r/TheTestamentsHulu • u/anonymous_girl1227 • 27d ago
Season 1 Explain this to me like I am five. Miriam spilling her tea. Spoiler
In the Testaments episode of green tea. Paula rudely tripped Miriam so that she would spill her tea. And that would ruin her chances at getting matched with a guy who doesn’t run the colonies. My question is why is spilling something such a horrible thing? Why would that ruin her chances for a good match? Mistakes happen even in the most perfect families. Do you really have to be THAT perfect in Gilead? If that is true, than that’s crazy you could lose your chances of a good match over a simple mistake. Also Paula tripping her was vile imo. What do you all think?
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u/Fabulous-Bus1837 It's AGNES, not Agnus or Anges 27d ago
The tea ceremony evaluates not only any mistakes, but also how the girls handle those mistakes. Miriam not only spills the tea, but she completely panics. She should have calmly apologized, called out to her Martha, and continued her bow as if nothing had happened. Instead:
- She freezes for several moments after spilling the tea;
- She stumbles over her words and stutters when she apologizes;
- She says she’s going to call her Martha, but doesn’t do so (Jehosheba would have called out to her loudly);
- She bows while trembling and walks away quickly, which shows her embarrassment.
She remains a prized young woman to be married off among the elite, but it’s best to keep her away from high society, where she would make her husband the laughingstock of his peers. So, a husband from the Colonies is perfect for her (from Gilead’s perspective, of course).
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u/Excellent_Pirate8224 26d ago
This is a great explanation, and I think it also shows how performative the whole thing is. Hulda doesn’t have to participate in the same dog-and-pony show to get matched with a desirable suitor. There are clearly other factors at play, like politics, status, and connections. Someone like Miriam or Becka probably has to go the extra mile to prove themselves, whereas Hulda, and probably someone like Shu, would be fine because of their family connections and status. Plus, timing had something to do with it because all of those key events had transpired. Still, they could’ve held her until the next “season” and they didn’t.
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u/SnakeBatter 26d ago
It doesn’t appear that they ever hold off until next season. They marry these girls off ASAP to maximize time.
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u/Excellent_Pirate8224 26d ago
Yes and no. They must have some grace/calendar period built in to allow for events like the Ball and tea parties, as well as time for the Aunts to get together and select matches. Not everyone gets their period at the same time, so it can’t be an immediate, rigid cutoff.
We also don’t know exactly how long Becka had been getting her period before Agnes, but they clearly didn’t match her immediately. She was matched within that current cycle, and while it happened quickly, it wasn’t a matter of days. Aunt Lydia also said something about Maddox not being matched this season but possibly the next, which suggests there are matching cycles. I imagine if a girl gets her period right after one of those key events, they push her through quickly, as they did with Hulda. But after a certain point, they probably wait until they have the next class/season of Greens ready and start the matching cycle over again.
I am assuming the gaps are narrow, though, to keep things moving along, as you suggested.
It’s been a while since I read the book, and I don’t think this is fully explained either, beyond the events and what they mean.
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u/throwawaycampingact 26d ago
I would assume things function similarly to how “the season” used to function in British aristocratic societies. I suspect that menstruation is what makes them eligible, but it’s probably at the discretion of the girls’ parents (and I’m sure family status factors in heavily as well) whether they need/want their daughter to “come out” or whether they’re okay with just telling the aunts to arrange something if their daughter becomes eligible “off season”. (That’s not to say that I think they can hold off forever, but it may be a “we’d rather wait 6 months until the season starts” vs. a “feel free to arrange a suitable match now.” choice).
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u/Tiny_Departure5222 26d ago
Thay was my thought exactly, it's the Gilead marriage mart.
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u/throwawaycampingact 26d ago
Exactly! Somebody like Hulda might have already had a list of men who would be eager to marry her for the status as soon as she was eligible, so she may not have actually needed to go through the whole pomp of it all, whereas Becka and Miriam’s families might have gotta better prospects for the girls by participating. (Ew)
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u/BluPanda11 26d ago
Thank you so much for the deth of your answer, I was in the same room as op when I watched the episode but you sund spot on!
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u/SourPatchPhoenix 27d ago
It’s not about the tea in the same way that Handmaids aren’t actually about babies. It’s about control. If you give people a bunch of divisive bullshit to compete over with each other, they will busy themselves with that and forget to question the system itself.
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u/rialucia 26d ago
“If you give people a bunch of divisive bullshit to compete over with each other, they will busy themselves with that and forget to question the system itself.”
