Queequeg proceeds to tell Ishmael his life story, stating that he is, in fact, the crown prince of Kokovoko, a South Pacific island made up of cannibals. Queequeg left the island as a whaler, where he learned his harpooning trade. Ishmael accepts Queequeg for who he is, and plans to leave for Nantucket with him to become whalers. The concept of accepting someone for who he is and not judging them based on their skin color or their beliefs is something that was not fully practiced until after the 1970s. It can be argued that it is still not practiced today. In an era that Melville lived in with terrorist organizations against blacks and immigrants from other countries such as the Ku Klux Klan and the White League, he still preached his beliefs through his books. .
Many signs show Queequeg to be of mixed decent, not only that of Kokovoko. He shows tendencies of African, Islamic, Native American, and Christian combined. The African idol worship combines with the Islamic Ramadan that Queequeg celebrates before he and Ishmael leave on their voyage on the Pequod. Queequeg also carries a "tomahawk pipe" which represents the American Indians. Since Queequeg also appeared in the chapel, he shows some Christian tendencies.
The other nonwhite characters in the book do not see the same discrimination that is shown to Queequeg on shore. This is because on whaling ships, people are not judged on what they look like, but how they perform. However, they still are given the bulk of the jobs on the ship. Ishmael says, since few of the whalers are American-born other than the officers, "the native American liberally provides the brains, the rest of the world as generously supplies the muscles" (Melville 89). Here, Melville is not only talking about experiences on a whaling vessel, but the idea of slavery in his world and he also almost foreshadows the America of the future. Tashtego, a Gay Head Indian turned harpooner, is a skilled worker which causes the others to overlook his savage ways.
