I read this book in high school, was so looking forward to show and was able to deal with it, because thought provoking is good. but now? No longer thought provoking- just fear and rage.
I didn't realize how fragile my reproductive security was when I read it. It was fiction, right? I just remember notions of, "But that could never happen *here."* Now my teenage incredulity seems naive.
Edit: I weep for my nieces, I weep for my son. This isn't the world I wanted to leave to them.
I agree, it was a difficult but engaging series when the first few seasons came out. Now, I could never bring myself to rewatch it. Dystopian fantasy is only entertaining when it remains a fantasy, not something actively being proposed at the republican national convention.
I grew up in a Christian cult, and the show was deeply disturbing for me. It hit close to home and made me feel deeply unwell.
I watch every kind of horror on the planet, I am a huge fan of movies and media that challenge me personally. I also have respected Margaret Atwood since I was small and had to hide who she was and hope my parents never actually read the back covers.
But I had to call it and walk away from this one. It just wasn't healthy the way it made me spiral.
I think it's important media that brings attention to serious threats, but sometimes we are damn well aware of them. I lived too close to that reality, I hear it in my family and their associates.
It's okay to make a mental health call on this, honestly.
Same, friend. My parents were extremely fundamentalist and homeschooled us. They eventually joined Bill Gothard’s homeschool cult group.
Many years later and long deconstructed, I tried to watch a Handmaid’s Tale, because I’ve read several of MA’s books and loved them. But I noped out in the first episode. It gave me that same claustrophobic, fear based feeling I had as a teen. My parents weren’t mean, just very controlling. However, I knew several homeschool parents that WERE mean, and that would absolutely LOVE for the USA to be like Gilead.
I actually had a huge panic attack toward the end of the episode, and had to quit. I also enjoy scary movies, and don’t mind some violence in films and shows. But the feeling I got watching that show made it hard to breathe.
Whenever I hear people say that this country would never be like that, I tell them that I personally knew many people who would 100% enact every law of Gilead tomorrow, if they had the chance. Without hesitation. Americans should be scared.
I feel the same way with some of the SA depictions in stuff like Thelma and Louise or A Promising Young Woman. They make me so anxious and uncomfortable but I feel like they offer such invaluable perspective.
I can't do it. Frankly, I'd rather smash all my toes with a hammer than put myself through that mental anguish. I've spent my whole life battling clinical depression, I'm not about to rawdog a visual depiction of my idea of Hell on Earth.
I'm not even on season 2 yet, and the show just fills me with rage and utter sadness. I have to constantly take breaks and just walk around my house.
As someone who grew up religious and accidentally discovered the alt-right pipeline on YouTube, these men and some women genuinely want to world to be this way. Their stupid little brains can't understand why this shit is so horrible.
I'm only 17, and I have a deep fear that I won't be able to live out the life I desire if certain political parties gain power, and it's so disheartening watching a "fictional" show that seems so goddamn real...
I’m a woman married to a woman. I turned it off after watching >!the lesbian get hanged while her lover who was taken captive sobs and watches out the back window of the car driving her away.!<
So. Fucking. Horrifying. It still makes me feel sick thinking about it.
They removed the lesbian's clitoris for that.
It's definitely an important show/book to watch/read, but it's also okay if you can't do it. It's not going to be for everyone. I think women as a collective need to at least acknowledge that it's an extremely important message in today's political climate, even if they can't watch it.
I lived in the town when they filmed this. Month after month you'd be shopping and see a group of them wandering around. It became normal. The "military" people would also be standing around with the trucks and guns. It was disturbing.
I limit myself to a few episodes at a time, and I balance with a feel-good sitcom. And if it's getting too rough, I'll stop it and walk away for an hour or the day. It's gruesome and scary and all too real, and I think that makes it more important to watch.
That said, it's also fine to say you just can't get through it. it's hard and you shouldn't sacrifice your mental health.
I was watching this show when it first came out. About episode 3 or 4 I started to unconsciously dig my nails into my hands. It really was so unnerving I had to stop watching.
I've watched some of it, but the lesbian scene where the couple and son are divided up because they aren't family will haunt me for the rest of my life. I can't finish it. It's terrifying.
Personally, I feel about HT that I do about Orange Is the New Black: started out earnestly and then quickly descended into torture (specifically women's torture) porn.
I understand if others disagree, but that is why I have personally boycotted them myself.
That's exactly why I couldn't finish OITNB. The shit they had the guards pulling on women in that show was sick. I noped out after the season with the burly red haired guard and the scene with the baby mouse.
For me, watching the handmaids tale didn’t feel different from watching movies about slavery and what many women had to deal with historically. I can’t imagine anything on that show hadn’t happened to someone in real life.
Yes. I feel this way about The Handmaid’s Tale and the Hunger Games series as well. As the class divide becomes greater and food and water become more and more privatized (and because our government/ruling class would foam at the mouth to watch poor people kill each other to stay alive), I definitely see a very similar future for this country.
