Perverse Piety:Criticism of Christian Extremism in The Handmaid’s Tale, The Gate to Women’s Country, and The Fifth Sacred Thing

Whitney ScottHonors ThesisFerrum CollegeApril 28, 2011

Roadmap•Project•Thesis•Disparity between feminism and

Christianity•Historical context•Extremism•Extremism in novels

Presumed World vs. Proposed World

(Wilson 77)

Perverse Piety: the Thesis•Religious values and political agendas

•Perversion of something intended to be pious

•Oppression of subordinates

•Oppression of leaders

(Gallagher 458)

Disparity between feminism and Christianity

(Gallagher 459)

Disparity between feminism and Christianity

(Steiner-Aeschliman and Mauss 254)

Disparity between feminism and Christianity

Are feminism and Christianity mutually exclusive?

Denise CarmodyVirginia MollenkottLeah Gcabashe

Time frame

Historical Context: BacklashWomen’s movement, 1960sFeminist legislate victories, 1970sRise of anti-feminism, 1970sBy 1980s:

New RightSilent MajorityMoral Majority (Chafe) (Harris)

(Wilcox)

“periods of anticipation and anxiety” (Bartowski)

Tendencies of Political Extremism “An impulse which is inimical to a pluralism of

interests and groups, inimical to a system of many nonsubmissive centers of power and areas of privacy”

Incipient changeMoralistic and absolutisticEvil conspiracies (Lipset and Raab 5)Concrete thinkingStatus symbolismStatus preservation (Lo)

Tendencies of Religious ExtremismTendencies of religious extremism

Five warning signs:Absolute truth claimsBlind obedienceIdeal timeEnds justify the meansHoly war

Literalism

(Kimball)

Synthesis of political and religious extremism

Political Religious

Moralistic/absolutisticConcrete thinkingIncipient changeStatus symbolismStatus preservation Evil conspiracies

Absolute truth claims

LiteralismBlind obedienceEnds justify the

meansIdeal timeHoly war

How to express in fiction?

“There was little that was truly original or indigenous to Gilead: its genius was synthesis” (Atwood 307)

Based on realityReality vs. fiction; non-extreme vs. extremeSetting

Climate (convenience) Time (prediction)

(Olderman) (Swale)

Gilead Gender roles

Women as servantsWomen as reproductive vessels

Sexual purityPunish deviant behaviorThe WallSalvagingsParticicutions

Gilead cont.Manifestations of extremism Why?

Gender roles Women as servantsWomen as reproductive vessels

Sexual purityPunish deviant behavior

Incipient changeConcrete thinkingAnti-modernismLiteralism Moralism

Status preservation (eugenics)

And when Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister; and said unto Jacob, Give me children, or else I die.

And Jacob’s anger was kindled against Rachel, and he said, Am I in God’s stead, who hath withheld from thee the fruit of the womb?

And she said, Behold my maid Bilhah, go in unto her, and she shall bear upon my knees, that I may also have children by her.

-Genesis 30:1-3

The Perverse JustifiedEnds justify the meansLiteralism Blind obedience

Perverse pietyHandmaiden demeanorSex as ritual

HolylandGender roles

Women as servantsWomen as reproductive vesselsWomen as “virtuous”

Sexual purityPunish deviant behavior

InfanticideBeatings

HolylandManifestations of extremism Why?Gender roles

Women as servantsWomen as reproductive vesselsWomen as “virtuous”

Sexual purityPunish deviant behavior

InfanticideBeatings

Incipient changeConcrete thinkingAnti-modernismMoralism

Status preservation (eugenics)

“He counted on his fingers. Seven from Rejoice, all grown but one. Four from Cheerfulness, the oldest was only nine, and two from Plentitude. Six from Susannah, not including the ones he’d disposed of. Nineteen, all together, fourteen of them boys. Could be that was just enough…”

-Elder Resolution Brome, 205

The Perverse JustifiedEnds justify the meansBlind obedienceEvil conspiracy

Perverse pietyFeminine demeanorSex as ritual

The Millennialist SocietyGender roles

Women as reproductive vesselsWomen as “virtuous”

Sexual purityPunish deviant behaviorMilitary“Pens”

Why?

