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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: The Help
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Gramps49
Shipmate
# 16378
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Posted
Our congregation's guiding principle this year is "Doing Justice." As part of the emphasis we will be discussing the movie "The Help." during lent. The way we do Lent is to have a soup dinner and discussion on the theme, then we go into Vespers.
Anyway, The Help is set in the early 60's in Jackson MS. It is actually based on a book about the African American women who took care of white families and their children. Very good book, BTW.
I would say it was very close to what actually happened by then. It brought some repressed memories for my wife. While she grew up in New Jersey she remembers some of the same attitudes in her home. Her folks always had household help. She remembers they had to eat in the kitchen and if they wanted to change clothes they had to do it downstairs. She also remembers they used a bathroom downstairs if they had to go (this was an issue throughout the whole movie.)
I recall when we lived in Mississippi some of the same attitudes shown in the movie. Our neighborhood had a garden club that was made up of white women. When a young woman invited a black neighbor to come, she was told those people were not welcomed. That forced my wife and a number of other military spouses to resign from the club.
There was a rural Black Church that got vandalized with a lot of racist graffiti. The congregation became dispirited and was considering disbanding. However, I got a bunch of airmen together and we went out to clean up the graffiti, repair the windows, even get a newer piano for them (the old one had paint spilled inside it.). Most of the airmen were white and many were from Northern States. The congregation could not believe a group of white people would want to help them recover from the incident.
In the movie their were several people who did justice. The one person for me that stood out was a woman who was considered white trash though she married rich young man. She showed a lot of care and concern for the black woman that was helping her.
Why is it sometimes the people that show the most compassion and justice are the very people that others look down on.
Posts: 2193 | From: Pullman WA | Registered: Apr 2011
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Porridge
Shipmate
# 15405
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
Why is it sometimes the people that show the most compassion and justice are the very people that others look down on.
You may have answered your own question. In the training my staff undergo (we work with people who are cognitively and psychiatrically disabled), we talk about people who get devalued (like our clients), and how important it is to pair such folks off, whenever possible, with people who are highly valued.
And then we pay these same staff about $10 an hour (barely a living wage where we are), thereby, well, devaluing them.
![[brick wall]](graemlins/brick_wall.gif) Can't win.
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Spiggott: Everything I've ever told you is a lie, including that.
Moon: Including what?
Spiggott: That everything I've ever told you is a lie.
Moon: That's not true!
Posts: 3925 | From: Upper right corner | Registered: Jan 2010
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
There are a lot of interesting theological themes in the book. One of the most interesting secondary characters in the movie for me was Allison Janney's character-- she shows so many different things-- the conflicting mixed emotions/relationships between white employers and"the help" from that era (the unspoken words between her and Cicely Tyson-- so much said with a glance!), the ease with which we comply with cultural norms, the tortured experience of regret & denial & projection, remorse & redemption. Her words, "sometimes courage skips a generation"-- there's a whole novel in that line.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Latchkey Kid
Shipmate
# 12444
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
Why is it sometimes the people that show the most compassion and justice are the very people that others look down on.
Maybe tangential
quote:
Dom Hélder Pessoa Câmara, Archbishop of Olinda and Recife
"When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why they are poor, they call me a communist
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'You must never give way for an answer. An answer is always the stretch of road that's behind you. Only a question can point the way forward.'
Mika; in Hello? Is Anybody There?, Jostein Gaardner
Posts: 2592 | From: The wizardest little town in Oz | Registered: Mar 2007
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
Why is it sometimes the people that show the most compassion and justice are the very people that others look down on.
Perhaps, for some, it is because they share similar experiences.
In my experience, it is also those who should most understand who are most vehement in persecution.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Latchkey Kid
Shipmate
# 12444
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
Why is it sometimes the people that show the most compassion and justice are the very people that others look down on.
Perhaps, for some, it is because they share similar experiences.
In my experience, it is also those who should most understand who are most vehement in persecution.
I remember an immigrant taxi driver who complained that the government allowed in immigrants, even when I confronted him with the fact of his own migration.
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'You must never give way for an answer. An answer is always the stretch of road that's behind you. Only a question can point the way forward.'
