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Throughout history, the treatment of women has been an ever-changing issue. Othello by William Shakespeare is a story in which the women characters are treated in the unfair way that women of the time of the story were treated. This makes the story a great model for comparison of the treatment of women in the present time and in the past time when the story takes place. In order to make this comparison, one must first examine the way that the characters of Bianca, Emelia, and Desdemona are treated.

Everyone including her husband, Cassio, treats the character of Bianca unfairly. This is because Bianca is really in love with Cassio, however he can only see the relationship as being a physical one. Due to this, Cassio has no problem making fun of Bianca behind her back when she leaves, and then wooing her when she returns again.

The character of Emelia is an even harder one to evaluate. This is because she is the smartest woman character, but nonetheless men still seem to find a way to treat her poorly. When Emilia goes out of her way to help her husband Iago do evil, he barely even thanks her.

Desdemona is the last of the characters to evaluate, however she is also the most important. Desdemona is treated very unfairly because she is a faithful wife, who loves her husband very much. However, through the help of Iago, her husband, and Othello suspects Desdemona is cheating on him. This is not true, but still Othello believes his friend long before he would listen to the woman who loves him. Othello then, instead of treating Desdemona fairly in return for her love, argues with and makes fun of her.

Othello is a great model to be used to compare the treatment of women then and now because by reading it, one could see how much worse the treatment of women was then than it is now.