The Undercurrent of Religious Heterogeneous Society

When stereotypical attitudes about the behavior of women are taken literally, the result is Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale. In this tale, women are seen merely as reproductional tools of religion. Yet they are encouraged to cover themselves and to dress and act severely modest. Their faces cannot be seen by men, and they are allowed to say only mainly a few set phrases to one another, such as "May the Lord open," which is related to the Bible verse: I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children. (114) The women's freedom is restricted, and this greatly sorrows the handmaid, who longs for human touch and consolement.
As one would guess, this modesty makes it difficult for one to interact with the opposite sex in a way that produces a loving, cheerful relationship. What if we didn't have the option of getting a divorce nowadays? All of the men in this book are seen as potential partners, and thus, the handmaids are forced to avoid them because their partners have already been selected for them. This is similar to the traditional value that many families used to favor about arranged marriage, however, the handmaids do not get married, and the cause of their selected partnership has more to do with fulfilling God's word and with subservience to men and religion than it does with power and prestige.

In an online book preview of a book by Catie Gill, the point is brought up that there used to be a "Cultural commonplace" about the difference between women and men. Women were and sometimes are still seen as "The more libidinous sex"(60). Libidinous referring to sexual desire. Why this occurs, I'm not quite sure. I am inclined to believe that men can be just as sexually driven as women. Maybe it is because women talk about the negative repurcussions of pregnancy more?

"Modesty is invisibility, said Aunt Lydia. Never Forget it. To be seen--to be seen--is to be--her voice trembled--penetrated"(28).
Modesty is another value that has greatly changed over the decades. Women used to conceal themselves and were strictly allowed to have sexual relations with one partner. In The Handmaid's Tale, women are passed on to different partners so that each male partner may have an heir. However, in the "Tale" the handmaid struggles with the relationship between her body, which is used but hidden and her mind, which is accused of being of no consequence.
"I used to think of my body as an instrument, of pleasure, or a means of transportation, or an implement for the accomplishment of my will....There were limits, but my body was nevertheless lithe, single, solid, one with me"(73).
Notice how the Handmaid says with me. She feels that her body is her definition in this dystopia, and she is denied the basic freedom of personality by the strict restrictions on mannerism forced on her.
Today in society, multipled partners are looked down upon, but the consequences of having sexual relations with more than one person are dependent on the circumstances of the relationship and the people involved, and not on strict rules of society based upon religious contexts.
Does this mean that religion has fallen out of style? Or does it mean that religion seems too strict for today's "laid-back" society?

Things within shadow, such as an underlying current of traditional values about gender can often be brought to light in writing and in life. In The Handmaid's Tale, values about the libido (Sexual desire) of women, and their role within religion and their image in society are revealed to us, in a way that may or may not be consisitent within our current societies.
Personally, I hope that shadows such as these do not come into the light in the same way as in The Handmaid's Tale.

Gill, Catie. Women in the Seventeenth-Century Quaker Community. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2005. Google Book Search. 3 Nov. 2008 http://books.google.com/books?id=1zez9fIHuHYC&printsec=frontcover&dq=women+in+the+seventeenth+century+quaker+community.