Margaret Atwood on whether anything shocks her anymore.
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Maybe everyday celebrity, post-gatekeeper, would change the world for the better.
Some of that happened.
But we also ended up with the alt-right and Donald Trump, inequality, impeachment, and debilitating FOMO.
How did we get here?
Earlier this year,Kylie Jenner threw a birthday partywith aHandmaids Taletheme.Oh, Kylie Jenner.
I had to look up who Kylie Jenner was, Im so old.
What, if anything, did you make of that?My readers deal with those things.
They notice them before I do.
There were some themed tequila.
People often do this in a very well-meaning way; theyre not trying to be unpleasant.
Will I turn up my nose at such cupcakes?
No, I will not.
I will not do that.
Will you eat the cupcake?That depends on my relationship to sugar at the moment.
If I were in a sugar-eating moment, I would certainly eat the cupcake.
Ive got some knitted chickens from a pro-choice outfit in Texas that knits chickens for charity.
She made me some themed knitted chickens.
First one is called the Henmaids Tale.
It has an outfit.
I have a piece of honey-point embroidery done before the embroiderer had readThe Testamentsor even knew about it.
I can picture Commander Epstein in the pages ofHandmaid.Epstein is more of a 90s story.
I think Epstein is more of aPlayboytype of story.
Whereas Gilead is much more virtuous, puritanical leaders.
But its a behind-the-scenes jot down of thing.
So you quite frequently have, in totalitarianism, [situations] like that.
The popes were notorious in the Renaissance, of course.
Wed call it abuse of power.
Ive heard of it.
Upon its publication, some readers sawThe Handmaids Taleas ominous, and some absorbed it as more fantastical.
I dont know what the ratio was.Its divvied up by country.
The English basically went, Jolly-good yarn, because they couldnt see this as a possibility for themselves.
They had their religious civil war in the 17th century.
Its not that they wont have a civil war, but it wont be about that.
The States split in two, with some of them saying, Dont be silly.
So its split like that, and guess who won?
But were not there yet, or you and I would not be having this conversation.
Its a what-if story.
Thats what all those kinds of books are.
So heres a blueprint of a house.
You have to see the blueprint before you move into the house.
Is this the house you want to live in?
Take a look around.
Are there enough bathrooms?
Do you like the wallpaper?
But you’re free to change it.
Its still just a blueprint.
What she really means is totalitarianism.
But she kind of lays it out on a plate.
Heres the warning signs, heres what you should be watching for, and heres what they all do.
They guiltily applaud because they didnt.
They were too pure to vote.
They didnt like either of the candidates.
For young people, one indicator of whether they vote is whether their parents voted.Oh really?
So like, Voting isnt a thing we do in this family?
A lot of on-the-ground door-to-door.
You took the Census manually, so it was a good student job.
You signed up to take the Census, and you had this questionnaire and you went door-to-door.
And one of my areas was high immigration.
And people were afraid of me.
They thought that I was going to report them for some unknown, unsuspected thing.
You just had to explain to them very carefully, This has nothing to do with politics.
Its just how many people.
And nobodys going to arrest you for living in this house.
I did get chased out of one house by an old lady with a cleaver.
She had been cutting up some chicken in the kitchen.
She was angry because I wanted to know her age.
You dont need to know my age!
Handmaids Talewas the life of my mother and her sisters in Iran during the early days of that takeover.
Is there aHandmaids Talein Saudi Arabia?Yep, there is, oddly enough.
In Yemen, in Sudan?I cant tell you about Yemen.
It goes by language.
So Arabic, yes.
But suddenly up pops this Russian translation.
But of course they were keen on it because they thought it said, U.S. bad.
But thats not actually what it said.
You see what they do?
You see how bad religion is for you?
But they all have a view.
Its just that they arent implemented.
They built it on a piece of land called the swamp, which they had to drain.
So building it was called draining the swamp.
They move into it.
They start accumulating bourgeois artifacts and pianos and doilies, and then Stalin starts purging.
And he purges the heads of government, and that is called draining the swamp.
Does this sound in any way familiar?
It does.The book is a very good account of what a moral panic looks like.
Why millenarian ideologies usually end up having Armageddons and purges.
What happens to them then?
So the idea that the totalitarian regime is terror all day, every day, for everybody isnt true.
Its that that terror is always there.
I recommend alsoThe Death of Stalin.
And you know about Anna Akhmatova.
So yes, lots of reading.
I could do a shelfie if you like.
A lot of times, you just dont see it coming.
He was an addict.
My theory is that he had to have fetal alcohol syndrome.
What makes you think that?All of the symptoms.
Look up fetal alcohol syndrome and then look upCrazy Town.
Im not the target market, because blending my corporate self into anything doesnt apply.
I dont own any business suits, Molly.
Nor do I go to hairdressers, for obvious reasons.
I do it myself and get the same effect.