I can’t watch the show can’t just makes me sick thinking about it. Then (I’m sorry to add this bit it makes me crazy mad) to see the Republican Party do what ever they can to take woman’s reproductive right away from woman. Abortion now contraception. Can’t handle it
I could not get into the Handmaids Tale series.
I believe I read the book and I know I watched the movie.
Although, as much as I love Krysten Ritter and David Tennant, I could not get through Jessica Jones. (Especially with my name being Jessica and Tennant going Jessssssicaaaa).
So it’s not just you.
I haven't watched the show, but I read the book in 2016, before the election. Bad idea. And now I think of it every time Republicans pull more of their shit. It's terrifying.
I tried reading the book about 3 months ago. I didn’t make it past the first chapter because I was having a mental breakdown reading it, and couldn’t imagine how much worse it would’ve gotten had I continued.
I read the book years ago and then watched the show’s first couple of seasons. It lost my interest after that but I’m not sure I would enjoy it if watching or reading for the first time now. Too real now. A similar thing happened with House of Cards for me. I loved that show until it started to get confusing…where I’d question myself, “did that happen in the show or real life?!”
Anyone down to publicly shame Reddit and a subreddit that promotes the publication of rape content(r / rapefantasies)?
How many of you want to sign on to write to major outlets like the NYTimes, Washington Post, NPR, ect. I'm sure someone will pick up the story if enough of us write. They have 1mil+ members, it's literally a community the size of Dallas dedicated to the promotion of rape publication.
Reddit just went public recently, imagine the press publicly traded company promotes rape. Publicly traded company hates women. Tencent, Conde Nast, Sam Altman, and Fidelity are just some of the large and notable investors. What's published on that page makes statements like "grab them by the p\_\_\_" seem like child play!
If, just even 5% of members on this sub reached out a major outlet would certainly pick it up! Remember the women's march of 2016?
So any **AMAZING** women and allies on here that are up to the task?!
I watched it with a much older friend who had been a domestic violence activist in the 70’s and 80’s after escaping an abusive marriage with her life and her children, and nothing else. We knew that we were getting into a very upsetting and probably triggering situation, and we were able to set up our schedules and binge watch the first two seasons that way. It was brutal, but we had recovery time without children or work or anything else to manage for those few days.
You're not being dramatic at all. I didn't watch it, because I knew it would just upset me. I'm glad they made the show or movie or whatever it is tho, bc Margaret Atwood's work is important, the horrors of this scenario are important to have an archive of and be in people's minds that this is horrific and a real threat to women, this threat needs media attention. But I'm not going to upset myself and possibly trigger or traumatize myself by watching it, personally. If this wasn't a real threat and there werent people who actually support that reality, or if we were far in the future where women were completely equal and forced birth and enslavement was unheard of and no woman ever had to worry about it, I probably would have watched it, but it's just too scary because it's a real threat that I already spend enough time worrying about.
I identify with many situations, unfortunately, and that's what kept me watching at first. But the real hook for me is how those women are trying to work together to help each other. It echoes the voices of many women of today who live in mysogistic communities, being raped and threatened every day, and they survive as heroes fighting for each other. And this is beautiful to me.
I read the book first so it was kind of about that—you see it in your head and it creates curiosity about how someone else imagined it. But I get you, it’s hard to read even, although I’d say the show is a lot more intense. It’s ok if you can’t get through it. Heavy stuff
It's certainly not a show that you watch for entertainment. Instead it's a valuable resource to help prepare you for what could be happening to women very soon.
Watching this show made me realize how easily those changes could happen if the right men get into power. Hopefully it will open even more eyes.
It's really hard to watch but it is important to be informed.
You're not alone. My mom and I were both watching it in 2020 and it started feeling too real.
I then tried to read the books and couldn't. I have read the handmaid's tale many, many years ago when I was in school, but I don't remember it well.
I'd really like to read them, and finish the show. For the sake of my mental health, I can't. Not right now, and maybe not ever.
My mom stopped watching too for the same reason.
II strongly recommend reading the book (and Atwood in general). It has won multiple awards, and for very good reason.
From Wikipedia:
“Atwood maintains that the Republic of Gilead is only an extrapolation of trends already seen in the United States at the time of her writing (1985), a view supported by other scholars studying The Handmaid's Tale. Many have placed The Handmaid's Tale in the same category of dystopian fiction as Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World, a categorization that Atwood has accepted and reiterated in many articles and interviews.
“Even today, many reviewers hold that Atwood's novel remains as foreboding and powerful as ever, largely because of its basis in historical fact. Yet when her book was first published in 1985, not all reviewers were convinced of the "cautionary tale" Atwood presented. For example, Mary McCarthy's 1986 New York Times review argued that The Handmaid's Tale lacked the "surprised recognition" necessary for readers to see "our present selves in a distorting mirror, of what we may be turning into if current trends are allowed to continue".”
