Making a Difference
(Spoilers: I have read the whole book!)
In the book The Help by Kathryn Stockett, the character Skeeter is a very important one. She is white in her early twenties living in Jackson, Mississippi. She has grown up with a maid her whole life and has never treated her maids like most of the white woman in this city do. Her friend, Hilly Holbrook, is a great example of how mistreated the maids are. She had started "The Home Help Sanitation Initiative" which called for each home having a separate bathroom for the help because she believed that these woman carried diseases that could be very harmful to white families.
Skeeter from the Help, with a line from the movie as well as the book regarding Hilly's bathroom initiative.
(http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/the-help-skeeter/images/32260170/title/tell-er-skeeter-photo)
(http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/the-help-skeeter/images/32260170/title/tell-er-skeeter-photo)
I admire Skeeter because she refuses to publish Hilly's initiative. There is no doubt that every white woman in Jackson adores Hilly and go along with everything she says. There is never any arguing with Hilly or her opinions. Despite the way Hilly feels about the help, Skeeter has never felt this way, especially about her maid as she was growing up, Constantine.
As the book goes on, Skeeter gets a job writing cleaning articles for a newspaper as Ms. Myrna. Skeeter goes to her best friend, Elizabeth Leefolt's, maid, Aibileen. As she continues to meet with Aibileen about the column, she comes up with the idea to write a book about what it's like for the colored maids working for white families in Jackson. At first, Aibileen and the other maids including her best friend, Minny, are very reluctant to tell Skeeter their stories. They believe she is just like all the other white women and thinks she just wants to get them in trouble. The amount of danger all of them face telling their stories to Skeeter is enough to scare them away. Eventually she gets more than a dozen maids to tell their stories and the book ends up being published.
The book becomes nationwide news and it is hard to believe that Skeeter's idea actually led to something so important. She wanted to write this book for completely selfless reasons. She wanted the people in the country to understand how wrong it is to treat their help like they do, although some of the stories told were of how they were treated well. Skeeter did not just do it for the money, because she paid all the maids with the money that she had made from the book.
I find Skeeter a truly inspiring character because she does not just sit back and watch these maids being treated horribly and do nothing about it like everyone else. She takes initiative for a cause that she believes strongly in, despite the amount of danger that she could face if the people of Jackson actually find out that the book was really about their city, which they eventually do.
As the book goes on, Skeeter gets a job writing cleaning articles for a newspaper as Ms. Myrna. Skeeter goes to her best friend, Elizabeth Leefolt's, maid, Aibileen. As she continues to meet with Aibileen about the column, she comes up with the idea to write a book about what it's like for the colored maids working for white families in Jackson. At first, Aibileen and the other maids including her best friend, Minny, are very reluctant to tell Skeeter their stories. They believe she is just like all the other white women and thinks she just wants to get them in trouble. The amount of danger all of them face telling their stories to Skeeter is enough to scare them away. Eventually she gets more than a dozen maids to tell their stories and the book ends up being published.
The book becomes nationwide news and it is hard to believe that Skeeter's idea actually led to something so important. She wanted to write this book for completely selfless reasons. She wanted the people in the country to understand how wrong it is to treat their help like they do, although some of the stories told were of how they were treated well. Skeeter did not just do it for the money, because she paid all the maids with the money that she had made from the book.
I find Skeeter a truly inspiring character because she does not just sit back and watch these maids being treated horribly and do nothing about it like everyone else. She takes initiative for a cause that she believes strongly in, despite the amount of danger that she could face if the people of Jackson actually find out that the book was really about their city, which they eventually do.
I agree with how Catherine described Skeeter. She defiantly doesn't just sit back and let the other ladies talk the way they do about the maids. I respect her for paying the maids with the money that she earned for writing her book.
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