The Butter Battle Book

Dr. Seuss wrote a book, well, actually quite a large amount,

much more and too many than I am willing to count.

But there’s one in particular that’s worth a real look.

According to the cover, it’s called “The Butter Battle Book”.

In class, many days before now, we read it together: Ann, Cara, and Sam.

We found it just like the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Oh, yes ma’am!

In case you’re unaware of the events that occurred over there,

it’s not clear, but don’t worry, we did research and are willing to share.

Northern Ireland is made up of two kinds of men:

Protestants and Catholics. They don't get along – it's messed up the Zen.

The Protestants, they wanted to stay a part of the UK,

but the Catholics, them, they just wanted to fray.

Christianity, you see, is like buttering bread,

there are so many ways that it can be spread.

The catholic Yooks like their sacraments up, while the protestant Zooks

like things facing down. The Trouble is that everyone thinks the others are kooks.

A divide thus occurs, between Yooks and Zooks, because of this big butter ordeal.

Over time, as the butter congeals and the divide is a wall, strong like steal.

Things get messy when both groups decide the wall is just not enough,

they want to exterminate the ‘others’, and prove they are tough.

[Here should be Sam’s paragraph. It speaks about the similarity between the religious beliefs of Protestants and Catholics. She relates the scenario to the Butter Battle by explaining that in both cases the two opposing groups are just executing the same ideals in a different way. The Protestants and Catholics have each interpreted the Testament differently while the Yooks and Zooks have each interpreted how to butter toast. Sam questions whether these two situations really possess the ground for an argument. Is it not ridiculous to fight over how one should butter their bread? In the end, everyone’s crunching on the same stuff.]

“Hug your neighbour and hug your neighbour's tree” is the philosophy of a tree-hugging, Irish based smoothie company. This image of harmonious neighbourhoods is not one that has always operated so smoothly in Ireland. “The Butter Battle Book”, a story by Dr. Seuss, depicts the separation of the Yooks and the Zooks by a wall, a situation that is comparable to that of the apartheid between Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland during the Troubles. The Troubles in Northern Ireland resulted in an intense apartheid between Protestant and Catholic neighbours. There are many venues in which this separation is apparent. The schools in Northern Ireland, for example, are extremely segregated. Not only do Catholics attend catholic schools and vice versa, but the subject matter taught in protestant schools is different from that at taught at catholic schools. The Irish Gaelic language is taught in all Catholic grammar schools, but not in Protestant schools. Catholic schools place an emphasis on arts/humanities courses while Protestant schools have a stronger focus on sciences. (CAIN) Differences in curriculum, greatly contributes to the divide between faiths as it can push the children’s interests in different directions. The wall between the faiths of Northern Ireland has grown overtime, through generations maturing in a segregated environment, in the same way that the wall depicted in The Butter Battle Book eventually grows so high that a Yook cannot “look a Zook in the eye”. The most literal comparison between the wall in Seuss’ book and that between the Protestants and Catholics of Northern Ireland is in the separation of faiths by neighbourhood. This physical separation between Catholics and Protestants has been in effect since the 17^th century. (CAIN) The wall, created through differences in education, physical separation and other factors, between Catholics and Protestants has kept many people of Northern Ireland from understanding their neighbours, let alone hugging them.