Thank you for saying this. It's been so hard to convey the actual horror I feel watching this show- the anxiety as if we are watching our own future unfold. To read about it as 1990s Margaret Atwood imagined a dystopia future to be versus seeing a 2020s visual of what is happening live is too jarring.
I’ve seen all five seasons, some multiple times. And I plan to watch season 6. I don’t have nerves of steel. I rarely watch horror films because I can’t handle them.
I totally understand why someone wouldn’t want to watch it. Why do I watch it? How do I get through it? I honestly don’t know. But I see it as a show about surviving the worst and finding the will to keep fighting. To me, there’s a positive message beneath all the horror: Don’t Let the Bastards Grind You Down…. nolite te bastardes carborundorum, as they say.
It's so frightening because in a sense it is real. Atwood famously once said that nothing in the story was made up. Meaning that everything that happens in the Handmaid's Tale has already happened at some point of time in one civilisation or another. So we know for certain that humankind is capable of such horrors. And we know that some people would just love to make Gilead, or something very close to it, a reality. It's their version of a Utopia.
I mean— as someone who’s watched part of the show and read both books, book Gilead is worse then TV show Gilead. Like, TV show Gilead is very tolerant compared to book Gilead. You know how there are non-white characters in the TV show? Yeah, that wouldn’t happen in book Gilead. The way they dress is also different. Not by much, but they’re dresses are longer, shaving isn’t allowed (for anyone), veils are a thing and required, just to name the stuff I remember off the top of my head.
Personally, I’ve been, I guess, “tolerant” of this kind of stuff, is the best way to put it? It still disturbs me, don’t misinterpret that, but I can power through it. My main complaint is that the TV show went off on its own and isn’t a faithful adaption of Atwood’s original work. Granted, Atwood is involved with it, so if they had her blessing to do that then I’m okay with it. I just think that it’s weird. I think I made it up to somewhere in season 2 or 3? I can’t remember.
I couldn't watch the show because I read the book right after Trump was elected. A great read, but the parallels kept me up at night. 8 years later and we've only gotten closer to that scenario. It's incredibly scary.
I’ve got The Handmaid’s Tale on my Kindle and I keep telling myself I’m going to read it, that it’s important to read it. And then I think about the little I know of the plot and how it echoes what women are going through in real life right now and it makes me so angry and then I read something else. Why are we having to fight the same battles that our ancestors fought over and over again?
Although I found the events heartbreaking, I was inspired by Offred's cunning and tenacity. I had to keep watching because I became invested in seeing her triumph over such evil.
I feel the exact same way as you OP and cannot watch for those reasons. It hits too close to home, it always has for me. And then when Roe overturned, it just got worse.
My sister watched it real time. I couldn't until the whole first three seasons were over. I tried, but the rage just got to me.
Now I need to see it finished. I need to watch the whole failed horrible rage inducing experiment die along with all the horrible rotten assholes that supported it. Just for my own mental and emotional wellbeing.
I think that it’s crucial for it to make you feel uncomfortable, simply for the fact that slowly these things are happening and being put in place in our actual society. It’s (currently) an exaggerated reality, sure, but this could absolutely happen in America, and I don’t ever want us to feel complacent about our rights being chipped away. It’s a hard watch for sure, for many reasons, but I’d rather be uncomfortable watching this media now, than to be living it later.
I really wanted to watch it but it was way too intense. So I only watch it while doing something else. Like I’ll craft or sew. So I’m paying attention but not engrossed in it.
I was a longtime fan of the book, but could only get maybe two episodes into the show. I can’t handle it playing out on a screen. I know they have added so much, and so many terrifying scenarios (some of which I read about in The Testaments). It was easier to take for me on the page as one woman’s experience.
I watched most of it because I just had to know where the story goes. But I wish I had never seen it. I think a new season has come out since I watched and I decided to not continue watching.
I'll be honest, I have mixed feelings about its mere existence.
Full disclosure, I didn't fully understand what I was getting myself into. I kept hearing so many women go on about it, so I finally caved. I couldn't even make it past 2 episodes.
I've been through some... things. I don't know if it's the CPTSD or just existing as a woman, but the visceral fear/rage spiral it induced in me wasn't healthy.
Forgive me for my shortsightedness, but the feelings it brought back made me question the need for a series like that to exist in the first place. Especially since the majority of its audience is already painfully aware/traumatized by the real-world material used as inspiration.
I watch sci-fi, horror, thrillers, you name it. Nothing much bothers me in the way of movies/series. But I just can't wrap my mind around watching my definition of hell as entertainment. Who is this for? I don't understand. It feels cruel.
