The year is 2351. It has been 112 years since aliens and humans first made contact. Since then, each stayed on their own home planet—humans on Earth, and aliens on Melmac. Pleemoks (as they were known), and Humans communicate often, and the communications are mostly friendly. Their schools have partnerships with one another, and students video chat to learn about each other’s cultures. The most popular account on Instagram (yes, still around in 2351) is of three Pleemok teenagers who act out famous scenes in Human movies, and in 2351, Facebook has over 500 groups for people and aliens to share recipes.

However, things are about to change. After 20 years of discussing, debating and deliberating, Pleemoks and Humans have decided that it is time to try visiting each other’s planets. Scientists from both societies have spent a year learning about the atmosphere and food of each other’s planets. A first test visit is considered to be safe. One human family is sent to Pleemok and one Pleemokian family will come to Earth. The Pleemoks were asked to choose the town or the city on Earth that best matched their own society, and they chose to send their family to Staten Island.

Now, if you were a Staten Islander, particularly one who lived near the Pleemoks, how would you feel? Well, some Staten Island residents were excited for this historic event, others nervous, and others so scared they immediately sold their homes and moved away. Unfortunately, there was one group of Staten Islanders who felt a different emotion: anger. This group of people was not particularly friendly to people they considered to be “different,” especially those from another planet. They formed a group called “Go Away Pleemoks,” or “G.A.P.” for short.

G.A.P. may have been full of mean, hateful people, but their members were also smart and crafty. They started researching Pleemok culture, news and history to learn as many negative things about Pleemoks as they could. They didn’t find much, but they found enough to start rumors: “Pleemoks don’t believe in showering!” (they actually have self-cleaning skin). “One in every four Pleemoks has received a speeding ticket!” (“tickets” on Pleemok are awards for keeping to the speed limit), “Pleemoks won’t say ‘hello’ to you when you pass them on the street!” (“hello” is a bad word in Pleemokian). By the time Staten Island G.A.P. was done spreading rumors, half the neighborhood had turned against the Pleemoks and resolved to get rid of them as quickly as possible. However, as to not get in trouble with the police or the U.S. government, they couldn’t attract too much attention.

The G.A.P. decided to choose their two scariest members to visit the Pleemoks one at a time to scare them into leaving. So, once Pleemoks settled in and the police protection left, Scars McMuscles put on his scariest leather jacket and brought his scariest dog and knocked (slammed, more like it) on the Pleemoks’ door. “Open up! I know you’re in there!” Scars heard someone coming and put on his scariest face. But it was a Pleemok child who opened the door. “Hi! I’m Kodos!” said the child with a cute Pleemok smile. Scars’ face immediately softened and the dog began to wag his tail. “Just wanted to know if you wanted to pet my dog,” said Scars. The Pleemok child reached down to pet the dog, who licked Kodos’ face playfully, causing the boy to giggle. Scars turned and walked away. “I couldn’t do it,” he told the G.A.P. crew. “It was just a little child.”

Next up was Razor O’Growling. Razor put on a leather jacket with spikes, picked up a baseball bat, grabbed his pet alligator, and set off for the Pleemok residence. Razor wasn’t going to be nice to some child, and when the door opened, he growled (of course) at little Kodos. “Where are the rest o’ ya!” boomed Razor. But then he stopped. He noticed that Kodos was crying. “Oh, I’m sorry. Didn’t mean t’make ya cry.” He put his baseball bat down as his pet alligator wagged his tail and licked Kodos until the child stopped crying. Razor turned walked away from the house with his head hung. “I couldn’t do it,” he told the crew. “The kid started cryin’.” With Razor’s change of heart, the G.A.P. gave up and changed their mission to welcoming the Pleemoks. The new group named themselves the “Pleemok Alien Welcoming Society (P.A.W.S.).

In this week’s parsha, we learn of Pharaoh’s horrible decree regarding Jewish babies. Surely, his own daughter knew not to let Jewish male babies live. She likely viewed the Jewish people as the enemy as well. So what was she doing saving baby Moshe? The answer to this question teaches us about how to abolish hate.

For one person or group to hate another, the hater has to see the other as different and less human. It is much easier to have negative feelings toward someone who is “not like you” or “not part of your group.” However, once you realize that this person is exactly that—a person—with feelings, a family, and a neshama, the hate should disappear or at least soften. This is what happened with Bat Pharaoh. It’s one thing to hate the idea of a Jewish child, it’s another to hate an actual Jewish baby. Once she saw the baby in person, and especially when the child began to cry, she immediately knew she couldn’t follow through with the decree.

This message is super-important to us. If you ever have negative feelings toward another person or group, or want to do harm to another, remember that person’s humanity. Get to know those different from you. You never know what you’ll learn.

Yair Daar is the Middle School Dean of Students at Yeshivat He’Atid. He can be reached at [email protected].