I recently went to the cinema to watch the documentary "Unity." "Unity" is a film focused on the idea that all living things – human, animal, tree – are all one; they are all interconnected. By and large, the film documents the lack of empathy and compassion humankind has for living things. Consumed by financial greed, thirst for power, pursuit of pleasure and desire, we have forgotten truly how to love ourselves, our bodies, our minds, our hearts, our souls and those of the animals and plants as well – the other earthlings. But what makes our species more superior than the others? Because we are more complex? Because we are stronger and smarter? Or because we are brutal and we have taken from this Earth so furiously what we need? Selfishly using and abusing, never replenishing, never nurturing the seeds from which we reap. Or is it simply because we have determined ourselves that humans are superior?

But not all humans. Only the humans who are not the "others." There are whites, blacks, reds, yellows. There are gays, straights, bisexuals. There are Muslims, Jews, Catholics, Atheists. There. Are. Others. At the end of the day, when you strip the material that aligns us with personal belief, we are all skin and bone, matter and atoms, blood and brain, heart and soul.

But we forget this simple fact. War rages on, fueled by leaders who allow their civilians to anguish, starve, endure torture, numbing loss and to perish. In great numbers. In small numbers. In homes and in trenches. In shelters and in streets. There is death among life. Our species has created opposites so that we distrust and oppose those who are not the same as ‘us’. And then we rape and pillage and kill. But when the suffering occurs on the ‘us’ side, it is wrong and unjust. It calls for armies, military, murder. All in the hope that we may win over the ‘others’ and come from the battle victorious, having served the world some sort of great sacrifice for keeping ‘us’ safe. They. Are. Not. The. Others. And they too are of this Earth. Rather than excelling toward peaceful coexistence, we have created the same suffering from which we have just borne. War is so far engrained in human history, a cruel truth of our evolution through time, that it has been deemed an acceptable brutality to inflict on ourselves – and on the others—in order to "strive for peace." In reality; however, all we are successful in is killing one another; stripping lives from this planet for the gains of fame, wealth and power. We have created the otherness. We have killed because of the horrific labeling of otherness.

But when death is upon us and we are to leave this world, we are simply just Earthlings living on this planet, breathing and living the days left of our lives. When we creep in to bed with our lovers, we all want comfort and love. When we cry for the loss of a loved one, we all weep the same tears. When we bleed, our blood is the same as any others.’ We are all borne of the same Earth, living a temporary existence. If we could live out our lives peacefully – striving to breathe, build, and better ourselves, and the others alongside us – we could create a beauty unbeknownst to mankind. We must forget the differences between us, the ones that make us uniquely beautiful, the ones that we have deemed unacceptable, and remember that we are all Earthling.

Other Earthlings are subject to our otherness as well. With only 14 minutes of film time, the animal brutality clips that were documented were the hardest to stomach. The film opens with a cow desperately searching to escape his small pen that leads him, quite literally, to his death only a few steps in front of him: a man with a gun. There are scenes of baby calves being ripped from their mothers just after birth – separated by metal and gates – so that the mother’s milk can be used for the consumption of humans, rather than used by her children to grow strong. There are scenes of fish being scaled alive, fried in hot oils, left bleeding to death -- only for this animal to be consumed by humans in the hopes of winning competition. There are scenes of the slaughtering of chickens, pigs and ducks. These horrors exist, yet we only manage to fight for the salvation of whales and seals! We do not kill elephants for their ivory because they are living beings! We clean the waters of the Earth so dolphins may swim freely without worry of polluted waters because they are living beings! But what about the other living beings? The meat we consume we do not think twice of its origin. How it was processed. How it was cleaned. How it was preserved. And most importantly, what its quality of life -- and death -- was. Animals are bred for slaughter, kept in cages where they suffer from disease. They experience pain the same way you or I do – they feel it in their physical beings and in their hearts. These Earthlings are helpless, they cannot speak, and they cannot march on Washington for their rights, and they cannot walk out of their cages and flee to a farm where they are treated with even a shred of respect for their lives. They are prisoners of humans. They. Are. Not. The. Others. They too are of this Earth. They deserve a life of value, filled with unconditional love from an offspring, a chance to graze in fields of grass, to suffer natural loss and to experience peaceful, unadulterated being.

But, if animals were allowed to wander this Earth freely, the way that they are naturally wired to do, they would need somewhere to live out their lives. However, once more, we, humans, have inflicted our brutality and have taken this Earth’s natural beauty, comprising it to fit our needs so that this fantasy of free animal living is impossible at the rate in which we are digressing. Forests are wiped out, acids are spilt in the oceans and seas, the airs are thick with pollution, the ice melts and the lands are cleared for humans to build machinery and factories to create things. We trade life for the production of material goods; we rip the roots of trees who have been here longer than any living human on this Earth. Or for the processing of meats. Or whatever the hell it is that we need in this moment. But we always need something. And we take what we need without thinking of the consequences; without thinking of the others. Global warming. Loss of biodiversity. Ever increasing carbon levels. They. Are. Not. The. Others. And they too are of this Earth. The air that humans breathe is the same air that animals and plants breathe. The grass that feeds animals is the fuel for the animals which we consume. If we continue to pillage this Earth of its natural resources, there will be nothing left for any beings. We are connected to this planet and we depend on it for survival.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an escapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly.” Every being on this beautiful planet is interconnected. We are beautiful in our creation and in our birth, and we have the chance to all be beautiful in our short, but potentially wonderful, lives as well. To live in harmony amongst the others – the humans, the animals, the trees — we must tap into our compassion; we must recognize that no life is more valuable than any other, we must attempt to exist in a peaceful harmony. Living is merely to exist in consciousness. So, why must we make it so difficult for Earthlings? Why must we create a life that is hard and brutal instead of beautiful and breathtaking? “Think of now what the universe is: millions of galaxies. And among those galaxies is our little planet. For it is here and only here that we are working out our destiny. We all exist in the same atmosphere. Why then, do we separate and distinguish? Always striving against each other for power and supremacy. This has been the formula throughout the history of man. The harmony of being is when we feel the suffering of every creature in our own hearts. Are we not all Earthlings? Each and every one of us. Is love of the one and not of the many? The world is trying to learn a lesson. We must go beyond these pairs of opposites.” We must coexist. We must strive for compassion. And – above all – we must love.