One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue fish- Social Action questions

Whilst I was reading ‘One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish’ by Dr Suess, I started to realize that there is a deep message portrayed in this kid’s allegory text. The book is about how there are many different ‘species’ of fish and that they are all great at something. It also touches upon how each fish in the sea have separate talents and can each help function a place if they participate in their ‘specialities’. As you all probably realize, this book is a child classic, where I have not met anyone who hadn’t read this as a child. However, most kids just read the outside layer of the book but if you re-read and dig deeper into the text, you find that there is a discrete message that is a representation for a real-life issue.

            The first social action question was the first thing that I thought about whilst reading the text, what really difficult or complex things are happening in the text? The story portrays a message of slight racism and segregation to being with. This is portrayed at the beginning of the story because we are introduced to so many different fish, that are all different in talents but they are al treated differently. It isn’t quite the section of racism that we are accustomed to, for example: The Civil War. But in fact, it is the kind of racism where you are judged on your looks. Throughout the book, these fish are assessed due to the colour of them or the way that they do things. They aren’t acknowledged for their personality but more for the way they look etc. However, towards the end of the book, the message takes an unravelling turn and we realize that the message is portrayed in two different ways. From the beginning of the book and to the end, we are portrayed with the same issue but kind of a resolution to the first aspect. For example, in the text, towards the end of the book, we learn that everyone is different yet each equal because everyone is the same being deep down and have equal value inside and out. It shows that everyone is unique, and has different qualities, but each person is the same truthfully and people should be equally respected and not just observed by their looks. We learn this by just observing the different characters and you start to observe a pattern, where we find that each person walks the same way and are the same, but just have a different skin colour and different talents.

            Whilst I continued to observe the 1^st social action question, I was almost intrigued by the 2^nd one, whose point of view is missing? The story is about the fish but yet told by a boy. The point of view that is missing is the ‘fishes’. The only person’s POV that is shown are the narrators and the one human’s voice. I think the author chose not to include the fishes point of view because they might have had different opinions about each other because of their looks, which may be not agreeable with the author’s issue that is tried to be shown. It shows that the author was choosing who gets to be heard just to fit his perspective. It doesn’t show a fair way to portray the book, because if we are learning about these fish, then why aren’t they being allowed to speak? It causes us to have less trust in the author and we aren’t accustomed to how the fishes feel about their way of life. The perspective of the one human being is included because it is seemed to be the ‘typical’ and ‘normal’ people looking in on the different people’s perspective and views.

The third social action question, is justice served, was a hard one because honestly the answer isn’t clear. At the beginning, justice isn’t served because each fish is being ‘racist’ towards each other and not joining and acknowledging people’s opinions because they are all base each other on their looks and how they are different. It shows no justice because they don’t give each other a chance to express their true ideas and perspectives but that they are automatically crossed out because they look different and have a different approach to things. It isn’t fair because you could meet your best friend but if they don’t look nice or ‘normal’ then you would never know that. They don’t acknowledge anyone’s similarities but only the differences between everyone. But in the end, justice is served because everyone realized that each other are the same deep down and that their looks don’t define them.

In conclusion, we learn a lot of messages throughout the book, which all have a deeper meaning than you would already think about. Not only do we approach the different perspectives in a deeper way, but also we realize how some kid’s books actually aren’t just for kids. The messages in the book, wouldn’t make sense for a child, so then we think, who is the author’s true audience. I feel as if this is another question that could be asked because it gives insight into the authors intended audience for the book.