As a male, I'm very happy for Bettina Arndt to write about experiences specific to men. She writes from a position that is researched, honest and empathetic to others.

The outsider's viewpoint on an issue can be the most useful, engaging and influential. And I think that's why The Help grabs readers. I know it grabbed me and made me think about all the things that weren't said, and weren't smashed into my head with a sledgehammer, as they might have been. Having the major race segregation events happening "just off stage" and muted, made them more powerful.

There is a "politics of representation", and it does matter who is representing who. The histories of communities and their relationships position them in different relations to questions of power, and representation is a form of power. Just ask yourself: Who gets the readiest access to channels of representation? Whose voices are heard most and whose least? And what do these differences do to people's lives?

Is colour a help? Perhaps being white is a bigger help when it comes to sales? Critical deconstructions and popular reception are also different problems. Some black women are annoyed by the book, perhaps because, as sales have proved, it is the kind of book white people like to read about "their story." It is a story about "them", but is it "for" them. The Association of Black Women Historians is concerned that it adds a layer to the misrepresention of their history... I would think it was worth listening to "them" as a way to a different understanding of the book.