On this election day where tensions are high, let’s take a breath and suspend political views for a second. Let’s ignore whether we bleed red or blue. Let’s not define ourselves in terms of where we live or what language we speak as determining our prominence in the world. Let’s ignore all of that and focus on one fact, the fact that we’re human.
Why is it that we, as a people, seem to forget that we are in essence the same? The human genome is 99.9 percent the same in all of us, with minor variations. It is those minor variations that also make us so interesting. So why do we bicker and squabble and disagree so much around our differences? Why do we taunt each other on that minuscule percentage that separates one person from the next? Imagine if we were all exactly the same; how boring the world would be? How unproductive we might be if we all had the same skills, and the same intelligence, and the same looks. Is that what we really want? I think not, because it is our differences that make us strong. Together we master thought and science, ideas and manufacturing, design and technological advancement, creativity and exploration. We do these things by contributing—each person, community, state, country, and ultimately the world. We are the stewards of where we live, how we live, and how we get along. We should strive to work together, while also having the freedom to find our own tiny niche where we can positively influence the world, and not in finding fault with each other, in pointing out differences and making those differences into defects. We need to stop tearing each other down.
The differences in our socio-economic status, geographical locations, political views, or even the smallest difference in how we look in comparison to each other should be celebrated and not used as weapons against each other. They are the qualities that make us interesting. I wonder why it takes something like a large-scale natural disaster to blind us together. Why does it take surviving for us to suspend our assumptions about those who are different from us, and finally work together? And then, why do we forget so quickly?
As we await election results here in the U.S., as businesses board-up in anticipation of rioting and social unrest, as the world battles a pandemic that is killing people daily, lets please appreciate each other and be gentle with each other, because in essence we are all the same, which makes us family. And family sticks together.
