Taipei, Taiwan

Overseas, the news may not have been as visceral as it was back home. The news came through just as news, another shooting, another horrific massacre. It's horrible every time it happens, it's horrible every time hearing about it, but with every senseless shooting, I don't think there's a single American who thinks it'll never happen again.

That means we know it's going to happen again. It's part of our gun culture, it's part of our entertainment culture, it's part of our violence culture.

Then the surprise twist came through, what I wasn't expecting – the shooter was Asian American. Oh shit. Here comes the anti-Asian backlash, here come the comparisons with Pearl Harbor. Model minority? We even do bloody massacres well. Too bad no one is going to notch this up as another benchmark for Asian Americans towards finally being considered "real" Americans.

But even overseas, for me, the visceral part starts sinking in as the news coverage continues, and the stories of the people start coming through, the victims, the families, the funerals. It's not just another news story, just another shooting, when you find one, each, or any of the 33 dead was a person, a story, connected to other people who are suffering in the current moment.

People who aren't coming home, people who will never be seen again, be there again. People who lived through a horrible moment, who died senselessly and undeservedly. People who will have to have their belongings collected and sent home. People who lived with them, people who studied with them, people who knew them.

And now the package the shooter sent to NBC and the decision to air significant portions of it. I think it was the right decision to make the contents public. This act wasn't some big political statement. It wasn't like the Unabomber or Tim McVey. They had a message they wanted to get out, but if they're going to kill people to do it, I don't want to hear the message.

Cho didn't have message. He said things that might sound like a message, that might be in the form of a message, but they are more the mad ravings of a severely sick mind. He was mentally disturbed, maybe even an artist. Believe me, the expression wasn't too far from what I've heard in the Asian American arts community.

And that might be another disturbing point. Cho is me, Cho is us, some Asian Americans, to a certain extent. There are some shared experiences there, parts of our paths where we walked the same footsteps. But then he crossed a line that we don't cross. He snapped.

The reason why I think we should listen to him is because he's a medical case, not a political vigilante. NBC Nightly News had a legal consultant on hand when they aired contents of the package. They should have also had a psychiatric consultant, too, because there's a lot to learn there about him, and about us.

angry asian man described his act as "cowardly and selfish". It's hard to disagree with him (although admittedly I rarely do). I won't say I know any actual part of Cho's mind or thinking, but there are resonances. And getting to the mental breaking point where you know you're going to take your own life is one thing. Then deciding to take as many innocent people out with you is some serious, disturbing shit.

There is a very disturbing connect somewhere in there. Something about the pain and anguish necessary to commit suicide, but also about the rage and anger to decide to massacre people. Having those put together, you get some serious, disturbing shit.