The Chemistry of Hate

My husband is a PhD chemist; I am not. So no doubt, my explanation of this will be seriously flawed, if not uninformed of the exact terms and process. But, I don’t really care. I care about ideas, art, gardens, God, people and many other things. We can’t all care equally about everything. Sometimes there are just not enough brain cells. Don’t misunderstand, not devaluing science…I am actually grateful that there are those who care about it and do amazing things!

Or maybe I just don’t have enough brain cells.

Awhile back we heard a talk called Everything is Spiritual. The speaker used the idea from science that the universe is constantly expanding and drew out many spiritual truths and concepts from that premise. Toward the end, I recall hearing something I thought very interesting.

Bear with me in my non-science brain, but it went something like this:

There are these little, little, teeny, tiny particles…I don’t know…molecules? atoms? electrons? neutrons? nano particles?? I don’t know. But there are really, really small. You probably can’t even see them, that’s how small they are! And they attract other small particles. And they join together. These particles or whatever they are…they attract other particles that are LIKE them. And then they bond together, because…they are the SAME. I think they also repel particles NOT LIKE them, but I’m not sure. They definitely just keep attracting those that are like them and they grow and grow and grow. Maybe they are a small cancer particle, or maybe they are the beginning of a beautiful human being. But the idea is…they keep bonding together and reproduce and grow and grow.

This has lots of implications for the entire universe, right?

OK, enough of my uninformed science. Let’s talk about the idea of this and what it means.

This morning, as usual, as I drink my coffee I start checking emails and, of course, Facebook. One of the first posts I saw was someone I know who decided it was a good idea to spew the contents of their heart online. And, quickly it seemed…..it attracted other like-minded people to “laugh” and “like” their statement.

I read it…and it repelled me. I considered writing: “I do not understand what this means, please explain. It sounds upon first reading as very hateful. But you are not a hateful person, right? So maybe I don’t understand its meaning?”

But then I thought…this person probably has way more time on their hands than I do. I knew that if I commented…I would spend the next eight hours of the time God gave me today checking back and forth on all the other hateful comments that would no doubt ensue from all the other “bonded particles.”

I decided it just wasn’t worth it! Yay for me.

Apparently some people have nothing better to do with their lives than to keep pressing their tiny little fingers to share vapid memes, or make ugly statements into cyberspace from some tiny little keyboard. I imagine these are tiny little people doing these things.

Sometimes I just don’t understand. It’s really pretty simple. Love God, love your neighbor as yourself.

Hate attracts hate. Love attracts love.

What attracts us? What are we drawn to? What and whom do we bond with? I would also like to know…what happens when, out of LOVE, we bond with those not like us?? Goes against the laws of nature…right?

Now, let’s clear something up here. The idea that calling out hatred is hateful is inane.

“Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. “ Proverbs 18:2

A covalent bond, also called a molecular bond, is a chemical bond that involves the sharing of electron pairs between atoms. These electron pairs are known as shared pairs or bonding pairs, and the stable balance of attractive and repulsive forces between atoms, when they share electrons, is known as covalent bonding.