The world of Gilead, as depicted in "The Handmaid's Tale," is a dystopian society in which women are treated as second-class citizens and subjected to extreme forms of oppression. Women are stripped of their rights and freedoms, forced to serve as reproductive vessels for the ruling class, and subjected to strict control over their bodies and behavior.
The women of Gilead are divided into strict social classes, with the Handmaids at the bottom of the hierarchy. Handmaids are assigned to households and required to have sex with the male heads of those households in order to bear children for them. They are not allowed to read, write, or have any control over their own bodies or lives. Other women in Gilead are also subjected to strict control, with wives and daughters of the ruling class restricted to traditional gender roles and denied access to education, employment, and political power.