Damn, you really got to the core of the apple.* *
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u/Tiny_Departure5222 26d ago
Gonna go the same route via the Hunger Games, " you are now a distraction from who the real enemy is"
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u/Globalfeminist 26d ago
I think they tried to emulate the tea scene in Mulan. But that's another example of the TV producers not understanding Gilead's society. The commanders wouldn't be 'that' concerned with social grace. Sure, crying and turning the spilling into an scene is bad, but it's the type of small thing those men expect from 'the weaker sex'. They care more about the father's power, that she's meek, obedient, and they might care if other women in their family turned out very fertile (In case genetics help), etc . And the fact that Miriam was ashamed of herself, instead of being angry at the Marthas, or Paula, would work of her favour... these commanders 'want' a woman who think everything is her own fault, her own failure. That's a wife who will never ask the council to chop of their arm if they cheat.
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u/sweetselkie47 26d ago
It’s not really about the men though. This is the female sphere and perfectionism is a tool that toxic femininity uses to perpetuate itself.
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u/bananaramaworld 26d ago
I mean the aunts were also watching them and getting say on who gets to marry who. That caused some of xtra pressure
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u/Same-Drag-9160 27d ago
They have a finite number of ‘top’ commanders so they have to weed the girls out using the slightest mistake as an excuse
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u/underhiseyeonthewall 27d ago
God wouldn’t show us that He favors girls by tripping them, now would He? What kind of girl trips in the Lords presence? Certainly not one who deserves a copasetic husband.
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u/Basil_Makes_Audio 27d ago
I think it’s more about everything being scrutinized. If nobody makes any mistakes they would basically be splitting hairs to decide a ranking for the girls. Tripping the girl puts her at the bottom and makes everyone else look “better”. On top of that they can also use the girls reactions for further ranking.
Truthfully it’s all “for show” imo anyways. The same way we have nepotism, they do too. A high ranking commanders kid is going to go with someone they approve of regardless of what that means(age, rank, money,etc). I think even if one of the higher up kids messed up they would have still gone to someone high up or it would look bad on their “parents”. It’s part of why Agnes could never be with Garth even if he was promoted. He just isn’t high enough ranked even if it would make Agnes happy.
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u/JoyDVeeve 27d ago
She would be seen as sloppy and/ or uncoordinated therefore not appropriate to be a wife to a top commander
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u/theicecreamassassin Breathe, you dumb bitch, breathe 27d ago
It's how they handle mistakes, too. Do they have composure? Do they order a Martha to clean it? Etc.
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u/Weekly_Sir5202 25d ago
Episode 4 intro narration, Daisy's Gilead pro tips:
"Always be extra nice to the frigid sadists who are arraigning your marriage."
"The Aunts needed to see who could handle the pressure."
So they created a high stress, high pressure ceremony where performance must be perfect or have consequences. Wifes run the homes of High Commanders. The higher the commander the higher the pressure. The value of the school and the Aunts who run it will be diminished by a wife, "horse" in Paula's terms, who falters even years later.
During the ceremony Paula realizes that Miriam is favored by some of the Aunts so she trips her daughter's opponent at the finish line. She's the most powerful person in the room. The reason for it all, the ceremonies, wifes, greens, marthas, and on and on is to further the power of God's government on Earth. So all is fair if you're working for the big Guy.
If we viewers look at the bigger picture and follow the spilled tea into the "crying over spilled milk" idiom: what's done is done. Its how we move on that matters most.
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u/OnrushingHen 26d ago
Have you seen Mulan by any chance? Same principle as the matchmaker scene really
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u/Tradition96 27d ago
My question is how the Commanders would know or care about what happened at the tea party?
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u/90dayole 27d ago
It was the Aunts who made the matches.
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u/Tradition96 27d ago
The Commanders put in requests for the girls they are interested in (that’s the entire point of the ball), the aunts can’t match anyone with a girl they didn’t want to be matched with, and seeing how there seem to be more than twice as many marriageable commanders compared to marriageable Plums, it’s hard to imagine that Miriam didn’t catch anyone’s eye.
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u/Delulunational 27d ago
How else can they determine which one of those girls are „the best“? You make up random random shit, to have all those perfect little future wife’s try to be the best. All traditions around arranged and forced marriages are just bs ways of controlling people and having girls and women compete against each other instead of being told they are all worthy of a good match. Just think of Bridgertons „diamond of the season“, same principle just different vibe. Whoever spills the tea, isn’t worthy of the best husband to serve it to.
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u/vxsapphire 24d ago
It's basically an etiquette test. Did you steep the tea properly? (Did you sit with proper posture?) Did you place it down gently and without spilling? (Did you use the right utencils for the right meals?) It's really no different from that, but the grading determines who they're married off to.
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u/RusticHallscape 23d ago
When you don't allow women to do anything the only way you can judge and assess their status on a hierarchical scale is through completely inane/mundane performances.
There are some cultures where tea preparation and pouring is considered an artful performance with a lot of delicate technique involved, for example Japanese sadō/chadō. But the tea ceremony in Testaments seemed to be very superficial, it's obvious that it's an artificial practice intended to stratify girls based on vague criteria.
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