The Handmaid's Tale: Triggering Right Wing Snowflakes Everywhere

[AthenaAwakened]

Yes, of course, The Handmaid’s Tale seems chillingly familiar to the modern day Republican party and its Twitter-addicted leader, but that’s what made Atwood’s original work so stirring in the first place. Atwood tapped into a genuine and timeless threat: those men who will trade away the liberty of their neighbors for power. A fixation on controlling women’s bodies, and their wombs; performative evangelicalism; anti-intellectualism; pollution and sexually transmitted diseases gone unchecked—“’Better’ never means better for everyone,” the Commander remarks. What about “Great Again,” Commander?

And so, to those Trump supporters who have seen the trailer and derided it as liberal propaganda, I ask: what is it about a dystopian horror world in which terrorist attacks are used as an excuse for unchecked power, and in which women are suppressed until they are worth little more than their ability to reproduce seems like it’s referring to your political party? Because if you recognize The Handmaid’s Tale, written over thirty years ago, as a big subtweet at your political movement, what does that say about your political movement?

http://observer.com/2017/03/trump-handmaids-tale-elizabeth-moss/

I read THT back when it was first published. My drama teacher in high school played one of the Marthas in the movie (1990). It's a book, with a point of view. It is an attack on theocracy. So evidently many on the political right are PRO theocracy. Who knew?

 

[LordKiran]

I'll be sure to give it a read the next chance I get.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Huh.

You know, i probably watch every submarine movie that ever comes out. I KNOW they're about what i used to do for a living, but i don't get triggered. I note the things they got right, the things they got wrong, the things that are ludicrous (If the CO's doggie wet on my equipment, i'd probably wire it with 440 VAC and pop that little turd machine into the next compartment... But i digress), the things that are eerily familiar (EVERY single person on the crew in Down Periscope, except Lake, I've been underwater with at one time or another...). And then i walk away from the movie thinking it was someone's attempt to tell a story that got a grade of x.

But with the exception of films set up to proselytize about how stupid atheists are, i just don't usually imagine that anyone can convince a studio to make a multi-million dollar commercial about the evils of a political party, promising they'll make their money back just because so many people are excited to go watch some people act out a talk radio episode with better lighting and make-up.
I'm usually amazed when people tell me that the movie i just watched is about gays, or marxism, or communism, or the evils of socialism.

Do i have too much imagination to see these things? Or not enough?

 

[Underseer]

Ugh. They want me to turn off my adblocker in order to read the article.

No thanks.

Once upon a time, I used script-blockers without an ad-blocker specifically because I wanted to support the web sites I visited. Then I got a virus from an ad. If web sites want me to stop blocking ads, they're going to have to figure out a way to make it impossible for those ads to spread malware.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

Why are websites, email, etc able to spread malware at all? Read only material should be able to do that why? Why not just make it so that it shows the text posted and if it isn't in the right format it just errors?

 

[Rhea]

Ugh. They want me to turn off my adblocker in order to read the article.

No thanks.

Once upon a time, I used script-blockers without an ad-blocker specifically because I wanted to support the web sites I visited. Then I got a virus from an ad. If web sites want me to stop blocking ads, they're going to have to figure out a way to make it impossible for those ads to spread malware.

If you get that you can click out side the box if it'll let you, or back arrow (alt-left arrow) then copy the material and read it else where.
Copy by doing this:

CTL-A (selects all) CTL-C (copies all that's selected) then open a word doc and paste (CTL-V) Then you can read it.

 

[credoconsolans]

Yes, of course, The Handmaid’s Tale seems chillingly familiar to the modern day Republican party and its Twitter-addicted leader, but that’s what made Atwood’s original work so stirring in the first place. Atwood tapped into a genuine and timeless threat: those men who will trade away the liberty of their neighbors for power. A fixation on controlling women’s bodies, and their wombs; performative evangelicalism; anti-intellectualism; pollution and sexually transmitted diseases gone unchecked—“’Better’ never means better for everyone,” the Commander remarks. What about “Great Again,” Commander?

And so, to those Trump supporters who have seen the trailer and derided it as liberal propaganda, I ask: what is it about a dystopian horror world in which terrorist attacks are used as an excuse for unchecked power, and in which women are suppressed until they are worth little more than their ability to reproduce seems like it’s referring to your political party? Because if you recognize The Handmaid’s Tale, written over thirty years ago, as a big subtweet at your political movement, what does that say about your political movement?

http://observer.com/2017/03/trump-handmaids-tale-elizabeth-moss/

I read THT back when it was first published. My drama teacher in high school played one of the Marthas in the movie (1990). It's a book, with a point of view. It is an attack on theocracy. So evidently many on the political right are PRO theocracy. Who knew?