Mutually Assured Destruction, or MAD in the form of its not-so-hilariously ironic abbreviation, is the predicted result of a military strategy in which, if employed, an arms race of nuclear weapons by opposing camps results in the termination of both (Gaddis, John). The good news? The war is undoubtedly over. Unfortunately, the victory party has to take an eternal rain-check. In Dr. Seuss “The Butter Battle Book”, he references Mutually Assured Destruction in the war between Yooks and Zooks. Although one would not expect such a morbid doctrine to appear in the colourful world of cartoon characters whose names rhyme and who fight with Triple Sling Jiggers and Snick-Berry Switches, one would imagine that the joke stops there. However, not only are the events of “The Butter Battle Book” a direct interpretation of the Cold War of 1985 (Amazon), but The Troubles in Northern Ireland constitutes MAD in a less literal sense. During the Butter Battle, The Yooks and Zooks engage in back and forth threats each time with more advanced weaponry at hand. The problem is that the two sides keep inventing the same machinery; their guns are equally as powerful. The Yooks and Zooks become paralyzed in this power-equilibrium, “in short: whoever shoots first, dies second” (Gaddis, John). The situation is perfectly captured when one unidentified Zook says with a yell, “If you sprinkle us Zooks, you’ll get sprinkled as well!”. The Troubles unfold into what is essentially self-hatred; two branches of the same religion fighting one another. The scenario involves MAD to a certain extent but really boils down to SAD: Self Assured Destruction. Like the Yooks and the Zooks, countering one another with the same weapons, Protestantism has no power over Catholicism. No one sect of Christianity can prevail because they both get their tricks from the same book (or in this case, Testament). There have been approximately four thousands deaths as a result of the Troubles (The Troubles), and although we should not undermine such a significant loss, it was not the pulling of triggers that was truly killing Northern Ireland but rather what the ladder implies. If two sects of Christianity start repel farther and farther apart, it takes its toll on the umbrella of Christianity. As the umbrella stretches, the definition of what it means to be a Christian loosens. How can both a Protestant and a Catholic refer to themselves as ‘Christians’ when they are so strongly opposed to one another’s religious views? Eventually, as a means of dropping all connection to those of the “other church”, one's label as a ‘Christian’ could easily be forgotten. That is SAD.

This marks the end of our essay, we hope you had fun.

As for the battles, in the end, no one won.

When you’re fighting over buttering toast,

There is no right answer. It’s just whichever way you like most.

No matter which or what way, you’re still eating the same stuff.

So eat breakfast together- enough is enough.

And if someone’s burns your toast, don’t burn theirs too.

Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.

Annotated Bibliography

Source no.1
CAIN Web Service (Conflict Archive on the Internet). Conflict and Politics in Northern Ireland (1968 to the Present). Jan. 10, 2009 http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/index.html

This site contains information and source material on 'the Troubles' and politics in Northern Ireland from 1968 to the present. There is also information on Northern Ireland society. New material is added regularly and there are also frequent updates. This was a very useful, though perhaps a bit excessive source. It provided all of the information needed, but it was more a matter of finding it all. It is a very large site and the information is very spread about and one must sift through quite a bit of very technical language and information. Overall this source was very informative and allowed for my paragraph to be accurately written.

Source no.2
Gaddis, John. Mutual Assured Destruction. Nuclear Files. www.nuclearfils.org

John Gaddis effectively defines the doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction and explains its origins during the Cold War. John Gaddis continues to explain its relevance in more recent history.

Gaddis provides a comprehensible definition of MAD. He briefly summarizes its derivatives and its meaning, providing only the essential information. His tone is not too formal, and language used is fairly simple. The explanation he provides is straight forward.

Understanding MAD is the first and most important step in order to be able to write about it in our essay. The information this source provided was therefore crucial.

Source no. 3
The Troubles. Kids Net. www.encyclopedia.kids.net.au

This article explains the reasons for the Troubles in North Ireland and how they unravelled. The article speaks of how the Troubles concluded.

Since this article is written for a kids’ online encyclopaedia, it is very easy to understand. The main points are clear and concise.
In comparison to other websites that provided extensive details, Kids Net provides a short explanation of a complicated situation.

In order to get a full understanding of the situation in Northern Ireland, we looked at various sources. This one however effectively summarized the important parts. I used this site to get the approximated death toll and the duration of the Troubles.

Source no. 4
The Butter Battle Book. Amazon books online. www.amazon.com

In the section entitled “Editorial Reviews”, Amazon explains that “The Butter Battle Book” is Dr. Seuss’s spin on the Cold War.

The review hardly elaborates how the Cold War and “The Butter Battle Book” are linked. It simply explains the moral of the story and mentions that this is a tale of the Cold War.

This was useful to our piece because it confirmed that the book was written about the Cold War, and although we had been told by peers and parents, this confirmed the notion.