{"id":293239,"date":"2025-06-14T18:04:53","date_gmt":"2025-06-14T18:04:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/uncategorized\/the-handmaids-tale-the-righteous-gemstones-and-the-tradwife-movement\/"},"modified":"2025-06-14T18:04:53","modified_gmt":"2025-06-14T18:04:53","slug":"the-handmaids-tale-the-righteous-gemstones-and-the-tradwife-movement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=293239","title":{"rendered":"‘The Handmaid\u2019s Tale,’ ‘The Righteous Gemstones’ and the Tradwife Movement"},"content":{"rendered":"


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The Handmaid\u2019s Tale<\/em> and The Righteous Gemstones<\/em> reveal how women\u2019s strategic submission within patriarchal Christianity\u2014from tradwives to televangelists\u2014can reinforce systems that ultimately strip them of power and autonomy.<\/h2>\n
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Elisabeth Moss as June Osborne in The Handmaid\u2019s Tale <\/em>(Hulu).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Prestige television\u2019s focus on U.S. Christianity is relevant, often provocative and perhaps both worryingly prescient and instructive.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The popular and critically acclaimed series The Handmaid\u2019s Tale<\/a> <\/em>(Hulu, 2017\u20132025) and The Righteous Gemstones<\/a> <\/em>(HBO, 2019\u20132025) each recently wrapped a successful series run.\u00a0Aside from a focus on U.S. Christianity, the two series have little overlap at first glance.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Adapted from Margaret Atwood\u2019s 1985 novel, Handmaid\u2019s<\/a><\/em> centers a dystopian theocracy in\u00a0which women have no rights or bodily autonomy. This includes Serena Joy Waterford, an architect\u00a0of the society that now silences her.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Gemstones <\/em>focuses on a wealthy and dysfunctional televangelist family and\u00a0megachurch culture\u2014showing how sisters-in-law Judy Gemstone and Amber Gemstone each\u00a0wield power within a system that seeks to exclude women.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While some critics have described Handmaid\u2019s<\/em>\u2018 story of the rise of a totalitarian theocracy in the U.S.\u00a0as hysterical<\/a> and implausible<\/a>, Gemstones <\/em>has been praised as an accurate<\/a> albeit over-the top depiction of wealth, power and Evangelicalism.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Despite these differences, both series critically explore the consequences of women\u2019s complicity\u00a0in patriarchal, religious regimes.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Adam DeVine as Kelvin Gemstone, Danny McBride as Jesse Gemstone and Edi Patterson as Judy Gemstone in The Righteous Gemstones <\/em>(HBO).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Judy and Amber Gemstone represent two versions of U.S. Christian women who embrace restrictive institutions. Judy craves power and recognition as a church leader alongside her brothers; however, enmeshed in traditional familial and religious structures, she demands\u00a0personal power while leaving intact systems that marginalize women.\u00a0<\/p>\n

On the other hand, Amber\u2019s identity and place within the family and church resembles real world tradwives<\/a>. Amber embraces her role as a Christian wife, helpmate and mother. She\u00a0positions herself as the family\u2019s moral compass while deferring to her husband (the church\u2019s associate\u00a0pastor and Judy\u2019s older brother) on all public matters.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Gemstone women accept and even normalize patriarchal constraints. They submit to men strategically, all the while working within and around patriarchal systems to carve\u00a0out their own authority based upon ambition and desire for accolades. For example, in private,\u00a0Amber guides her husband and helps position him as heir to the family\u2019s religious empire.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

While Judy and Amber adeptly manage restrictive religious and social systems to their benefit, The Handmaid\u2019s\u00a0Tale <\/em>considers long-term consequences of women\u2019s deference (even if performative) and\u00a0willingness to prop up systems rooted in misogyny.<\/p>\n

Judy Gemstone and Amber Gemstone\u2014along with real-world tradwives\u2014should be read as the precursor to the anti-feminist villain<\/a> Serena Joy Waterford.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The former conservative activist and Gilead architect also worked to normalize and advance a\u00a0deeply misogynist religious and political system. Yet, unlike the Gemstone women, Serena Joy loses her ability to wield power behind the scenes. Strategic submission leads to a loss of\u00a0autonomy and expected subservience.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Like the\u00a0Gemstone women, Serena Joy attempts to work within conservative cultural boundaries to claim status and power. Demonstrating her piousness while appealing for women\u2019s rights, Serena reads\u00a0aloud from the Bible in public. Her finger is cut off as punishment for resistance because Gilead forbids women\u00a0from reading and writing.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As the series progresses, Serena\u2019s status as a high-ranking Commander\u2019s wife, her ambitions and her ability to\u00a0manipulate public perception lead her to believe in the possibility of a better life for herself on the periphery of Gilead.<\/p>\n

While Serena sees opportunity for herself within an oppressive system, Gilead\u2019s male leaders see her as a\u00a0rogue woman who needs to be put in her place. In Gilead, Commander\u2019s wives embody the\u00a0tradwife identity. They have been conditioned\u2014some more willingly than others\u2014to accept that\u00a0women submit to men.<\/p>\n

Serena only realizes she cannot escape the painful realities of subjugation in the\u00a0regime she built when her second husband brings a handmaid into their home against her wishes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Serena, Amber and Judy each work to uphold systems that degrade women. While Gilead is far\u00a0more brutal and deadly than the Gemstone megachurch, the two systems parallel one another and\u00a0the contemporary tradwife movement.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

The tradwife movement and many characters in these series similarly treat submissive femininity as\u00a0reflective of God\u2019s will. Men are protectors and providers and can only fulfill their sacred duty if\u00a0women devote themselves to homemaking and childcare. Ultimately, the success and growth of\u00a0the tradwife movement relies upon women\u2019s participation and enforcement of patriarchal norms.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Judy and Amber Gemstone submit to men strategically, maintaining some individual\u00a0choice and control. In turn, the women of Gilead live with the abusive and dehumanizing\u00a0consequences of women forsaking bodily autonomy, economic independence and personal\u00a0choice.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When placed in conversation, The Righteous Gemstones <\/em>and The Handmaid\u2019s Tale <\/em>expose the\u00a0dangerous consequences of women participating in anti-feminist cultural backlash. The tradwife ideologies that Amber and Judy negotiate, and that Serena Joy once embraced in theory,\u00a0become a totalitarian nightmare for all women in The Handmaid\u2019s Tale<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Yet women surrendering choice\u2014not only for themselves but for others\u2014is not a hyperbolic\u00a0fictional threat. As the tradwife movement gains influence, more women are experiencing the\u00a0consequences of romanticizing traditional gender roles\u2014often without questioning how\u00a0submission can masquerade as choice within coercive systems.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n