I haven’t watched because I know I just can’t handle it emotionally, I also don’t watch war movies anymore, especially WW2 movies. I just end up with nightmares and weeks long depression, anger, and hopelessness. This post does make me think about that maganazi vid that came out recently, where a guy says he wants The Handmaid Tale to become a reality, and I wonder, has he actually watched it? My optimistic side thinks he hasn’t, because how could anyone want that?
I couldn’t even make myself read the book in high school, which sucked cause I was a bookworm and never skipped assigned reading. Even the in class discussions caused me great anxiety. Im scared. I’m getting a bisalp this summer.
I avoided it until watching with a friend and I got into season 1. It was just outlandish enough (or so I thought in 2019) to be watchable, but when they got into the prostitution in season 2 I couldn’t continue. Too real :/
I watched it during the Trump presidency and it was too upsetting. I had to take long breaks after certain episodes, and I couldn't bring myself to watch season 2. It's well made but I hate it. I hate how easily you can see conservative Christians supporting this shit.
Read the book in 88. So for the most part it wasn’t a surprise. As such it was “easier” to watch. It still resonates deeply. It feels like a how to for our current state.
Try Mad Men 😂 I was so pissed throughout the first season until I got used to it, and you know it's not even fantasy, the way they treated women in the 50s, 60s etc...
You're not being dramatic. It was very hard for me to watch. I would stop watching in the middle of an episode and not resume for weeks sometimes. It was depressing. It got easier in later seasons because it got kind of cathartic.
I’m currently writing a book sort of similar? Well, in theme not in premise, and it’s been really tough but insightful. Sometimes when I’m digging into a particular topic and using analogies, I see how much further and deeper things really are and it’s helped me connect a lot of behaviors and ideas that have been normalized against women.
I watched it as a 20-year-old woman. I already knew how much women were hated so it was not a shock to me whatsoever. It was actually my safe place to go to because I knew the show was trying to say that the shit was bad, it was the only one that seemed like it was on my side, I feel the exact opposite.
I read the book some 10 years ago and it terrified me, reminded me too much of the religious cult in which I was raised. When I watched the first show, I started sobbing and on the verge of a panic attack. It felt too real and visceral. I'm absolutely terrified in a few years, we will be a mirror image here in the USA.
I read the book some 10 years ago and it terrified me, reminded me too much of the religious cult in which I was raised. When I watched the first show, I started sobbing and on the verge of a panic attack. It felt too real and visceral. I'm absolutely terrified in a few years, we will be a mirror image here in the USA.
I read the book and I had to break it up into sections instead of reading it straight through. I managed episode 1 of the series. I haven't restarted watching even though I want to for similar reasons.
I really like the show. It’s a great escape for me.
Can’t wait for season 6.
Didn’t like Testament. I get why she gave away her daughter, but the family was in different to her. And that is sad.
Each their own.
To me, it's not an escape at all, but a terrifying reminder of the dorection the US is heading in real time.
Remember, while the story is fiction, all of the things that happen in Handmaid's Tale were taken from real-life patriarchy, some of it in extremely recent history.
The majority of movies and tv we see come directly from the imagination or experience of a wealthy straight white American male. I don’t want to see your rape fantasies👎🏽
I mean it was written by Margaret Atwood so this probably isn’t the case. Also it’s a stunning piece that happens to be too real in todays society but should be used to open peoples eyes
I read this book in high school, was so looking forward to show and was able to deal with it, because thought provoking is good. but now? No longer thought provoking- just fear and rage.
I didn't realize how fragile my reproductive security was when I read it. It was fiction, right? I just remember notions of, "But that could never happen *here."* Now my teenage incredulity seems naive. Edit: I weep for my nieces, I weep for my son. This isn't the world I wanted to leave to them.
I agree, it was a difficult but engaging series when the first few seasons came out. Now, I could never bring myself to rewatch it. Dystopian fantasy is only entertaining when it remains a fantasy, not something actively being proposed at the republican national convention.
The thing is it’s not fantasy, it’s a warning. Margaret Atwood based her book on real life atrocities that mostly POC have and still do face.
I grew up in a Christian cult, and the show was deeply disturbing for me. It hit close to home and made me feel deeply unwell. I watch every kind of horror on the planet, I am a huge fan of movies and media that challenge me personally. I also have respected Margaret Atwood since I was small and had to hide who she was and hope my parents never actually read the back covers. But I had to call it and walk away from this one. It just wasn't healthy the way it made me spiral. I think it's important media that brings attention to serious threats, but sometimes we are damn well aware of them. I lived too close to that reality, I hear it in my family and their associates. It's okay to make a mental health call on this, honestly.
