Feet

Feet, are not fins.
Just like waterbenders are not firebenders.
Do you understand where I am going with this?
No? Oh, well, silly being. Continue reading then, and don't be so impatient.

Water Sprites with fins instead of feet are considered higher in their little water society. For they can swim better, and of course scales are much more beautiful than feet, no matter how you decorate them. So they are considered higher for that reason also.

Though footed Water Sprites are lower, they are not considered nuisances or pests, or ones to be ruled over.
For, the finned sprites cannot walk, while the footed sprites may walk and swim. Footed sprites can do many things finned sprites cannot. And though it is the other way around as well, finned sprites ultimately depend on footed sprites more than they would care to mention.

And the footed sprites know this. Yet, they do not take advantage of it, nor gloat or mock. They simply take their differences in stride (quite literally) and do what they can.
And finned sprites (though often more vain) do the same.