What Really Matters

This is a photograph of Earth taken by one of the Apollo astronauts while in transit to the Moon.

Earth is the only planet in the solar system capable of supporting life, human and otherwise, without artificial aid. Our solar system is part of the Orion Arm, a minor spiral arm of the Milky Way Galaxy, which is far from the galactic center. Though I'm certain there are other Earthlike planets capable of supporting human life in other planetary systems in our galaxy and in other countless galaxies, such planets are many light years away from us. They are effectively unreachable at our current level of technology and of that for many years to come.

Planets capable of supporting life are a rare thing in our universe, and ours is suffering from years of pollution as indicated by global warming.

It is the birthplace and home of humanity; of every human being that has ever lived until the present time. We are all in the same boat together: Americans and Iraqis, liberals and conservatives, terrorists and pacifists, Christians, Muslims, Jews, Atheists, black, white and asian, men and women, and every other category of human on Earth.

Viewed in this way, all the petty things that divide us and seem to matter so much to us in our short lives on this planet don't really amount to hill of beans in the long run. The sooner we all learn we're all in this together and cooperate to save our planet from destruction and stop concentrating on the minuscule things that divide us, the better off we'll be.

Before anything else, we are all citizens of Earth first.

Thoughts?