The Help

I read "The Help" over a year ago. I thought wow this is a wonderful opportunity to pull some Black, Asian, Latino, and White women together for a book discussion. I did an evite and it was on. Now in the final analysis there were some black women present and two white women. As it goes the black women were mostly verbal. Of the two white women one was very outspoken while the other was more reserved in her comments. Anyway the night went on and we had our discussion on The Help.

"The Help" was one of the best books I read in 2010. I read it because a sister, soror, black female friend recommended it. Now up front a brief description about a white woman writing on the maids in the civil rights era would have held no interest for me. In fact, it was a turn off. But because a friend had read and recommended it so highly I downloaded it to my Kindle. Now the book was compelling and I found myself finished almost before I began. The book pulled at so many emotions I felt the need to talk to someone who had read the book. I wanted to talk to others to at least process my feelings. It's one of those books you need to talk about with others.

The books seemed legitimate and believable to me. Now let me be the first to say as a black woman I wouldn't know how accurate the author was to that time period and the black women she portrays. We are reading of a situation where racism was not only oppressive towards blacks it also oppressed a nation. In a book I am reading now, "The Warmth of the Other Sun," the author talks about how we are all constricted by oppression. For example, she mentions this lady had an artifact in her home that got interpreted by her company as Catholic. The comments to the women implying she was Catholic were so scary the lady took the item down immediately after they left and worked hard to show she was in no way Catholic. This example remind me of just how restrictive racism was/is where we all stay in our place, we are all bound. Now I understand race + power means that Blacks are often doubly and triply oppressed and in no way am I equating we all suffer the same. Instead I am wanting to say oppression harms us all.

As a kid, I grew up watching my grandmother help white families. I watched her cater to them in a way that humiliates me to this day. Now my grandmother has always been a kind person to me but she would butter these folks up like they were sweet corn. She acted different and they loved it. They would donate stuff to our family including clothes. I watch my family eat up any scraps they threw our way. I refused to wear or use anything that was given by these white families. With no words or analysis to help me understand what I was experiencing, I hated them. I hated what they represented and the role that had been designated for my grandmother as the help. If I was around them I would not smile or play with their kids. My aunt has scars on her knees from scrubbing white folks floors. And to add insult to injury the family she still works for at 73 years old asked her when the wife passed away if she could wear a white uniform to the funeral. The Help is not just a movie or some book or some analytical argument but it is the street that passes through my heart. It is about the unequal distribution of power and the places we've been assigned as a result. I get that.

Over and against the painful history of blacks in America, for me in some small way these women rebelled against the system just by telling their story at this time. They said what many Blacks have not gotten a chance to say to listening white people. They said what I never got a chance to say to those white families. They said what America has not fully yet heard. They were a small counter culture colony. They were risk involved for both sides. They did not accept the system as it is and so for a little while they journey together. In the book, the white journalist gives these black women a literary platform to speak to White America. It doesn't seem big perhaps today but in that time period it was no small thing. They got a chance to cross lines.

I think the author of The Help has come under great critique and we live in such a world where that is a good thing. I applaud her for having the audacity to touch a subject that is a part of the country's history - race. I applaud her for having the audacity to cross the lines however successful or unsuccessful others deem her efforts. I applaud her for giving us another platform to talk about race. I always celebrate the opportunity to have authentic conversation about how are we going to learn, live, and love on this earth together celebrating the full humanity of all especially those who have been marginalized. Thank you!