The Millennialist Society Manifestations of extremism Why?Gender roles

Women as reproductive vesselsWomen as “virtuous”

Sexual purityPunish deviant behavior

Military“Pens”

Incipient changeConcrete thinkingAnti-modernismMoralism

Status preservation (eugenics)

“I thought fornication was the biggest Millennialist sin,” Madrone said.

“Fornication is what you do with another person. We’re not people. Our mamas did something to lose their immortal souls, like getting raped, maybe, or selling their bodies to put some food on the table. And our holy genes have been tampered with. That makes us a sort of higher animal.”

“That’s insane.”

“Nobody ever rated the Millennialists high in sanity.” -Madrone and Isis

(Starhawk 186)

“The blonds. They were toys for rich men. Bred for it. Raised and trained from birth. For sex and pain.”-Katy

(Starhawk 303)

The Perverse JustifiedEnds justify the meansLiteralism Concrete thinkingBlind obedience

Perverse piety“Letter” of morality

Rule Breaking•Serena Joy, Commander Fred

•Sons, Elders

•Wives, Ohnine

“Like feminism, utopias are intended to bring about shifts in consciousness through engagement with political debates and critiques of the status quo.”

(Eichler 9)

Questions?Check out http://

hervillage.wordpress.com for more info and a digital copy of

the paper!

Works CitedAtwood, Margaret. The Handmaid’s Tale. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1986. Print.

Bartowski, Frances. Introduction. Feminist Utopias. Ed. Frances Bartowski. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1989. Print.

Carmody, Denise Lardner. Feminism and Christianity: A Two-Way Reflection. Nashville: Abingdon, 1982. Print.

Chafe, William H. The Paradox of Change: American Women in the 20th Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991. Print.

Eichler, Margrit, June Larkin, and Sheila Neysmith. Introduction.Feminist Utopias : Re-Visioning Our Futures. Eds. Margrit Eichler, June Larkin, and Sheila Neysmith. Toronto: Inanna Publications and Education, 2002. 77-86. Print.

Gallagher, Sally K. “Where Are the Antifeminist Evangelicals? Evangelical Identity, Subcultural Location and Attitudes Toward Feminism.” Gender and Society 18.4 (August 2004): 451-472. Web. JSTOR. 11 November 2010.

Gcabashe, Leah. “Spiritual Liberation or Spiritual Oppression?” Agenda: Empowering Women for Gender Equity 25 (1995): 7-15.JSTOR. Web. 11 November 2010.

Kimball, Charles. When Religion Becomes Evil: Five Warning Signs. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2003. Print.

Lipset, Seymour Martin and Earl Raab. The Politics of Unreason: Right-Wing Extremism in America, 1790-1970. New York: Harper & Row, 1970.

Lo, Clarence Y. H. “Countermovements and Conservative Movements in the Contemporary United -States.” Annual Review of Sociology 8 (1982): 107-134. Web. JSTOR. 11 November 2010.

Mollenkott, Virginia Ramey. Women, Men, and The Bible. New York: The Crossroad Publishing Company, 1989. Print.

Olderman, Raymond M. “American Fiction 1974-1976: The People Who Fell to Earth.” Contemporary Literature 19.4 (Autumn 1978): 497-530. Web. JSTOR. 11 November 2010.

Starhawk. The Fifth Sacred Thing. New York: Bantam Books, 1993. Print.

Steiner-Aeschliman, Sherrie and Armand L. Mauss. “The Impact of Feminism and Religious Involvement on Sentiment toward God.”Review of Religious Research 37.3 (March 1996): 248-259. Web.JSTOR. 11 November 2010.

Swale, Jill. “Feminism and Politics in ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’: Jill Swale Examines the Social and Historical Context of the Novel.”The English Review 13.1 (September 2002): 37. Web. Literature Resource Center. 11 November 2010.

Tepper, Sheri S. The Gate to Women’s Country. New York: Bantam Books, 1988. Print.

Wilcox, Clyde. “Pre-millennialists at the Millennium: Some Reflections on the Christian Right in the Twenty-First Century.”Sociology of Religion 55.3 (Autumn 1994): 243-201. Web. JSTOR. 11 November 2010.