Q: Complicated women that asks us to consider how women can/are be complacent in their own subjugation. Why might they be this way?
While the other women of more upper-class status had a bit more power than the handmaids, they still are underneath the boot of the men at the top of the social pyramid who they are still subjected to. We see this when Aunt Lydia begins to sympathize when trying to teach the handmaids the rules of the roost of being a handmaid.
“It’s not the husbands you have to watch out for, said Aunt Lydia, it’s the Wives. You should always try to imagine what they must be feeling. Of course they will resent you… Try to pity them. Forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Atwood).
She brings up a good point here, that the handmaids aren’t the only ones in this society that have been pigeon-held and stripped of their identities. The Marthas, due to their age, are ripped of their femininity and any sort of attractiveness and forced to work in the kitchens of the Commanders. The wives of the Commanders, as cruel as they can be, are placed into a similar position only possessing power over her own household. They also are painted as heartless, almost like the Hitchcock blondes, smart and cunning but lacking in warmth and any other emotion. They also are forced to be mothers, almost as a societal power and evolution position rather than a personal choice made by love. Aunt Lydia is forced into a crueler position, that of a cattle prodding autocrat, forced to show little emotion except the fear she strikes into her handmaids.
These women are indeed complacent in their societal roles, due to their power over each other and the handmaids. But another thing to consider is, besides ruling with varying levels of strictness, what else could they do to change their position? They aren’t even in the larger ruling class, just another level under the men at the top who control everything. These upper women have just as much of a lack of a voice in the changes in the society they’ve become involved in.
Womens Lit. Blog 