Roe v. Wade was recently overturned in the United States, which means individual states can now ban abortion should they so choose. Currently, it's predicted that approximately half of U.S. states will outright ban or place heavy restrictions on abortions.
Seeing as this is a major repeal of women's rights, people are taking to comparing present-day America to the American state in The Handmaid's Tale that treats women like property rather than people.
Warren Littlefield, an executive producer of the show The Handmaid's Tale based on the novel by Margaret Atwood, has many thoughts about the matter, namely the sheer amount of comparisons that real life has been getting to the dystopian plot of the show.
Called the Republic of Gilead, a driving feature of the nation is the oppressive way they treat woman, as property of the state rather than people. Furthermore, Gilead used to be part of the United States.
With women's rights actively being challenged in the U.S. presently, people have begun pointing to the show and novel as a potential look into the future.
"We would love to be less relevant, but sadly, the show’s been hauntingly relevant. And today appears even more so," he told Deadline after the official ruling was announced, "I think we all wish that we were this bizarre, dystopian, no-one-would-ever-believe-this concept. We all wish that we were a made-up graphic novel."
"But today, I just feel tremendous sadness, anger and frustration because of who we are right now in America, and what this says. Over the past number of years we’ve seen throughout the planet the rise of the far right. Unfortunately, I think the United States stands the tallest, and with the rise of that movement, the continued restriction of women’s rights and freedom [...]."
As he told the interviewer, he believes "the series echoes what we’re living with today."
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h/t: ET Canada
