Humanity Needs Aliens to Survive

We are a weird bunch. Does it really matter if somebody likes Android over iPhone, a Ford over a BMW, or even the Labour party over the Conservative party, considering none of these entities have any interest in you whatsoever outside of making a sale through cash or a vote.

I remember growing up in Manchester back in the late 60’s and early seventies; the kids from Callow Green were the best and we really did not like the kids in Callow Close, (the next street along,) often resulting in name-calling and fights. The one thing both our street ‘gangs’ could all agree was that the guys on the other side of the council estate were worse. When we went to Glossop school which covered most of the town, everyone from the council estate were however united in the fact that we were better than those posh people from the other part of town.

Of course, all the kids from Glossop school were a million times better than those kids from Hadfield school three miles away, and the pyramid gets bigger as we zoom out. When it came to football teams, I supported Manchester City (because my dad did), other, lesser people, supported Manchester United and the rivalry was fierce, except when it came to a Manchester team against a Liverpool team, then the anger was directed at ‘those Scouse bastards’. The one thing people living in both Liverpool and Manchester could agree on however was that England were the best team, and if we were playing Germany we would stand hand-in-hand, chanting against the hun (generally until we inevitably lost).

Hatred of one group of people over another based on the rules above makes no sense whatever. I find I have more in common with the Chinese guy I go walking with every week, or the Argentinian guy I work with than anyone I grew up with in Manchester, and these relationships change all the time, yet we always seem to be forced to pick a side by some idiot or other.

Collectively, humanity is so stupid and irrational, that it almost needs a common enemy to survive; An enemy we can collectively agree on that humans (regardless of whatever race, religion or sex) are better than. Maybe AI’s can perform this role as you can almost certainly guarantee in five years a large group of society will hate the AI and robots that put them out of work, or maybe we can just wait for aliens, that both humanity and AI can agree are the ones we really need to hate.

I once imagined a plot of a Sci-Fi book, one where a group of smart humans somehow faked an alien invasion force on its way to earth, in order to bring humanity together, I guess such a book is out there already, but if not, I think the time is probably about right to write it.