So, they recognized themselves and got mad at being recognized?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Ugh. They want me to turn off my adblocker in order to read the article.

No thanks.

Once upon a time, I used script-blockers without an ad-blocker specifically because I wanted to support the web sites I visited. Then I got a virus from an ad. If web sites want me to stop blocking ads, they're going to have to figure out a way to make it impossible for those ads to spread malware.

Never been burned but I fully agree with you. Almost nothing is whitelisted.

- - - Updated - - -

Why are websites, email, etc able to spread malware at all? Read only material should be able to do that why? Why not just make it so that it shows the text posted and if it isn't in the right format it just errors?

Because a "browser" that did only that would be pretty useless on the modern web.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Huh.

You know, i probably watch every submarine movie that ever comes out. I KNOW they're about what i used to do for a living, but i don't get triggered. I note the things they got right, the things they got wrong, the things that are ludicrous (If the CO's doggie wet on my equipment, i'd probably wire it with 440 VAC and pop that little turd machine into the next compartment... But i digress), the things that are eerily familiar (EVERY single person on the crew in Down Periscope, except Lake, I've been underwater with at one time or another...). And then i walk away from the movie thinking it was someone's attempt to tell a story that got a grade of x.

But with the exception of films set up to proselytize about how stupid atheists are, i just don't usually imagine that anyone can convince a studio to make a multi-million dollar commercial about the evils of a political party, promising they'll make their money back just because so many people are excited to go watch some people act out a talk radio episode with better lighting and make-up.
I'm usually amazed when people tell me that the movie i just watched is about gays, or marxism, or communism, or the evils of socialism.

Do i have too much imagination to see these things? Or not enough?

Most stories have a message to express, a point to make, or something like that. Sometimes the point is "communism sucks" or "gays are bad/good/people too" but those stories tend to be lame because it's an unimaginative writer in the first place who would look to tell a message like that.

It's other stories, the really GOOD ones, that examine the issue and get into depth about WHY it is good or bad, or WHAT about it is good or bad. But in those cases, the political/social message is part of the story itself and not the entire point of it.

Put it this way: "Das Boot" was a submarine movie, and it was mostly about the ship, the characters, and their struggles to survive through the war in the Atlantic. But woven through the story is the overall message about how utterly futile war really is and how the sailors who threw their lives away for the Third Reich are more tragic figures than they are heroes.

 

[Phil Scott]

Why are websites, email, etc able to spread malware at all? Read only material should be able to do that why? Why not just make it so that it shows the text posted and if it isn't in the right format it just errors?

Your browser should have a Reader View, which just extracts the main body of text and formats it in a consistent and very readable way. I have a Firefox add-on to try to open in Reader View by default.

I belong to that camp that thinks the web is bloated with awful javascript, that javascript is itself a blight on the universe, and that webpages that are primarily about serving text should serve text in a single consistent way. I go here occasionally for catharsis.

 

[ronburgundy]

I wonder if conservatives say "What a bunch of liberal propaganda!" every time they pass a mirror.

 

[blastula]

Atwood was writing anti-Trump snowflake propaganda before it was cool.

 

[Underseer]

Never been burned but I fully agree with you. Almost nothing is whitelisted.

- - - Updated - - -

Why are websites, email, etc able to spread malware at all? Read only material should be able to do that why? Why not just make it so that it shows the text posted and if it isn't in the right format it just errors?

Because a "browser" that did only that would be pretty useless on the modern web.

There is no reason we can't create a standard in which ads include just text and/or an image with a link, and nothing more. Advertisers want scripts so that they can keep track of who clicked on what and came from where? Tough shit.

Advertisers can have their scripts, or they can have their messages reach more potential customers. Obviously, they made their choice. I am simply honoring their choice.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

Ugh. They want me to turn off my adblocker in order to read the article.

No thanks.

Once upon a time, I used script-blockers without an ad-blocker specifically because I wanted to support the web sites I visited. Then I got a virus from an ad. If web sites want me to stop blocking ads, they're going to have to figure out a way to make it impossible for those ads to spread malware.

Even if you're using noscript and blocking all scripts?
(I did that and had no problem reading the article)

 

[Underseer]

Sorry for the derail. I read it on an Android device with my pants down (no blockers of any kind).

Back to the original topic.

Once again, conservatives have their panties in a wad because people are criticizing a fictional totalitarian state. Do they fail to realize what their own complaints say about them?