The Handmaid’s Hoax: The Attack on America’s Religious Right
The Dr. Phil Podcast
Dr. Phil McGraw
4.3 • 13.5K Ratings
🗓️ 15 January 2026
⏱️ 33 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Handmaid’s Tale is often framed as a warning about America’s future but is it rewriting America’s past? Author Margaret Atwood has argued that the story reflects real historical patterns.
But Dr. Phil and historian and author Danny Stein challenge that claim, arguing the story is pure fiction that misrepresents and attacks America’s religious roots.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Chances are that you have seen or read The Handmaid's Tale. The book written by Margaret Atwood |
| 0:06.2 | has sold more than 10 million copies worldwide since its publication in 1985. It is mandatory |
| 0:13.1 | reading in many high schools and universities, including AP English classrooms. On television, |
| 0:19.3 | the Hulu series just completed its sixth and final season. |
| 0:23.3 | The series finale drew 4.4 million viewers in the United States in its first seven days. |
| 0:30.5 | For years, we've been afraid of them. |
| 0:36.2 | Now it's time for them to be afraid of us. |
| 0:39.1 | This story is not just fringe. |
| 0:41.8 | It is mainstream, and it is incredibly influential. |
| 0:45.5 | And increasingly, it is used to attack Americans of Faith, like myself. |
| 0:51.7 | So what is the Handmaid's Tale? |
| 0:59.4 | Well, it is a dystopian story set in a future theocratic version of the United States called Gilead. Now, in this society, women are stripped of |
| 1:07.5 | rights, fertile women are forced to become handmaids, their sole purpose |
| 1:12.9 | is reproduction under state control. |
| 1:15.9 | According to Atwood and her supporters, Gilead is not imagined, it is historical. |
| 1:22.7 | Listen to Atwood a few years ago on The View. |
| 1:26.5 | And I read that the events in the book |
| 1:27.9 | came from actual real-life events. |
| 1:31.6 | Everything. |
| 1:32.5 | Everything? |
| 1:33.5 | Everything. |
| 1:34.4 | Well, I didn't want people saying |
... |
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