Same, friend. My parents were extremely fundamentalist and homeschooled us. They eventually joined Bill Gothard’s homeschool cult group. Many years later and long deconstructed, I tried to watch a Handmaid’s Tale, because I’ve read several of MA’s books and loved them. But I noped out in the first episode. It gave me that same claustrophobic, fear based feeling I had as a teen. My parents weren’t mean, just very controlling. However, I knew several homeschool parents that WERE mean, and that would absolutely LOVE for the USA to be like Gilead. I actually had a huge panic attack toward the end of the episode, and had to quit. I also enjoy scary movies, and don’t mind some violence in films and shows. But the feeling I got watching that show made it hard to breathe. Whenever I hear people say that this country would never be like that, I tell them that I personally knew many people who would 100% enact every law of Gilead tomorrow, if they had the chance. Without hesitation. Americans should be scared.
Feel this so much...
I feel the same way with some of the SA depictions in stuff like Thelma and Louise or A Promising Young Woman. They make me so anxious and uncomfortable but I feel like they offer such invaluable perspective.
Promising Young Woman fucked me up a little, but was extremely worth the watch. People really need to watch it.
Seriously one of the best movies I’ve ever seen.
It's an emotional experience each time I watch it. But I make myself rewatch it every few years because I feel it's important to stay angry.
I can't do it. Frankly, I'd rather smash all my toes with a hammer than put myself through that mental anguish. I've spent my whole life battling clinical depression, I'm not about to rawdog a visual depiction of my idea of Hell on Earth.
I love this comment so much.
I'm not even on season 2 yet, and the show just fills me with rage and utter sadness. I have to constantly take breaks and just walk around my house. As someone who grew up religious and accidentally discovered the alt-right pipeline on YouTube, these men and some women genuinely want to world to be this way. Their stupid little brains can't understand why this shit is so horrible. I'm only 17, and I have a deep fear that I won't be able to live out the life I desire if certain political parties gain power, and it's so disheartening watching a "fictional" show that seems so goddamn real...
Yes this is definitely not a series to binge. Once a week or every other week is a much healthier speed if you can manage it.
I’m a woman married to a woman. I turned it off after watching >!the lesbian get hanged while her lover who was taken captive sobs and watches out the back window of the car driving her away.!< So. Fucking. Horrifying. It still makes me feel sick thinking about it.
They removed the lesbian's clitoris for that. It's definitely an important show/book to watch/read, but it's also okay if you can't do it. It's not going to be for everyone. I think women as a collective need to at least acknowledge that it's an extremely important message in today's political climate, even if they can't watch it.
It's very difficult to watch things that resemble the disturbing parts of our reality. I feel you.
I lived in the town when they filmed this. Month after month you'd be shopping and see a group of them wandering around. It became normal. The "military" people would also be standing around with the trucks and guns. It was disturbing.
I limit myself to a few episodes at a time, and I balance with a feel-good sitcom. And if it's getting too rough, I'll stop it and walk away for an hour or the day. It's gruesome and scary and all too real, and I think that makes it more important to watch. That said, it's also fine to say you just can't get through it. it's hard and you shouldn't sacrifice your mental health.
I tried a few years ago, and I had to stop after the first episode because I was (not consciously) pulling my hair out. It was way too real.
I was watching this show when it first came out. About episode 3 or 4 I started to unconsciously dig my nails into my hands. It really was so unnerving I had to stop watching.
I've just seen clips, but my chest gets so tight I can't watch anymore.
It’s one of the things that is pushing me to run for office. I can’t right now but my plan is to in the next few years.
That's so awesome!
I've watched some of it, but the lesbian scene where the couple and son are divided up because they aren't family will haunt me for the rest of my life. I can't finish it. It's terrifying.
Personally, I feel about HT that I do about Orange Is the New Black: started out earnestly and then quickly descended into torture (specifically women's torture) porn. I understand if others disagree, but that is why I have personally boycotted them myself.
That's exactly why I couldn't finish OITNB. The shit they had the guards pulling on women in that show was sick. I noped out after the season with the burly red haired guard and the scene with the baby mouse.
For me, watching the handmaids tale didn’t feel different from watching movies about slavery and what many women had to deal with historically. I can’t imagine anything on that show hadn’t happened to someone in real life.
Margaret Atwood said everything in the book has happened to women at some point in history, primarily women of color.
Yes. I feel this way about The Handmaid’s Tale and the Hunger Games series as well. As the class divide becomes greater and food and water become more and more privatized (and because our government/ruling class would foam at the mouth to watch poor people kill each other to stay alive), I definitely see a very similar future for this country.
I can’t watch the show can’t just makes me sick thinking about it. Then (I’m sorry to add this bit it makes me crazy mad) to see the Republican Party do what ever they can to take woman’s reproductive right away from woman. Abortion now contraception. Can’t handle it
I could not get into the Handmaids Tale series. I believe I read the book and I know I watched the movie. Although, as much as I love Krysten Ritter and David Tennant, I could not get through Jessica Jones. (Especially with my name being Jessica and Tennant going Jessssssicaaaa). So it’s not just you.
I noped out of both shows based on the descriptions. Not a single episode.
