The Handmaid’s Tale and Philosophy: A Womb of One’s Own

Philosophers look beyond the sea of red dresses to reveal insights about gender inequality, religious oppression, power, and violence.

In The Handmaid’s Tale and Philosophy, philosophers give their insights into the blockbuster best-selling novel and record-breaking TV series, The Handmaid’s Tale. The story involves a future breakaway state in New England, beset by environmental disaster and a plummeting birth rate, in which the few remaining fertile women are conscripted to have sex and bear children to the most powerful men, all justified and rationalized by religious fundamentalism.