race

race is an interesting issue. hypothetically, you're a race, and people that look like you and are vaguely related to you are the same one. you could be indo-european or upper-cumberland or appalachian or anything. and so anyway, there are like a thousand races they've shown on star trek, like the bajorans and cardassians (evolved from crustaceans) and klingons (have five hearts and six lungs) and vulcans (copulate via electricity) and these were all evolved from seeds sewn by an ancient race of human-looking progenitors in gene roddenberry's godless universe where starfleet captains worship the prime directive. non-humanoids are usually made of silicon or metal or music or lightning or something, and usually xenophobic since they're so relatively alone in the galaxy. in the lord of the rings and other fantasy series, you have an interesting concept that i have been musing about: the orc. orcs are interesting because they're like people, but their skin is green and they're ugly and they like rotten meat and ride warboars where we ride horses. we can't imagine where their musculation is like, since they look strong as well as sick, and also like they should be dead and yet dabble in evil (a force which lends strength and makes things less dead).
you may or may not be uncomfortable around members of other races. i, personally, think humans are all more or less alike, and i don't think the majority of us could get along with orcs or most aliens. maybe with the proper conditioning.