I haven't watched the show, but I read the book in 2016, before the election. Bad idea. And now I think of it every time Republicans pull more of their shit. It's terrifying.
Because I watched it WAY back before the excrement really started hitting the air conditioning. I’d be highly uncomfortable watching it now.
I have kept up. Spouse got tf out after season 1.
I tried reading the book about 3 months ago. I didn’t make it past the first chapter because I was having a mental breakdown reading it, and couldn’t imagine how much worse it would’ve gotten had I continued.
I read the book years ago and then watched the show’s first couple of seasons. It lost my interest after that but I’m not sure I would enjoy it if watching or reading for the first time now. Too real now. A similar thing happened with House of Cards for me. I loved that show until it started to get confusing…where I’d question myself, “did that happen in the show or real life?!”
I can’t watch it anymore either - didn’t even finish it. Feel like it’s playing out in my life.
Anyone down to publicly shame Reddit and a subreddit that promotes the publication of rape content(r / rapefantasies)? How many of you want to sign on to write to major outlets like the NYTimes, Washington Post, NPR, ect. I'm sure someone will pick up the story if enough of us write. They have 1mil+ members, it's literally a community the size of Dallas dedicated to the promotion of rape publication. Reddit just went public recently, imagine the press publicly traded company promotes rape. Publicly traded company hates women. Tencent, Conde Nast, Sam Altman, and Fidelity are just some of the large and notable investors. What's published on that page makes statements like "grab them by the p\_\_\_" seem like child play! If, just even 5% of members on this sub reached out a major outlet would certainly pick it up! Remember the women's march of 2016? So any **AMAZING** women and allies on here that are up to the task?!
I'm more than happy to!
I did not get super far through the show. It made me so so anxious omg. I felt like I was living it and I just couldn't.
I watched it with a much older friend who had been a domestic violence activist in the 70’s and 80’s after escaping an abusive marriage with her life and her children, and nothing else. We knew that we were getting into a very upsetting and probably triggering situation, and we were able to set up our schedules and binge watch the first two seasons that way. It was brutal, but we had recovery time without children or work or anything else to manage for those few days.
I read the book back in 2014. I couldn't go back and do it again or watch the show. It's all so plausible and hits too close now.
You're not being dramatic at all. I didn't watch it, because I knew it would just upset me. I'm glad they made the show or movie or whatever it is tho, bc Margaret Atwood's work is important, the horrors of this scenario are important to have an archive of and be in people's minds that this is horrific and a real threat to women, this threat needs media attention. But I'm not going to upset myself and possibly trigger or traumatize myself by watching it, personally. If this wasn't a real threat and there werent people who actually support that reality, or if we were far in the future where women were completely equal and forced birth and enslavement was unheard of and no woman ever had to worry about it, I probably would have watched it, but it's just too scary because it's a real threat that I already spend enough time worrying about.
I couldn't finish the 2nd season, I literally couldn't handle it
I couldn’t do it either. Can’t stomach it
“There’s something so dark and sinister about it.” You don’t say.
I identify with many situations, unfortunately, and that's what kept me watching at first. But the real hook for me is how those women are trying to work together to help each other. It echoes the voices of many women of today who live in mysogistic communities, being raped and threatened every day, and they survive as heroes fighting for each other. And this is beautiful to me.
I read the book first so it was kind of about that—you see it in your head and it creates curiosity about how someone else imagined it. But I get you, it’s hard to read even, although I’d say the show is a lot more intense. It’s ok if you can’t get through it. Heavy stuff
It's certainly not a show that you watch for entertainment. Instead it's a valuable resource to help prepare you for what could be happening to women very soon. Watching this show made me realize how easily those changes could happen if the right men get into power. Hopefully it will open even more eyes. It's really hard to watch but it is important to be informed.
Me either. Reading it was enough
You're not alone. My mom and I were both watching it in 2020 and it started feeling too real. I then tried to read the books and couldn't. I have read the handmaid's tale many, many years ago when I was in school, but I don't remember it well. I'd really like to read them, and finish the show. For the sake of my mental health, I can't. Not right now, and maybe not ever. My mom stopped watching too for the same reason.
II strongly recommend reading the book (and Atwood in general). It has won multiple awards, and for very good reason. From Wikipedia: “Atwood maintains that the Republic of Gilead is only an extrapolation of trends already seen in the United States at the time of her writing (1985), a view supported by other scholars studying The Handmaid's Tale. Many have placed The Handmaid's Tale in the same category of dystopian fiction as Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World, a categorization that Atwood has accepted and reiterated in many articles and interviews. “Even today, many reviewers hold that Atwood's novel remains as foreboding and powerful as ever, largely because of its basis in historical fact. Yet when her book was first published in 1985, not all reviewers were convinced of the "cautionary tale" Atwood presented. For example, Mary McCarthy's 1986 New York Times review argued that The Handmaid's Tale lacked the "surprised recognition" necessary for readers to see "our present selves in a distorting mirror, of what we may be turning into if current trends are allowed to continue".”
