The "truth" according to some

A lot of people in my family read SciFi books and/or alternative history books. When I talked to them about globalization and pessimistic views like Huntington’s class of civilizations or optimistic plans for a global word ethic, one of their answers always stands out: that the only way to have a real, peace-based global humanity fully realized would be if aliens attacked the planet. Then, differences would have to be swept aside and suddenly there would be something to contrast to “human” – whereby all distinctions among humans which seem so important now would no longer be categorically relevant. It’s the us-vs.-them scenario – the banding together against a common enemy. Since, as to my knowledge there are no aliens here or arriving any time soon, I’m going to say this plays into the pessimistic view of globalization that no natural means will bring about a global sense of humanity without outside pressure (and there is no outside pressure to ‘humanity’).