Its the old story.
Who had more money and stuff: Queen Elizabeth I or a Tudor male ditchdigger?
I think many women Women are people.
Many women have an emotional response of revulsion, a kind of gender traitor response.
Is that a naive reaction to someone like Ivanka Trump or Kellyanne Conway?What is naive?
Going back in time, looking around at Hitlers entourage, there were a lot of women in it.
Of people who participate, there are usually three motives.
The first is theyre a true believer; No.
And the third is fear: If I dont do this, I will be punished in some way.
I will be excluded, I will be killed, I will be jailed, I will be disappeared.
In really thoroughgoing totalitarianism, fear is a big factor.
In the America of today, its a factor but not as large a one.
That has certainly happened in this country.
Those things are not to be discounted or sneered at, because they motivate a lot of people.
And you dont know what you would do until those are the choices offered to you.
So are they wrong to be disapproving?
Are they consigning these people to the category of nonhuman?
That would be a mistake.
Because this is human behavior.
Usually its a bell curve, like everything else.
The television series is turning that ordinary person into an extraordinary person.
And that too has happened.
For instance, history of the French Resistance.
There were two of those instances.
One was called the Alliance.
The Alliance was run by awoman who never got caught.
Its a pretty cliffhanging story.
A number of her friends did, and they were killed.
For my generation, it was 9/11.
You were born during World War II, so you would have been quite young during the war.
In fact, we had a lot of fairly organized war stuff going on.
They had rationing stamps in the States, too.
There goes your sugar, milk, and butter.
It didnt create chaos, but it was a sort of scary event.
I was living in Boston at the time.
But the shocker was the assassination of Kennedy.
By social chaos, what I mean is Berlin being bombed.
That was social chaos.
The Blitz in London.
But again, people were very organized.
Its astonishing how organized they were and how little social chaos there was.
How much more you might have expected.
It seems to have kind of petered away or what?
I think its still going strong.4chan, is it?
Yes, among others.Have you gone there, Molly?
Unfortunately, yes.What a brave girl you are.
They want what do they call them?
Its a womans name thats supposed to mean sort of a model.
Stacys.They only want pictures out of magazines to have sex with.
They dont seem to want actual people.
And you havent gone on 8chan and investigated.Is it 8chan or 4chan?
I wanted the dot.
I just wanted to see how small it was.Very, very small.
We should all donate to it.
Currently, only two and a half percent of people actually donate to it.
You donate to it.How did you know that?
Theyve got a list of donors to Wikipedia?
I think if you use it, you should donate to it.
Have you ever edited a Wikipedia page?No.
I dont think I would know how, quite frankly.
And the question is how or whether What is the problem?
Male sexual aggression.Oh, that problem.
One of them is calledAfter Me Too.
I think a lot of people of high profile are now keeping their hands in their pockets.
But if you dont have that to lose, what then?
That kind of work is hard.
It can take years to change these laws.
You often have to go at it multiple times.
So for instance, in Ireland, where I just was, they managed to change the law.
830 women a day die of childbirth complications.
So I met with them, and I got to know them and have kept in touch with them.
She had a miscarriage; she didnt even know she was pregnant.
She went to the hospital, she had a miscarriage.
1, controlling education textbooks and, No.
2, getting in [to office] at the municipal and state levels.
In my world, nothing is inevitable.I dont believe in predestination.
So its a wake-up call.
Something else becomes then the hot topic of the day.
However, everythings connected.
Theres a really obvious connection between the welfare of women and girls and the climate crisis, for instance.
Wars are terrible for women and girls.
The pink pussy hat from the Womens March and the handmaids uniform offer two different ideas of visual protest.
Lets say that theyre both very visual and they both make their point.
So why rule out one or the other?
Going back a couple of elections, some people were knitting little cervixes and sending them to politicians.
Did you knit a cervix?I did not knit a cervix.
My knitting skills are a little bit rusty.
Protesters in handmaid cloaks appeared at theBrett Kavanaugh hearing.Did you watch the hearing?Some of it.
Ive got news for you, Molly, it doesnt happen to me anymore.
Theres a bright light at the end of the tunnel.
Im never going to be aggressed by a drunken Brett Kavanaugh.
I thought Congress missed their chance.
And the FBI investigation was very curtailed.
They were directed basically not to talk to certain people.
So to me do you know what a stitch-up is, Molly?
No.All right, something for you to look up.
Its an English term.
It means youve been framed, or that its been fixed.
The fix was in.
You know that saying The fix was in?
That was carefully tiptoed around.
As soon as somebody asked him about his drinking, he had this explosion: I like a beer.
That wasnt the question.
Were you ever blackout drunk?
So he may have been telling the truth when he said he couldnt remember doing such a thing.
Its very possible he couldnt.
And if you read this interesting book calledTalking to Strangersby you-know-who
Malcolm Gladwell.Yes.
