The Handmaids,Rebels,and Eyes

As a rebel, feelings of anxiety take over you. My main focus was preserving the revolution while still trying not to get caught so I could preserve my life.  In this activity, we learned the correlation between the roles in Gilead and fear. The rebels are always cautious and scared. The eyes are in fear of people discovering their true identity. And the handmaids themselves are scared of rebelling. In this dystopian society, fear drives everyone’s actions. It makes the difference between life and death.

In Gilead, the rebels have the hardest position to me, well aside from the fact that handmaids are dehumanized and have to have sex with people they barely know. But the rebels drive the revolution, there would be no hanging if rebels did not exist which means the precedent for what sets order would also not exist because there wouldn’t be anyone doing otherwise. Everyday is a day that a rebel can get caught. They have to consciously watch out for everyone and everything. People that may seem like their friends may actually be an eye because to the eyes, it’s a game…

In the activity the rebels really did have the hardest position. We had to convert a handmaid every night while actually figuring out who was a handmaid during the day all while still maintaining a handmaid’s position. In the book and in the game the odds were always in the favor of the eyes. In our activity the only way an eye could be caught was if someone nominated one, even then you could face being caught. And if you were a rebel, you basically had just told all of Gilead that you were a rebel but that is what a rebellion is for right. One recognizes that they must risk their own life for the rebellion but even with that recognition everyone does not uphold those standards.

During the game, sometimes handmaids who had been converted to a rebel didn’t even lift their head when we had out meetings. They keep their head down and concealed their identity because they were interested in saving themselves but you can’t have your cake and eat it to. But in the end everyone was caught because we were all too scared to nominate the eyes to get rid of them.  As the eyes got stronger and wiser, we kept losing rebels. After a handmaid had been converted, the very next day she would get caught. So I suspect the eyes were cheating but it’s okay because that is just the way Gilead works. No matter what you say, what you do, how sneaky or clever you are, you will get caught. As long as you never risk your life to get rid of the eyes, they will also be there, just ready to kill you.