Mika; in Hello? Is Anybody There?, Jostein Gaardner
Posts: 2592 | From: The wizardest little town in Oz | Registered: Mar 2007
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
Sorry, I read the thread title and thought it was about the difficulty in getting good domestic staff these days. Pond difference I guess.
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
Posts: 2118 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: Nov 2006
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Karl: Liberal Backslider
Shipmate
# 76
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
Why is it sometimes the people that show the most compassion and justice are the very people that others look down on.
Not sure, but I'm sure I heard a very old story about just that.
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Might as well ask the bloody cat.
Posts: 17938 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: May 2001
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SusanDoris
Incurable Optimist
# 12618
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Posted
One of my readers read that book to me, finishing last summer. She was away at University in term time, so it took a while to work through!! However, we both enjoyed the book so very much, and there was no possibility of forgetting where we were when she came back in the holidays. It will be interesting to hear about the Lent discussions linked to the book - or rather the film, (which I haven't seen).
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I know that you believe that you understood what you think I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.
Posts: 3083 | From: UK | Registered: May 2007
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Gramps49
Shipmate
# 16378
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Posted
Susan-- As usual, I would say the book is much better--lot more detail.
One of the most interesting reactions my wife has heard comes from some African students who have seen the movie. They could not believe this could have happened in the US.
If anything, I think the movie is understated.
The book is better. Am going to suggest we also read the book as part of Lent.
Posts: 2193 | From: Pullman WA | Registered: Apr 2011
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sabine
Shipmate
# 3861
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
Why is it sometimes the people that show the most compassion and justice are the very people that others look down on.
Many different answers come to mind. One would be that some people feel ashamed or guilty or embarrassed by their own lack of concern when they encounter the good hearts and works of others.
And then there are society's greater underlying issues: I am helping a group of Quakers from Guatemala start a Quaker Meeting to serve Latinos in my city. When they wanted to have a big fiesta to raise awareness among a wider number of people in are greater metro area, they asked me if I would help them pass out flyers. Why? Because (as they told me) it will seem more important if a white person issues the invitation.
As sad as that made me feel, I told them I would be their gringa.
sabine
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"Hunger looks like the man that hunger is killing." Eduardo Galeano
Posts: 5887 | From: the US Heartland | Registered: Dec 2002
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
Susan-- As usual, I would say the book is much better--lot more detail.
One of the most interesting reactions my wife has heard comes from some African students who have seen the movie. They could not believe this could have happened in the US.
If anything, I think the movie is understated.
The book is better. Am going to suggest we also read the book as part of Lent.
The movie leans toward the comedic end of things, which is fair enough. If someone made a faithful representation of the book it would get pretty damn dark in places. The book gives a much better idea of how much danger-- legal, social, physical danger-- these hypothetical women were placing themselves in by doing what they did.
It's no mistake that the Medgar Evers assassination serves as a backdrop to the story. Everyone involved in the project knew exactly what the stakes were, the maids in particular were making themselves painfully vulnerable, and that's what made what they did so jaw-droppingly brave. The movie touches on this, but the worst threat it shows toward the women is jail time, and loss of job. Tip of the iceberg.
Still, I think it did a good job of encapsulating the general concepts of the book, and I have watched it several times. I too take great delight in "corn pone" Miss Celia, and the way she makes her own rules. She has a really bad-ass scene in the book, too, so if the movie made you like her, you have GOT to read the book.
[ 06. February 2013, 17:35: Message edited by: Kelly Alves ]
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
Posts: 35076 | From: Pura Californiana | Registered: Mar 2002
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
I loved the book and the movie. They both did a good job of showing how the help could be so loving and selfless in their work and yet rightfully resent the shameful way they were treated.
Growing up in Philadelphia in the 1950s and 60s we never had any kind of help, but we knew people who did.
The appearance in these households was that the help were simply very much loved members of the family. I loved them too because they were extremely kind, humorous, individuals with a lot of character.
Looking back on it, though, I realize how much their situation must have been like what was depicted in the book.
Today in the same community I don't know anyone who has help like that. It is something that has died out, except perhaps when live-in caregivers are necessary for nursing care and hospice situations.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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