When asking someone else to do a favour, one would append ください or くれる. For
example, 手伝ってください or 手伝ってくれる to either mean "please help me" in the former
case and "can you help me" in the latter case. What if I were to say
手伝ってくれていい, would this mean exactly the same as 手伝ってくれる? Or does no one
actually say it like this? Also, is the difference between 手伝ってください and
手伝ってくれる, only being that the former is taking a stronger stance in asking
someone (for a favor) to help, whilst the latter a lighter stance, such that
it isn't really forcing but merely asking in a light tone?
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2019-08-11T13:19:06.150
70019
2023-05-16T13:06:55.973
31222
question
giving-and-receiving
ください/くれる and its various conjugations
You probably mean spoken language or "cartoon Japanese", as using くれる to end a
question would (if writing) need a question mark afterwards. (And this is of
course an indication that is is not formal and belongs more to something like
cartoons).

One advice to you: Just don't use the structure "手伝ってくれる？", unless you know
what you are doing.

手伝ってくれる？ is not about "taking a lighter stance", if having to choose, it could
be thought of as the opposite, and also be rude depending on the situation.

One might use it in situations where one in a way "has the right to assume"
that the person will do as you request. For example, at work, the boss
**_might_** use "手伝ってくれる？" when asking his/her subordinate to help. On the
countrary, if you would use that to ask your boss to help, you might soon need
to find yourself a new boss (=get fired)

The "手伝ってくれていい" is something you would not say, as the "いい？" would require
"the opposite direction" ie あげていい？ would work. (Sorry for lousy explanation,
but while I am bad at using the search function, I am quite sure it has been
answered somewhere on this forum already.)
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2019-08-13T08:14:22.337
70061
2019-08-13T08:14:22.337
34261
70019
answer
手伝ってください is a kinda straightforward "Help me please". てください is a polite
imperative so like with every imperativ you don't really give the other person
a choice (In a grammatical sense). Same with 手伝ってくれ(よ) which is the plain
imperativ which sound like a "Cmon, please help me" or 手伝いなさい as "Help me
(now)!" (Of course depending on the context)

Politer ways to ask for something would be 手伝ってくれる(?) and 手伝ってもらっていい？ Both
give the other person a choice and therefore sound nice. They are on the same
politeness level, but people have personal tendencies. Some examples:

> ...  
>  A: 明日なら一緒に勉強していいよ  
>  B:本当に手伝ってくれる？ありがとう！

or

> A:ちょっと説明してもらっていい？  
>  B:明日なら一緒に勉強していいよ

As mentioned by other people the いい wouldn't work out with the てくれる so you
would have to combine it with もらう.
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2019-08-13T13:41:07.177
70068
2019-08-13T13:41:07.177
34178
70019
answer