By Peter Kaufman

We all need food. We all need water. We all need air. We all have parents. We all have organs. We all have blood. We all need love. We all get sad. We all get annoyed. We all have friends. We all have hearts. We all need to learn. We all like to laugh. We all feel pain.

These are just some of the responses that were generated last month when I took a group of college students to participate in The Similarities Project with a class of third graders.

The purpose of the visit was to explore (and eventually draw) some of the similarities between these two groups of students. At first glance this might seem like a difficult task. Just thinking about their sizes, ages, and hobbies, it would appear as if third graders and college students have very little in common. But in less than an hour the students were able to identify over forty similarities.

The challenge of finding things we have in common is not only difficult when we bring together two disparate groups; it is sometimes difficult when we are among our peers. I do a version of The Similarities Project in some classes. After the initial pairing, students then join together progressively into groups of 4, 8, 16 and 32. At each step, they need to find new things that everyone in the group has in common. Not surprisingly, as the size of the group increases it becomes more difficult to find things they all share.

The Similarities Project demonstrates the extent to which we are socialized to focus much more on our differences than our commonalties. This is not necessarily a bad thing; after all, opposites do attract and diversity does enhance our experiences.

But too often, our emphasis on differences impoverishes instead of enriches our lives. It separates us instead of brings us together. We end up using these differences to assign value, worth, or legitimacy. And from this, artificial and arbitrary borders, structures of inequality, and institutions of oppression quickly develop.

If you think about it, it is not an exaggeration to say that all of the harm we (humans) have done to each other and even to our planet comes from emphasizing our differences instead of our similarities. Consider the following:

· War: All wars have been fought over differences in religion, economic status, tribal affiliation, race/ethnicity, or territorial borders (which demarcate one of the above or some other difference).

· Systems of Oppression (such as sexism, racism, heterosexism, ableism, classism): All forms of discrimination and oppression stem from identifying another group as “other”—as less equal, less worthy, less human.

· Environmental Degradation: As we (humans) deplete natural resources such as air, water, soil, and as we destroy ecosystems rendering certain species of plants and animals extinct, we are doing so with the implicit assumption that we are separate from and different than other living organism—including being different from other humans whose lives also depend on these scarce natural resources.

The fact that we overwhelmingly emphasize our differences at the expense of our similarities should raise some red flags for us because as sociologists we know that all of these differences are socially constructed. In other words, there is nothing inherent, natural, or essential about these differences. We humans have defined them, created them, emphasized them, and eventually, have fought or oppressed each other over them.

The Similarities Project is a modest attempt to socially construct a different reality. Instead of identifying the ways in which we seem unalike, this exercise promotes the many things we have in common. You would think that for a species that is said to be 99.9% similar we would not have much problem identifying our commonalities. But because we are socialized to identify and emphasize our differences the things that connect us are often obscured, neglected, or ignored.

Will the Similarities Project put an end to the harm and suffering humans cause as a result of our over-emphasis on socially constructed differences? On the macro-level, probably not. But in our everyday social interactions, focusing on our similarities has great potential to reduce teasing, bullying, stigmatization, prejudice, discrimination, and voluntary segregation.

Moreover, there are numerous examples of groups and organizations engaging in similar efforts to socially construct a new reality by focusing on the things that bring us together instead of the things that tear us apart:

• In October 2011, there were nearly 2,500 schools around the country that participated in the Mix It Up program organized by Teaching Tolerance. This program encourages school kids to identify, question and negate social differences by sitting with someone new during lunch.

PeacePlayers International uses basketball to educate and unite children who live in communities divided by racial-ethnic, religious, and cultural differences. Working since 2001, PeacePlayers International now has an operating budget of over $2.2 million dollars and currently works in Northern Ireland, South Africa, the Middle East, and Cyprus.

• The Center for Ecoliteracy uses education as a way to promote sustainable living. Through programs, teaching strategies, and instructional tools, the Center for Ecoliteracy emphasizes our connections with the planet so that we humans live in unison with all living creatures (including each other) as opposed to seeing ourselves as superior to, different from and dominant over other living organisms.

The next time you are among a group of diverse individuals or meet someone new, see if you can make a list of all of the things you have in common. The longer you think about it the more you will realize that you have many more similarities than differences. After all, we all need shelter, we all live on planet earth, we all have stereotypes, we all have names, we all suffer from war, we all have dreams, we all communicate, we all fail, we all need sleep, we all have ancestors, we all were born and we all eventually die.