Someone once said; “sometimes it’s the smallest decisions that can change your life forever,” a quote that utterly complements The Help. With this in mind, The Help is both, a movie and a novel. According to an article that Valerie Smith wrote in Gale Academic OneFile, the novel was written by Kathryn Stockett in 2009 and then was produced into a movie by Tate Taylor in 2011. Moreover, Stockett and Taylor introduced precise characters to show the conflicts of life. The Help takes place in Mississippi while discrimination devours the best out of society.
A young white woman, Eugenia Phalen r also known as Skeeter, returns home from college with the desires of becoming a writer. In fact, Skeeter’s unique dreams compared to those of other white women which make her extraordinarily powerful. In other words, women are supposed to be weak, classy, wear beautiful and colorful skirts, prepare club activities, and above all, be exceptional wives which is everything that Skeeter doesn’t stand for. Moreover, Skeeter commits herself into writing a book about black maids and their experiences even knowing the consequences that it might bring in the future.
While writing the book, Skeeter starts working in he local newspaper and uses it to bring chaos to those who takes advantages of their black employees. As soon as she found out that her childhood friend – Hilly Holbrook- was trying to pretend any black employee from using the toilets inside the house where they work in, she uses her work to show her a lesson. Furthermore, Skeeter prints an advertisement in the newspaper saying that if anyone has useless toilets to leave them in Holbrook’s lawn.
In general, the white woman that lacks what it takes to be a lady of society, rebels against everything her country stands for and helps black people have a voice at he perfect time, during the Civil Right Movement. Stockett makes the last name of Eugenia a hidden symbol; her last name being Phalen but sounding like fallen, just like her, the fallen woman of society – the outsider from society. With time, a lot of fallen women start to appear and they all stand for what they believe in no matter the consequences. Correspondingly, Esther Peterson and Malala Yousafzai are also fallen women.
According to Gale Biography in Context, Peterson was a spirited lobbyist who fought for equal pay for woman. In addition, she organized a strike with the help of her friends and as a result, he International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union helped secure higher wages for the women. Peterson continued all her life dedicating herself to help women by becoming the director of the Women’s Bureau in 1961. As a result of her strong desires and success, she won the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1981. Moreover, another fallen woman is Malala Yousafzai; a Pakistani girl that defies what her country believes in.
Yousafzai is the first educated girl from her country due to the circumstance that in her country girls shouldn’t have an education. Yousafzai writes in her blog how eager she is to be ducated and that causes terror for the militant Taliban. Also, on her blog, she addresses that girls should have an education which results in people wanting to kill her. In 2012, a man shoots her in the head in order to stop her from spreading her idea but that doesn’t stop her. Even after the terrible event, she continues to spreads her idea about the importance of education.
Furthermore, she won the National Youth Peace Prize by the Pakistani government in 2011 and the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize. Henceforth, as Pakistani says, “We are stronger than those who oppress us, who seek to silence us. We are stronger than the enemies of education. We are stronger than fear, hatred, violence and poverty. ” The Help also has two outstanding black maids, Aibileen Clark and Minny Jackson. Surprisingly, both of them are like day and night but have something in common, the desire to have a voice in society.
For a better understanding, Clark is the delightful nanny that makes sure that the white kids are raised in a safe and appropriate environment with plenty of love. Correspondingly, she follows everything that she is told to do and never protests when she’s doing her work. In contrast, Jackson works in the kitchen while stealing from the food she’s serving to the white people even when she’s not supposed to do it. Also, she complains about everything white people does and at some point, she even makes a pie made of chocolate and feces to give it to Holbrook as a payback for all the struggle she made her go through.
Important to realize, even though they behave like this at work, when they go home they careful choose their own future by helping Phalen write the book. Furthermore, Clark and Jackson are living in a dangerous time for colored people, the Civil Right Movement. The movement rings disturbance for white people because black people are rebelling and for black people because a lot of white people start wanting the death. Under the circumstances, Clark’s son is run over by a car that white people was driving and then left in the front of the hospital without bringing him inside; the worst thing us that they did it for fun.
At the end, Clark’s son dies but she still has to go to the white families’ houses with a smile on and take care of their children while her son is dead and her daughter is at home being taken care by someone else. Due to the Ku Klux Klan, color people and Clark herself are forced to un to their houses at night in fear that they might be killed if they wander around on the streets. Equally important, she has to endure every day the embarrassing moments that Holbrook makes her go through by making her hear about the supposedly diseases black people have or by asking her how does it feel to have a bathroom outside the house.
By the same token, Holbrook also faces bathroom conflicts with Jackson. Holbrook makes Jackson use a bathroom outside the house because she doesn’t want to be transmitted the black people diseases, not only that, but she also marks how much of the toilet paper Jackson can use per day. Suddenly, there’s a storm and Jackson needs to use the bathroom but Holbrook makes her use the bathroom outside the house even if that means that Jackson is going to get stuck in the storm. With this in mind, the black maid acts like she’s going to the kitchen and goes inside her employer bathroom but only to get caught.
After, not only Holbrook fires the maid and makes her leave under the atrocious storm, but also tells all the white wives that the maid stole from her and that no one should employee her. As can be seen, two different black maids suffer from hatred and discrimination even when ne of them doesn’t deserve it but all because they share the same dark color that makes society exclude them from being someone worth of having a life. Up to the present time, there are groups of individuals that are encountering discrimination even after so many years of peace between every human being.
In the movie the villain is Holbrook but real life has a bigger threat, Donald Trump. According to Heather Haddon, “Donald Trump is calling for the deportation of millions of immigrants living in the U. S. illegally.. adding specifics to the hard-line immigration stance that first helped his Republican presidential campaign take flight. ” Moreover, Trump wants to send back to their countries those immigrants that help every day build America. In other words, immigrants are the foundation of this country; they are the ones that construct every building and also, they are the majority of workers in regular jobs.
Although illegal immigrants come to this country through the worse way, they are still a group of people that have been part of our country for several centuries and have been there helping make America a better place. Henceforth, Trump wants to deport those people that have influenced in uch an extraordinary way this country just because a small group of those individuals doesn’t follow the law. All things considered, he wants to create a wall around this country to keep out a big part of America’s history.
In the meantime, Trump has also been segregating certain type of individuals from America. As mention in an article in Gale Academic OneFile, “boasted Donald Trump as he signed the executive order entitled “Protecting the nation from foreign terrorist entry into the United States”. The order suspends entry by citizens of seven mostly Muslim-majority countries (Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya and Somalia) for 90 days; halts all refugee admissions for 120 days; and bans Syrian refugees indefinitely.
In other words, due to the terrorist attacks that the United States have been suffering, Trump decides to ban or put in halt any people from Muslim countries. Although not every Muslim is a terrorist and some Americans also helps with the terrorist attacks, he makes every Muslim go through the embarrassment or terror of being feared and judged. Moreover, he’s putting laws to pretend people from enjoying this amazing country just like in the movie there were laws to prevent color people from feeling free.
