Morgan Hafer

Miss Monsalve
English 12

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___/15 Intro/Thesis and Conclusion
___/20 Treatment of Quotes
___/25 Content
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___/ 10 Grammar/Usage

May 9th 2016

Truth is Stranger than Fiction: Orange is the New Black & The Handmaids Tale

In July of 2013, the Netflix series, Orange Is the New Black was released. The television
show was written and created by Jenji Kohan, and inspired by the book Orange Is the New
Black: My Year in a Womens Prison, by Piper Kerman. Orange Is the New Black quickly drew
in media attention shortly after its release. Taking place in a fictional womens prison, Litchfield
Penitentiary, located in upstate New York, the series follows the story of Piper Chapman as she
adjusts to life in prison and the other inmates whom effect heavily in her incarceration. Similarly,
The Handmaids Tale, written in 1985 by Margaret Atwood, told the dystopian tale of a futuristic
America where women have been stripped of all their civil rights. These women, in both plot
lines, are stripped of their personal allegiance. The female characters exemplify the theory of
freedom, confinement, and perceptions.

The loss of freedom is devastating, but still, a punishment that society has put in place for
years. When one decides to commit a crime they are confined to prison, a place in which almost
all freedoms are taken away. Similar to The Handmaids Tale by Margaret Atwood, women
belong to the government. In both this fictitious tale and our reality the man decides our fate.
After all, Gilead is not much different than Litchfield. In both women are told what to wear,

where to sleep, and how to act. Women are stripped of their personal belongings and confined to
routine cells. Perhaps it is our freedoms that make us human. Trapped in a prison, of any sort,
and stripped of freedom, one is only left to feel like an animal. One of the mother figures in
Orange is the New Black, Red, once said, No one in here is people. When you cage humans
like animals your infrastructure becomes a zoo; both plots enforce these same dehumanizing
rules, but only one is pure fiction.

In confinement one will experience the loss of human connection, loss of empathy, the
loss of it all. In Orange is the New Black the very thing that the prisoners fear most is not the
murder lying next to them at night, but rather S.H.U. The Security Housing Unit or Segregated
Housing Unit, is a villain no one is equipped to meet. Confinement is the terrors of all terrors
because it strips the prisoners of all human connection rendering them subhuman. In The
Handmaids Tale, the women face confinement everyday in their segregated roles. Left with no
one to turn to except their own thoughts one can begin to go stir crazy. As quoted in Orange is
the New Black, Piper tells one of casemates, The scariest thing about prison isnt other people
its the fact that it forces you to come to terms with who you really are. Left alone in a cell one
will begin to turn on even themselves. The human mind needs stimulation and without it will
decay; without anything to do, the brain atrophies; and without the ability to see off in the
distance, vision fades. Isolation and loss of control breeds anger, anxiety, and hopelessness.

The show Orange is the New Black draws no distinction between inmates, prison guards,
corporate overlords, and family members in its thesis that everyone has the capacity to do terrible

things, whatever their background or religion or financial status. Humans, at a young age, are
taught to spot out the bad people. Many may perceive prisoners as these bad people, but,
perception is a kind of story, made up of filtered memories, projections, assumptions, and
interpretations. Something that both Jenji Kohan and Margret Atwood made clear in their story
lines is that no role color or title can define a human being. Both teach their audience to perceive
the human beings in a different light. In Orange is the New Black, Prison guards deal drugs and
assault inmates; CEOs send hate-crime victims to solitary confinement out of vindictiveness; and
therapists abuse their power to get revenge on women. Whether you place the inmates in orange,
or the handmaids in red, no color can define a human sole.

The women in both examples of fiction, demonstrate traits of freedom, confinement, and
perceptions. Mark Twain has infamously quoted, Truth is stranger than fiction. When
comparing the two tales, Orange is the New Black and The Handmaids Tale it is important to
remember one depicts a reality while the other does not. Much of the plot Margret Atwood
included in her dystopian tale sadly does in-fact occur in our world today. Although we may not
live in the world of Gilead, segregated by titles and traits, the world we do live in is one not far
off. Until the man cuffed in the orange jumpsuit is looked at and treated with the same respect as
the man in the works suit, this world will not experience freedom. Confined to our roles as
women and men we will remain. Truthfully, this world is fully of preconceived notions where
freedom is hard to find.

Works Cited
Atwood, Margaret. Collapse: The Handmaids Tale. New York: Round Table, 1998. Print.
Ball, Aimee L. "Prison Life, Real and Onscreen." New York Times 2 Aug. 2013: 1. Print.
Kerman, Piper. Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Woman's Prison. New York: Spiegel &
Grau, 2010. Print.
Kohan, J. (Producer). (2013-2015). Orange is the new black [Television series]. Retrieved from
http://www.netflix.com/