Confronting Theofascism in the Usa
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In the Republic of Gilead, a Christian theocracy exists in the place of an elected secular government. The state regulates nearly every aspect of public and private life based on biblical fundamentalism. Those who do not conform are pressed into service as “handmaids” and servants or deported to regions where pollution has reached toxic levels. Martial law has been declared as “hordes of guerrillas” jeopardize the stability of the Republic — though the threat may be greatly exaggerated.
The foundation of the Gileadean regime is the control of sex and sexuality. They execute gays and lesbians; they destroy pornography and sexual clothing; they kill abortion doctors; they outlaw divorce and second marriages; and they even prevent most women from learning how to read.
Thankfully the Republic of Gilead does not exist. Gilead is merely Margaret Atwoods dystopic vision of a totalitarian theocratic state, but one that is exhaustively detailed in her novel, The Handmaids Tale.
Influenced mainly by the Christian backlash against feminism, Atwood published her book in 1985, a few years shy of the all out “culture war” that erupted when the Christian Right movement decided to take on homosexuality, which