He has a thing about excessive drinking and what it actually does to the brain.
And if youve ever known any blackout drunks, as I have, thats what they tell you.
Gladwell, inTalking to Strangers,is discussing the effect of alcohol in relation to theBrock Turner case.Yeah.
In other words, you are not this person that you think you are when youre drunk.
Youre not the person you think you were when youre sober.Youre a different person.
And two recollections of reality can be both true and conflicting.Its the same with religious visions.
Its true that thats what you saw, but it doesnt necessarily mean that thing was there.
People that delve into psychedelic drugs and consciousness-altering drugs will tell you in great detail what they saw.
Its often quite boring to you but not to them.
Have you ever experimented with a consciousness-altering drug?Of course.
What do you take me for, Molly?
Care to share any epiphanies?It was kind of boring, Im sorry to say.
Maybe I had the wrong trip-taking partner, who talked all the time about his relatives.
What did you talk about?He was taking up all the airtime.
But I had some interesting experiences with the carpet.
Was the carpet responsive?No, it didnt reply.
But it was quite three-dimensional.
Molly, dont do this at home.
There are some things that, if I were younger, I would probably do that I havent done.
Like what?I dont know why Im telling you all these awful things.
Mr. Peyote Button is apparently lots of fun.
It makes you throw up, though.Oh, thats ayahuasca.
I dont think peyote causes you to vomit.
Im not into the vomiting either.
I have a friend who just is dying to have me do this ayahuasca thing.
The universe will become clear to me.
But I say, I dont like throwing up.
I just really dont like it.
Maybe Ill have a coach.
That has bad consequences.
Have you tried anImpossible Burger the lab-grown beeflike substance?Yes, I have.
I thought they did a pretty good job.
I had them at a very nice wedding reception, and they were passed around as little sliders.
I thought they were yummy.
A convincing simulacrum?Well, I thought so, but Im old.
That doesnt have anything to do with it.It might have.
Maybe my taste buds are fading away.
But let me just say at this point that it is a defamation suit, not brought by me.
So this is not the Brett Kavanaugh case.
We know what he was accused of.
And it is not the Harvey Weinstein case.
They have the documents, they did the investigation.
This thing happened to this person before there was any investigation and before anybody knew anything.
Molly, youre guilty.
What am I guilty of?I cant tell you.
Why are false rape accusations good for women?
This stuff is not good for women.
After there had been an investigation.
And after the judge who did the investigation said she didnt think there had been a sexual assault.
By then the damage had The accusers just kept on accusing.
What does that tell you?
Whats in those documents, Molly?
I would really like to know.
Has anything over the past decade truly thrown you for a loop?
Anything that really shocked you?I think surprise is different from shock.
Of course, there are always surprises.
So not drone warfare orkids in cages?Seen it before.
Well, what do you mean byshock?
This is appalling?Yes, This is appalling.
I am shocked because I never could have imagined such a thing?
Not that kind of shock.
Weve seen it before, weve seen worse.
Weve seen it on a mass scale.
But what I dont like is the reprise.
I dont like it that its so much like those other things.
It ought to be better than that.
It ought to be living up to the best version of itself.
Maybe theres still hope.Oh yeah, there is.
For instance, Virginia just went Democrat, which means that theEqual Rights Amendmentmight finally be ratified.
Youve just turned 80.
Do you have any plans?The plans have been made for me, Molly.
I have plans whether I like it or not.
So youre a Scorpio?
I am a Scorpio.
Are you an astrology person?Of course.
Really?It goes way back, Molly.
Astrology and palmistry, theyre related.
I wonder what sign Hieronymus Bosch was.That would be interesting to know.
Aries?No, no, no.
Something much more devious.
He was probably a Scorpio.
Molly, its a good profession for you investigative reporter.
Whats in the sewer system?
Scorpios are interested in plumbing.
Thats why, of course, Im so interested inPrior Attire.
Have you seen it?
Its a YouTube channel.
Shes a historical-costume-maker; she makes historically correctly sewn costumes.
One of my favorite is the late-19th century, with a bustle that sticks out the back.
I always thought that was a bolster.
Its a flexible, articulated cage.
When you sat down, it actually folded up.
Otherwise, you would have been sitting on this big lump of wool, I guess.
She puts everything on.
She comes out looking absolutely authentic.
Have you read Anne HollandersSeeing Through Clothes?
Shes a fashion historian.
I wish we could do a palm reading.
You wish what?Just a quick one.
[Takes interviewers hand.]
Sometimes you have to work at holding it together emotionally, Molly.
I do?You do, or you will.
Heavy artistic interest on the right hand but, oddly enough, not on the left one.
Whats the bad news?Youre quite stubborn.
You dont care about wallpaper, Molly.
Just not as much interest to you.
We could go into great details, such as your fingerprints, if I had a magnifying glass.
How long before you take over the world, Molly?
