It's because The Handmaid's Tale puts it all into an American context, which makes Americans more receptive to the potential future.

Margaret Atwood never really made anything up in The Handmaid's Tale. Just set it in a collapsed USA.

The effectiveness of it really varies from one person to the next.

I'm the kind of person who finds it easier to understand a concept by relating it to fictional works

On the other hand, there are also people who simply refuse to understand that fiction can be reflective of reality. Not saying you're like that, I'm just saying some people are

And then there are people in between who understand that fiction reflects reality but still prefer real life examples to understand things

as if it portrays some form of documented history

I don't think people are using it in this specific way.

The answer is, the handmaids tale is popular fiction of today. I know the books are decades old but the TV show is what people have "experienced". Additionally, most people's understanding of history is poor.

My education was reasonably good, but we only ever learned about Australian colonial history. I mean we did learn about First Australian's history prior to European arrival but only briefly because not much is known. We also learned quite a lot about the suffering of First Australian's during (and since) the settlement era.

My point is, we did not learn about fascist governments outside Australia.

That being the case this meme is immediately recognisable and carries meaning, while something historic might not.

I also dont know for sure. But most (american) state executions are not live streamed. Handmaidens tale was VERY popular here, and althought the story is old, most of us dont realize how many of those tactics have been a part of American culture for, iunno, about ever? Never minds rest of the world.

So using a pop show based on oppression, to meme about current oppresive practices... well it seems understandable to me at least. Dont get me wrong, id rather op was printing a 3d gun with dumps name on all 36 bullets...

because the map has become territory. we're culturally unbound from reality (or at least trying really, really hard to fake it that way) and we're paying ever higher prices to maintain these fictions.

everything she wrote did happen, but what's really, truly important, is that we recognize the aesthetic and use that as judgement, apparently.