Musings from Brian J. Noggle: The Antithesis of Sharing

The Antithesis of Sharing

Someone gave my son a book, a book that that particular someone thought might have been a nice story about sharing or merely about fish. If that someone had cracked the cover of the book and had perused the book at all, I'd have to assume that someone wanted to co-opt my son into a world where all the altruistic bogeymen of Ayn Rand fiction are true. That book is The Rainbow Fish, and its author's name might as well be Marx Pfister.

The Rainbow Fish cover

You see, the Rainbow Fish has colorful, reflective scales made of foil embedded within the sheets of the book. That differentiates the Rainbow Fish from the other fish in this fictive undersea world, too, making it more beautiful and, according to the value system espoused by the book, better somehow as the other fish value and covet those scales for themselves. Are they the villians? Of course not. The fish endowed by its creator is the villain because it recognizes the value in its scales and is unrepentant for having them:

The other fish demand the Rainbow Fish give them its beauty

The other fish demand the Rainbow Fish give them its beauty

Okay, perhaps the Rainbow Fish is a bit impetuous. Perhaps a bit of a, erm, jerk. However, note the fish's demand: Give me one of your scales. Part of your actual body that I find attractive. In the real world, if you ask a woman with pretty hair for a lock to keep and wear, she'll pepper spray you, get a restraining order, and you're the one ostracised, or so I have heard. In the Rainbow Fish universe, if you refuse, you are ostracised.

Brothers and sisters, I know something of sharing. Sharing occurs when someone with something says, "Hey, I have something, and someone has less or nothing. I shall give that person some of my something." Instances that begin with someone having something and someone else demanding it are called "Robbery." This book, then, seriously tries to inculcate urchins with the worst ad absurdums of Rand's villainous thoughts: altruism, to give of yourself because other want you to give it up or because self-denial is a value. I mean, even Marx said From each according to his ability, which implied that ritual self-dismemberment or self-flaying was not required.

Unfortunately, the Rainbow Fish is weak and consults with a many-tentacled consultant who then tells him that he needs to give in, compromise, and everyone will love him. So the Rainbow Fish does: The happiest comrade in the commune

Now that they're all equal in the ugly, asymmetrical single shiny scale, everyone loves him. Or at least Diana Moon Glampers would be. You see, in the Rainbow Fish undersea soviet, people love you for what you give them, not for what you are. And what you give them is the power to demean and diminish you for their own benefit.

Call it whatever you want, but it's not a lesson in sharing. It's a lesson in self-destruction for the pleasure of the masses.

You know, when the boy brings me this book to read to him, he gets a different story than the words tell him, and by the time he can read himself, Daddy might lose this book. Because, jeez, this is not what I want to teach my son, and it's not what I want him to absorb from professionals because I'm not paying attention.

Sort of related thoughts from Rachel Lucas here, but she's not a breeder like me, so it's all theoretical on her part.

- posted by Brian J. @ 7:25 PM