The Help in the Sixties

          The story presents the racism prevalent in the sixties to help the audience understand both perspectives of the white and blacks. In the movie The Help they emphasize strict separation between whites and blacks because it was during the Jim Crow Laws where they are "separate but equal". In the movie Hilly does not want African Americans to use her toilet because she believes they have diseases they could spread only by toilet. Hilly then starts a bill she calls The Home Help Sanitation Initiative where it requires for families of Mississippi to build outdoor bathrooms for their black employees. The movie also emphasizes the difference between the black and white neighborhoods and ways of travel. The black people neighborhood houses are small and close and they travel by walking or by bus; while the white neighborhood houses are huge with have lots of land and they travel by car.The strict separation shows why the whites and blacks were never treated the same because they never used the same things, whites always had something better.

Minny trying to use the inside restroom because their is a horrible

 storm outside however she  gets caught and fired.

       
             In the movie The Help, the relationship between the whites and blacks is prevalent to help us understand how each side felt about each others' rights. Throughout the movie blacks and whites are "separate but equal" and during the sixties time period things were starting to change for some people. The relationship between Hilly to her maids was always cruel because she never saw them as equal just like so many people in Mississippi still saw whites better than blacks. The relationship between Minny and Celia or Skeeter and Aibileen was respectful and they gained each others trust. Some people were like this in the sixties however, it was hard for them to be different than society. Many famous activists today during that time period started to fight for their rights such as Medgar Evers, who made an appearance in the movie on the Phelan's TV and later on the radio they heard about his murder. The movie ends with the question of will life ever change because of the book, The Help that Skeeter wrote. However, the audience knows that because of the activists and people that wrote about similar things like The Help, society did change.

Medgar Evens on TV

             In the movie, The Help and also in the sixties whites would have parties while the maids would work non-stop and gets paid less. Throughout the movie and especially during that time period blacks and whites were still not treated equal when it came to jobs. The movie represents "The Help" or maids to help the audience understand one of the main jobs black women had at that time. For their job they had to clean the whole house daily, cook for the household and also most times take care of the kids. The Help did this Monday through Saturday and the people they worked for really did not have much to do except go to a party and worry about their social status. Even with all the maids hard work they are still paid less than whites mainly because that is the only type of job they can get. The movie presents this for our understanding of life in the sixties well, so the audience will have more sympathy for the African Americans.


Mrs. Leefolt hosting a party