“The Help” by Kathryn Stockett: Examining Inequality and Empowerment

The Fabric of “The Help”

No two human lives hold the same value. In this world, few attest to this statement; in Jackson, Mississippi, everyone lives this statement. In her novel, “The Help,” Kathryn Stockett of how the threads of three women’s lives thread together to illustrate life in Jackson, Mississippi, in 1962 and make their mark on the world in a unique way. The Help is a beautifully orchestrated take on equality in all forms, whether it be gender, social hierarchy, or race.

Challenges of Gender in the South

The 1960s was not a time of independence for women. Gender inequality, in this story, is conveyed through the lives of Skeeter Phelan and Minny Jackson. Both women struggle with the idea of a husband but have different situational struggles. For Skeeter, it is the pressure from just about everyone in Mississippi to marry, have kids, and tend to her husband’s every need. Skeeter aspires to be a journalist and feels she does not have a husband because she neither wants nor needs one. Her mother, however, blames this on Skeeter’s appearance. Skeeter does not meet the beauty standards of the time period; she is 5’10, skinny, and surrounded by a head of frizzy, blonde hair. Skeeter is not typical marriage material, but unfortunately for her, every woman must marry in order to find some kind of place in this world, especially if they have ambitious dreams like Skeeter. Minny’s predicament also envelopes the same battle of instability without a husband. Minny has five kids living in a two-bedroom house and has married an alcoholic that reminds her of her father. Throughout the story, Minny faces verbal and physical abuse hurled at her by her husband, Leroy. Although the thought of leaving her husband crosses her mind almost every day, she cannot leave him because “Plenty of black men leave their families behind like trash in a dump, but it’s just not something the colored women do. We’ve got the kids to think about.” (Stockett, 366) Minny cannot leave because she gets paid less than minimum wage and cannot support her kids without her husband’s money. Men are shown to be above women in various other mundane aspects of life as well. Women are to ask their husbands for permission before making any and all decisions. For example, Miss Celia, Minny’s boss, went behind her husband’s back to hire Minny and was afraid he would get angry for not being told about their new maid. Although women are generally inferior to their husbands, Stockett displays another underlying class system in which women are given the chance to be just as important and as ruthless as men.

The Labyrinth of Social Hierarchy

What others declare someone as is far more important than what someone makes of themselves. Kathryn Stockett has depicted the significance of everyday life through her character Hilly Holbrook. Hilly Holbrook is the head of “The League” and represents the social anxiety that every person has felt at some point or another. The League is an organization held by the women of Jackson to carry out social events; everyone has their own position in the League. Their position represents their social status. Hilly becomes the puppeteer of all social manners in her town. She controls her friends, employees, and even her own mother by making her executive position in The League well known, thus being Stockett’s second example of inequality: social hierarchy. The inequality is shown through the women with lower positions having to strive to be seen by Hilly. These women all compete for Hilly to notice them so that they might achieve higher social recognition. For example, Celia Foote has just moved to Jackson from Sugar Ditch, a poor area in Mississippi, after marrying Hilly’s ex-boyfriend. Hilly, being the social ruler, tarnishes Celia’s name because of her hometown and for marrying someone she is still interested in. Celia is now unable to make friends or attend social gatherings because she is under the will of Hilly Holbrook. Hilly considers herself above these women, but overall, she considers herself above another social group, the Help. As did everyone, Hilly Holbrook gave zero respect to the black people in her county.

Racism: The Help’s Burden

Out of all types and levels of discrimination in Jackson, racism was the most infamous, and the Help received the worst of it. In “The Help,” the chapters are written from the point of view of Skeeter Phelan, Aibileen Clark, and Minny Jackson; Aibileen and Minny are both maids, which allows for a first-hand account of how racism affects the Help in the South. In their accounts, one can read about how many maids of the South raised white children that then took on their parents’ racist views and turned on the maids that fed them. The maids tell stories of white families building them separate bathrooms outside so as to not catch “colored diseases.” Countless times in the book’s dialogue, black people are called negroes and other racial slurs. Along with being segregated, looked down on, and mistreated, one can read about the emotional effects these conditions have on the black population of Jackson, Mississippi. When they help recount their stories to Skeeter, they all tell of feeling angry, depressed, or hopeless. However, the tale does not end here; with Help from Aibileen and Minny, Skeeter has a plan to rise against not just race but all of these forms of inequality in one project.

Skeeter Phelan compiles twelve maids’ stories into one book to report on the discrimination of black people in Jackson and, in doing so, flips Jackson upside down and proves the importance of speaking out and having hope. When the three women write their book “The Help,” they renounce ideas of only men being journalists, social lives ruling all, and the racism and mistreatment of colored people. Although all of the women were afraid to write the book, The Help ended up taking a small role in the Civil Rights Movement as well as benefiting the lives of the authors. Skeeter lands a job as a copyright editor for a magazine in New York without the Help of a man, Minny is able to move away from her abusive husband and work a steady job with the Footes, and Aibileen retires after being supported by the money made from the book. Not to mention each of the twelve women that told their stories are compensated for taking such a great risk.

Overall, “The Help” is an inspiring story of overcoming fear, circumstances, and discrimination in order to do what is right. The inequality exhibited in this novel, although not as violent, is still occurring today in various forms, and this novel can and should be used as an important reference to handle these issues. Kathryn Stockett has brilliantly narrated how imperative it is that no one person stops fighting for equality until these stories cannot be related to modern-day life. These are problems that the world has and always will deal with unless people like Skeeter Phelan, Minny Jackson, and Aibileen Clark step forward to better everyone in this world.

References: 

1. Stockett, Kathryn. “The Help.” Penguin Books, 2009.
2. Jackson, Brian K. “Racial Hierarchies and the Help: Kathryn Stockett’s Novelistic Portrait of Black Women Domestic Workers.” Southern Quarterly, vol. 51, no. 1, 2013, pp. 51-70.
3. Roberts, Marilyn. “Black Women in White Houses: The Unrecognized Legacy of African American Women in the White House.” Southern Quarterly, vol. 50, no. 2, 2013, pp. 64-82.

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