take action on

these topics. The reason being is that they are not directly and readily affected everyone. One

way to see how these problems are not being given the attention they deserve is to read.

Margaret Atwoods The Handmaids Tale lays bare the results of such complacency and

ignorance. Atwoods dystopian novel is a simulation of how these issues have overcome and

broken down the people of Gilead. The environment has been exploited and abused, leading

many people to have a dramatically decreased lifespan as well as lower fertility rates. Not only

has the environment been subject to loss, but the people are under total subordination

beneath a few who control the wealth. This hierarchy leads many to not be able to afford all

the essentials and hardly ever any luxuries. Here, this book shows what happens when such

vital matters are overlooked and especially for so long. In this essay, then, the significance of

the happenings in The Handmaids Tale and real life will be compared and contrasted in order

to gain an understanding of why more should be done to bring the environment back to

stability and to stop the plateau that is the middle class to stop crumbling at both sides.
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Complacency is defined as a feeling of smug or uncritical satisfaction with oneself or

one's achievements. It is easy to become complacent. Many people find it the easiest to

become complacent. It could be said that is an element of our instinct to survive. The truth is it

has never been more devastating in history. The Industrial Revolution, which is very recent in

relation to the time itself, set the world on the fast track to global warming. Global warming is a

serious issue that needs to be addressed. It is the process by which heat from the sun

penetrates the atmosphere and is then locked in by carbon dioxide. Findings from NASA show,

[carbon dioxide is released] through human activities such as deforestation, land use

changes, and burning fossil fuels. Humans have increased atmospheric CO2 concentration by

more than a third since the Industrial Revolution began. This is the most important long-lived

"forcing" of climate change. (IPCC Fifth Assessment Report, 2014, Lockwood, 2009) This quote

is demonstrating how disregard for environmental health has led to a world that is becoming

more and more polluted every year. This has increased the severity of the green-house effect

which is slowly bringing the temperature of the Earth up. With the ever increasing

temperatures comes sure and slow destruction of everything around us. Ice is melting, sea-

levels rising and the homeostasis of environments is becoming unbalanced. And this is not too

different from the gradual changes seen in The Handmaids Tale.

A quote from The Handmaids Tale reads, Nothing changes instantaneously: in a gradually

heating bathtub you'd be boiled to death before you knew it (Atwood). This quote is an

example of how complacency and contentment with the world will lead to ultimate and

unexpected destruction. It is not an issue we can readily see right now but something that must
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be compared between this time and those before it. The characters in Gilead became blind to

the events that gradually destroyed their freedom and world around them. Atwoods dystopian

novel also says, Ive been wasting my time. I should have taken things into my own hands

while I had the chance I should have paid attention (Atwood). This quote shows how only

when it is too late we notice something happening. How are the issues of climate change and

income equality seen in The Handmaids Tale? And more importantly, how have they been

ignored so much that they are now issues too large to control? Both matters have enveloped

the people of Gilead.

The entire purpose of women in this book is to have babies. When they cannot or choose

not to, they are seen as disposable and in turn sent to The Colonies. The Colonies have been the

most affected from nuclear waste and are not a suitable environment to live in. Being a

dumping site for waste and in the shadow of industrial factories, The Colonies are certainly

inhospitable. Because of the blind eye that was turned to these disasters, these people now

must live in terrible conditions. The connection is that the world is doing the same thing and

does not realize it. An astonishing amount of waste is produced and dumped every year. What

does this mean? Ann Simmons at the L.A. times wrote that, When waste is not collected, the

frequency of illness such as diarrhea doubles and acute respiratory infection linked to the

burning of waste is six times higher, Ijjasz-Vasquez said. (Simmons 2016) The incredible

amount of waste being generated is causing serious health ramifications, as also seen in

Atwoods book. The only way to help this is to be more conscious of how waste is disposed and

the potential side effects.

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The sad truth is that many issues seen in The Handmaids Tale are comparable to real

world events. Another caution we need to be wary of is income inequality. It is indisputable

that the middle class is a plateau that is breaking down at both sides and getting smaller. An

article from Huffington Post states, ...State governors are now having to make major budget

cuts that hit lower-middle-class families the hardest: restricting eligibility for health insurance,

cutting aid to K-12 schools and reducing assistance to public colleges and universities (Bassett

2011). Most Americans feel disenfranchised by the government. This is simply a microcosm of

what is going on in the country. The middle class is struggling which leads us to either being rich

or poor. It is difficult to find a middle ground these days. The extreme lack of quality education

leads many into a cycle of unemployment and destitution.

The same is seen in The Handmaids Tale. The Commanders have control of the currency

and make the decisions in the interest of themselves/their families. The rest are left to scrap

and not have anywhere near as many luxuries (or necessities, for that matter) as the top. While

Offred is having an encounter with one of the Commanders, she thinks, He looks us over as if

taking inventory (Atwood). This is an example of how Offred and the lower classes feel they

are being unfairly treated. The anecdote of the previous paragraph goes to show just one of

many cases of inequality and unfairness.

The lesson to be learned is that there are some major issues that we clearly do not care

enough about to do anything. Humans become complacent and it is dangerous. The only hope

is that we can learn from our mistakes. There are many things to be learned from The

Handmaids Tale about what happens when we do not pay attention. A crumbling middle class
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and the exploitation of natural resources are examples of a couple parallels that can be drawn

between real life and Atwoods dystopian novel. It can be seen through the novel that these

issues are ones that have not been taken seriously yet. If these issues continue to be ignored,

The Handmaids Tale demonstrates just one of many outcomes that can occur. Unfortunately,

these issues have progressed rapidly not only in America but around the world. Only through

history and simulations like The Handmaids Tale will we have a tangible incentive to stop the

damage.
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Works Cited

Atwood, Margaret. The Handmaids Tale. Boston, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2017.

IPCC Fifth Assessment Report, 2014

United States Global Change Research Program, "Global Climate Change Impacts in the

United States," Cambridge University Press, 2009

Judith Lean, Cycles and trends in solar irradiance and climate, Wiley Interdisciplinary

Reviews: Climate Change, vol. 1, January/February 2010, 111-122.

Mike Lockwood, Solar Change and Climate: an update in the light of the current exceptional

solar minimum, Proceedings of the Royal Society A, 2 December 2009, doi

10.1098/rspa.2009.0519;

Naomi Oreskes, "The Scientific Consensus on Climate Change," Science 3 December 2004: Vol.

306 no. 5702 p. 1686 DOI: 10.1126/science.1103618

Simmons, Ann M. The world's trash crisis, and why many Americans are oblivious. Los Angeles

Times, Los Angeles Times, 22 Apr. 2016, www.latimes.com/world/global-

development/la-fg-global-trash-20160422-20160421-snap-htmlstory.html.

The Lower Middle-Class Crunch: Too Rich To Qualify For Government Assistance

Laura Bassett - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/29/no-help-for-the-middle-

cl_n_629255.html
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