Kathryn Stockett

They go do it anyway.

I think Birdie came from me.

Okay.

She's someone who speaks her mind and often gets in trouble for it.

Okay.

So much.

I don't think there's been enough written about this subject.

But in the 1920s and the 1930s, the eugenics movement was just starting to heat up.

And the idea was that by sterilizing certain people, they could cleanse the population of what they called undesirables.

And these were people that, you know, might have epilepsy, that might have autism, people that they...

perceived as having a lower intelligence, they thought by sterilizing them, they could stop the procreation of these types of people.

And the one that really stood out to me was that in Mississippi, a woman could be sterilized for being promiscuous.

And that one stopped me in my tracks.

I mean, I guess, you know, the idea was that if, you know, if you're promiscuous, well, then you must be stupid.

And if you're stupid, then, you know, because it's hereditary, you're going to have all these children that then the state of Mississippi and so many states adopted these laws would have to then take care of.

For somebody like Bertie in the book, that's what she's looking for, a group of people where she feels like she fits in.

And so many of us are looking for that.

And I think that's a reasonable thing to ask for in life.

And she finds it with, yeah, a group of misfits, and it surprises her.

As for what I want the reader to take...