Yesterday Was a Really Bad Day for Him
/”Cherokee County Sheriff's Capt. Jay Baker said, ‘I spoke with investigators, they interviewed [Long] this morning. And they got that impression, yes -- he understood the gravity of it.’
‘And he was pretty much fed up and had been, kind of, at the end of his rope. And yesterday was a really bad day for him, and this is what he did,’ Baker said.”
I follow a significant number of mental health and wellness influencers. Nearly all of them had the same response to the pitiful excuse Long gave for killing eight people: “I’ve had more bad days than good days and my murder count is still ZERO”. My recollection from being acutely suicidal is fragmented, yet I remember with piercing clarity that family and doctors were far more interested in making sure that I was not having homicidal thoughts. The subtext was: “homicidal thoughts are more concerning than suicidal thoughts.”
For fifteen years I had a suicidal thought every single day. On bad days, thoughts assaulted me nearly ever minute. I cut myself, I asphyxiated myself, I punched dents into my car’s roof; I even hammered my laptop into tiny pieces because I thought porn contributed to losing my mind.
I had a rule: no one else could suffer for my human failings. The religion in which I was raised didn’t instill this rule, my parents’ didn’t, nor did societal mores.
My rule was established because by the time I turned eighteen, I had meaningful interactions with individuals who immigrated or were children of immigrants from at least thirty different countries. A ninety pound Japanese man who everyone in the gym called Hurricane, whooped my ass repeatedly. A woman named Abby left bruises on my arms when I fed her pads in kickboxing classes. I saw real pain in my gay friend’s eyes in high school when I parroted a religious ideology that I didn’t believe he had the right to marry someone of the same sex.
I aspired to be as skilled at arm bars as Hurricane (I never was). I drilled to have kicks as hard as Abby (close, but she had better hip turnover). I still feel shame for my lack of empathy toward my friend in high school. Since my realization of his unspoken pain at my words, I have tried to increase my understanding and acceptance of things that other may wish to do that have zero effect on my life.
This past week, I’ve come across the following:
Read devastating news of a massacre of mostly Asian-American women by a young, white male.
Witnessed a traffic argument escalate when one driver pulled out a pistol and pointed it at the other.
Used my de-escalation techniques to calm an argument between two individuals after a game.
What’s the common thread along this spectrum? A lack of emotional regulation, not caring for long-term consequences, and the inhuman (yet perplexingly very human) thought that one’s problems can be solved by harming other people. We don’t stop to think, and we all too easily permit violence and the threat of violence to any person outside of our in-group.
Let me be clear — Long killed a majority of people that have been stereotyped, overtly sexualized, and generally dismissed by society with a laugh. You read: “spa,” but you mentally replace that with: “massage parlor.” Tack the word: “Asian” in front of that and suddenly, your mind is inundated with variations of: “happy ending,” and, “me love you long time”. I believe that Long had a bad day, and I’m painfully aware of how much of a bullshit rationalization that is. He didn’t shoot up a local strip club. He didn’t stalk a porn star. He drove to an area of town that offered sexual services that had little to no security and a population that he felt comfortable dominating. Pre-meditated murder against a majority of individuals who were more likely to not fight back.
My Asian-American and women friends have been sharing stories of violence. They’ve been told to share less. I have the same response to those that want a more relaxing new feed as I do to Long: “Go fuck yourself.” If you’re upset with my choice of language, then channel your anger toward those that actually harm human beings and not their fragile sensibilities.
I almost didn’t write this piece. I was going to let my friends who were closer to this by accident of genetics and history to carry the banner of greater awareness. Then I remembered how we all bleed red, and those of us with any amount of public influence have an obligation to shout from the rooftops instead of cowering in the basement.
“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” - Martin Luther King
New York Times: What We Know About the Victims in the Atlanta Shootings
Soon Chung Park, 74;
Hyun Jung Grant, 51;
Suncha Kim, 69;
Yong Ae Yue, 63;
Delaina Ashley Yaun, 33;
Xiaojie Tan, 49;
Daoyou Feng, 44;
Paul Andre Michels, 54.
Elcias R. Hernandez-Ortiz, 30, was seriously injured.