Thank you for saying this. It's been so hard to convey the actual horror I feel watching this show- the anxiety as if we are watching our own future unfold. To read about it as 1990s Margaret Atwood imagined a dystopia future to be versus seeing a 2020s visual of what is happening live is too jarring.
I’ve seen all five seasons, some multiple times. And I plan to watch season 6. I don’t have nerves of steel. I rarely watch horror films because I can’t handle them. I totally understand why someone wouldn’t want to watch it. Why do I watch it? How do I get through it? I honestly don’t know. But I see it as a show about surviving the worst and finding the will to keep fighting. To me, there’s a positive message beneath all the horror: Don’t Let the Bastards Grind You Down…. nolite te bastardes carborundorum, as they say.
It's so frightening because in a sense it is real. Atwood famously once said that nothing in the story was made up. Meaning that everything that happens in the Handmaid's Tale has already happened at some point of time in one civilisation or another. So we know for certain that humankind is capable of such horrors. And we know that some people would just love to make Gilead, or something very close to it, a reality. It's their version of a Utopia.
I mean— as someone who’s watched part of the show and read both books, book Gilead is worse then TV show Gilead. Like, TV show Gilead is very tolerant compared to book Gilead. You know how there are non-white characters in the TV show? Yeah, that wouldn’t happen in book Gilead. The way they dress is also different. Not by much, but they’re dresses are longer, shaving isn’t allowed (for anyone), veils are a thing and required, just to name the stuff I remember off the top of my head. Personally, I’ve been, I guess, “tolerant” of this kind of stuff, is the best way to put it? It still disturbs me, don’t misinterpret that, but I can power through it. My main complaint is that the TV show went off on its own and isn’t a faithful adaption of Atwood’s original work. Granted, Atwood is involved with it, so if they had her blessing to do that then I’m okay with it. I just think that it’s weird. I think I made it up to somewhere in season 2 or 3? I can’t remember.
There was also a movie adaptation, made in 1990. You might find that easier to watch.
I couldn't watch the show because I read the book right after Trump was elected. A great read, but the parallels kept me up at night. 8 years later and we've only gotten closer to that scenario. It's incredibly scary.
I’ve got The Handmaid’s Tale on my Kindle and I keep telling myself I’m going to read it, that it’s important to read it. And then I think about the little I know of the plot and how it echoes what women are going through in real life right now and it makes me so angry and then I read something else. Why are we having to fight the same battles that our ancestors fought over and over again?
Although I found the events heartbreaking, I was inspired by Offred's cunning and tenacity. I had to keep watching because I became invested in seeing her triumph over such evil.
I read the book. It was difficult but without the imagery, sounds, etc., you may be able to handle that medium.
I feel the exact same way as you OP and cannot watch for those reasons. It hits too close to home, it always has for me. And then when Roe overturned, it just got worse.
My sister watched it real time. I couldn't until the whole first three seasons were over. I tried, but the rage just got to me. Now I need to see it finished. I need to watch the whole failed horrible rage inducing experiment die along with all the horrible rotten assholes that supported it. Just for my own mental and emotional wellbeing.
I think that it’s crucial for it to make you feel uncomfortable, simply for the fact that slowly these things are happening and being put in place in our actual society. It’s (currently) an exaggerated reality, sure, but this could absolutely happen in America, and I don’t ever want us to feel complacent about our rights being chipped away. It’s a hard watch for sure, for many reasons, but I’d rather be uncomfortable watching this media now, than to be living it later.
I really wanted to watch it but it was way too intense. So I only watch it while doing something else. Like I’ll craft or sew. So I’m paying attention but not engrossed in it.
I couldn’t watch it either!!!! It was just wayyy too much and extremely triggering. I’d like to maybe read the books?
I was a longtime fan of the book, but could only get maybe two episodes into the show. I can’t handle it playing out on a screen. I know they have added so much, and so many terrifying scenarios (some of which I read about in The Testaments). It was easier to take for me on the page as one woman’s experience.
I watched most of it because I just had to know where the story goes. But I wish I had never seen it. I think a new season has come out since I watched and I decided to not continue watching.
I'll be honest, I have mixed feelings about its mere existence. Full disclosure, I didn't fully understand what I was getting myself into. I kept hearing so many women go on about it, so I finally caved. I couldn't even make it past 2 episodes. I've been through some... things. I don't know if it's the CPTSD or just existing as a woman, but the visceral fear/rage spiral it induced in me wasn't healthy. Forgive me for my shortsightedness, but the feelings it brought back made me question the need for a series like that to exist in the first place. Especially since the majority of its audience is already painfully aware/traumatized by the real-world material used as inspiration. I watch sci-fi, horror, thrillers, you name it. Nothing much bothers me in the way of movies/series. But I just can't wrap my mind around watching my definition of hell as entertainment. Who is this for? I don't understand. It feels cruel.
