The Ultimate Tragedy is the Silence of the Good People

The novel “ The Help” by Katheryn Stockett is a perfect reflection of Martin Luther King Jr.'s statement that “ The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty but the bad people but the silence over that by the good people.” The treatment of the black community in 1962 was horrible, but the novel focuses on the treatment of the coloured maids in Jackson, Mississippi. Aibileen has been working for Mrs. Leefolt, cleaning her home, cooking for her, and raising her child. Aibileen clocks in at 6 in the morning and leaves at 4 in the evening. Mrs. Leefolt decided that Aibileen was unfit to use the same bathroom as her after a heated discussion with her bridge group, for she was scared of catching disease. So in the effort to prevent her family from catching a coloured disease she build Aibileen her own coloured bathroom outside in the garage. The reason for building the coloured bathroom alone was degrading and insulting, but no one sticking up for Aibileen, no one from the bridge club who heard the discussion decided to say anything against the idea. It ruined her self esteem as a human being and her dignity as a maid and part of their family. We also learn in the novel of a you boy named Robert, he worked for a construction company, he accidentally used the white bathroom not knowing their was a sign permitting him from using the bathroom. He was run off the property, by two white men and beat with a tire iron. Just because he used a white bathroom instead of the coloured bathroom. All the people who saw what happened never protested, no one at the scene tried to stop the beating. Robert was in the hospital for three weeks and ended up with serious injuries and came out blind. Loosing his sight because he used the white bathroom. He was charged and came out as the bad guy. The bad people are at fault as much as the one's who stand by and watch. A life could be save, a young man could still have his sight and a maid could still have her dignity and self confidence.