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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Weird that pp is defending the way both of these women treat their helpers.

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Agreed. I think part of the issue is imagining being one of the helpers, versus being Margaret or Hilary. I just think the whole helper role is exploitative by its nature. Any role where your job is simply to meet the needs, generally, of your employer is dangerous because it can be very hard to draw lines. It is much better if someone has a clear professional role. I just think Puri and Essie are in these very powerless roles, and it's culturally reinforced because the economics of Hong Kong reinforce the idea that these women exist to serve the wealthy. Remember the scene on the boat from earlier in the series where the other women are telling Margaret that you "have" to be demanding or stern with the helpers because "it's what they respond to." Like they are dogs.

The interesting thing to me is that as Americans, I think Hilary and Margaret are both aware that this dynamic is not particularly healthy. Unlike someone raised in Hong Kong or from another country with a similar underclass of people who do this kind of work for low wages, they are from a country where it is no longer considered appropriate to have this kind of employment relationship. In the US, nannies and housekeepers and landscapers and similar have more professionalized roles and in many cases can demand very good wages, especially when working for highly demanding, wealthy employers. There is not this attitude here of "well that's what people like this are for." But in HK, as well as in a number of other countries, that attitude is rampant. There is more of a hierarchy and a sense of fundamental entitlement to the labor of poor people.

But I think in their discomfort with the dynamic, they run into pitfalls. It's hard for them to operate in HK at their socioeconomic level and not rely on their helpers the way other women do. And both Hilary and Margaret attempt to fix the dynamic by befriending their helpers, but this is actually a bad impulse because all it does is create more obligation on the part of Essie and Puri, to do more emotional labor for their employers and make them feel okay about their relationship.

It's just a messed up dynamic. You can't fix it. By hiring a helper, you're buying into a corrupt system of how society is supposed to work.[/quote]

I can see that. Hilary’s HK friend’s way is colder but healthier for everyone in the end, not personal. I could not have helpers of any kind bc I’d feel unable to detach from the personal dimension.[/quote]

Yes, I had this same thought about Hilary's friend. She has her own issues, of course, but she seems to understand that the women they hire are employees and nothing more -- it's transactional. This will sound basic but I also think it matters that she lives in a much larger house. Part of the issue for Hilary and Margaret is that they are living in apartments. Large, luxury apartments, yes, but still apartments. Their live in help is just physically closer to them and it's more enclosed and I think this contributes to these issues with boundaries.[/quote]

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