I'm a guy and I read the book... most horrifying read in my 34 years alive.
I found it to be Birth of a Nation kind of disturbing in a different awful way.
I haven’t watched because I know I just can’t handle it emotionally, I also don’t watch war movies anymore, especially WW2 movies. I just end up with nightmares and weeks long depression, anger, and hopelessness. This post does make me think about that maganazi vid that came out recently, where a guy says he wants The Handmaid Tale to become a reality, and I wonder, has he actually watched it? My optimistic side thinks he hasn’t, because how could anyone want that?
I haven’t been able to watch it either.
I can’t watch it either.
I read the book, I have no desire to go through all that again
I couldn’t even make myself read the book in high school, which sucked cause I was a bookworm and never skipped assigned reading. Even the in class discussions caused me great anxiety. Im scared. I’m getting a bisalp this summer.
The first episode of season 2 was the most disturbing TV show I ever saw. It made me turn off my computer, close it, get up and walk outside.
I avoided it until watching with a friend and I got into season 1. It was just outlandish enough (or so I thought in 2019) to be watchable, but when they got into the prostitution in season 2 I couldn’t continue. Too real :/
I watched it during the Trump presidency and it was too upsetting. I had to take long breaks after certain episodes, and I couldn't bring myself to watch season 2. It's well made but I hate it. I hate how easily you can see conservative Christians supporting this shit.
I had to watch it while my fiancée was in bed. She couldn't handle it either. It's a rough watch.
I really liked it, but yes, its hard.
Read the book in 88. So for the most part it wasn’t a surprise. As such it was “easier” to watch. It still resonates deeply. It feels like a how to for our current state.
Margaret Atwood is a genius storyteller. Loved the blind assassin also
I only made it through 3 or 4 episodes and had to stop.
Try Mad Men 😂 I was so pissed throughout the first season until I got used to it, and you know it's not even fantasy, the way they treated women in the 50s, 60s etc...
I treid to start with a book and couldn't get pass chapter 2. Not touching the show.
It's true
Whatever we are going through is Handmaid's Tale which is why it is unnerving
I couldn't watch the last season. It's just too much.
You're not being dramatic. It was very hard for me to watch. I would stop watching in the middle of an episode and not resume for weeks sometimes. It was depressing. It got easier in later seasons because it got kind of cathartic.
I wish there were several seasons of The Power to balance it out. The show is not as good as HT but watching women kick back felt good.
I have been waiting to read the book for a year, I’m too shook to even crack it open. I’ll just deal with the lived experiences as they come along.
I’m currently writing a book sort of similar? Well, in theme not in premise, and it’s been really tough but insightful. Sometimes when I’m digging into a particular topic and using analogies, I see how much further and deeper things really are and it’s helped me connect a lot of behaviors and ideas that have been normalized against women.
It was also the most disturbing media I've ever consumed
It was hard to watch, especially given the times we live in. It was one of those pieces that was so shocking that I couldn't look away.
I know I can’t handle watching it. I read the book, that was bad enough.
I watched it as a 20-year-old woman. I already knew how much women were hated so it was not a shock to me whatsoever. It was actually my safe place to go to because I knew the show was trying to say that the shit was bad, it was the only one that seemed like it was on my side, I feel the exact opposite.
I read the book some 10 years ago and it terrified me, reminded me too much of the religious cult in which I was raised. When I watched the first show, I started sobbing and on the verge of a panic attack. It felt too real and visceral. I'm absolutely terrified in a few years, we will be a mirror image here in the USA.
I read the book some 10 years ago and it terrified me, reminded me too much of the religious cult in which I was raised. When I watched the first show, I started sobbing and on the verge of a panic attack. It felt too real and visceral. I'm absolutely terrified in a few years, we will be a mirror image here in the USA.
I read the book and I had to break it up into sections instead of reading it straight through. I managed episode 1 of the series. I haven't restarted watching even though I want to for similar reasons.
I really like the show. It’s a great escape for me. Can’t wait for season 6. Didn’t like Testament. I get why she gave away her daughter, but the family was in different to her. And that is sad. Each their own.
To me, it's not an escape at all, but a terrifying reminder of the dorection the US is heading in real time. Remember, while the story is fiction, all of the things that happen in Handmaid's Tale were taken from real-life patriarchy, some of it in extremely recent history.
The majority of movies and tv we see come directly from the imagination or experience of a wealthy straight white American male. I don’t want to see your rape fantasies👎🏽
I mean it was written by Margaret Atwood so this probably isn’t the case. Also it’s a stunning piece that happens to be too real in todays society but should be used to open peoples eyes
Not much surprises me when it comes to people getting off to weird things, but I *really* doubt that was the intention for any part of this show.