Once they had them within their clutches, they were able to use them for their own purposes. The key to the whole program was using other women to train and control them. It is hard to go against your own kind, and the Sons knew that if they used men, it wouldnt work. The women would feel oppressed and strike back as one group, or could too easily seduce the males to get their own way. "Something could be exchanged. We still had our bodies."(p. 4) By using other women, known as the Aunts, they could tell the women that they understood and knew what it was like, and that all this was for their own good, to keep them safe and make their world a better place. There were many of these training facilities, but we learn the most about the red centers, where the women are trained to be handmaidens. In other words, mistresses, to bear children for wives who were no longer capable of child birth, but too important to get rid of. Older women, and some incapable of child birth were trained as Marthas. They .
were servants to the wives and raised the children, if they were lucky enough to have one. The poorer women were called Econowives and performed the duties of wife, handmaiden and Martha. The final category was the "unwomen"; those who had committed some crime such as abortion, or who were too old to be good for anything. These "unwomen" were sent to the edges of the colonies to clean up nuclear waste or work in the industries. Both of which would soon lead to death. The women were distinguished by the color of robes they wore, which reached to the ground, revealing nothing. This was another way of keeping them safe, so men would not be tempted. The handmaids wore red, the Marthas green, the wives blue, daughters white, the unwomen wore grey, and "the striped dresses, red and blue and green and cheap and skimpy, mark the women of the poorer men."(p. 23) the econowives. "Sometimes there is a woman all in black, a widow.