People Are More or Less the Same

Over the past few days I happened to visit Geneva. The city was extremely organized, clean and tidy and the diversity of the population was overwhelming. Despite all these, I couldn't help but draw some comparisons with my home country.

We are all the same species yet we we differ greatly based on our cultural background. What is considered acceptable in one country might be ludicrous or unacceptable to another. This is how morals and values become irrelevant. What we have to come to know and understand as accepted behaviour is nothing more than what we have been taught previously by those who came before us based on the arbitrary place we happened to be raised.

On a greater scale this realisation alone should make everyone more tolerant to one another yet we see the exact opposite. While we all differ and belong to a variety or groups we all have come to a point to have created our own unique identity that no one is able to understand. When people say "nobody understands me" all they mean really is that "I don't wish to be understood. I want to keep my uniqueness". Ego always come first no matter how altruistic we all wish to be.

Whereas in the past being part of a group (religious, political or otherwise) was considered a positive trait, today people view themselves within groups quite differently. For example, a religious or political individuals might side with one specific ideology but at the end of the day they would be their own heresy since their interpretation and understanding of events will differ from others. There is no single canon to be followed. No dogma can express more than 1 person at a time.

This ofcourse, does not apply from the superficial way we view each other. The human brain, in a effort to summarize information in clusters, groups similar things leaving the 'individuality part' lingering in mid air. We group all muslims the same, fans one team, people from one country because it is easier for the brain to take decisions this way. We can handle that much data so overgeneralization serves as well when it comes to taking decisions.

At the end of the day though, we are all the same. We have a specific capacity to store information. The data might be slightly different based on era, environment, situation but at the same time we all craft the same narratives whether they have to do about the betterment of humanity, love or making offspring.