Yesterday a teenager in Germany killed himself and fifteen people. He had told others about his plan to kill on an internet chat site.
"Heribert Rech, the state interior minister of Baden-Württemberg, told a news conference that an unidentified person wrote on the German-language chat room that he had access to weapons 'and I will go tomorrow morning to my old school and do a really nice barbecue. You will hear from me tomorrow.'"
The gunman's name is 17-year-old Tim Kretschmer. According to the article, before the shooting took place Kretschmer posted on a web site and said, "I am sick of this messy life. Always the same. Everyone makes fun of me. No one recognizes my potential. I am serious."
Kretschmer was seeing a therapist for his depression but had decided to stop going. He took one of his father's guns to do the shooting and ended up killing himself in a "Volkswagen dealership".
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I had actually read about this story in the New York Times last week. I remember reading about the story, the killer, the shooting and the website where he had practically declared his shooting to come. However, it left me experiencing many emotions because many people make open ended threats about death, or killing. People even openly state things like "I just want to do" or "I'm going to kill this person" but it happens so often or in a joking manner that it's hard to decifer when it's a true situation or simply a heated statement. It made me wonder how often I personally make broad statements about wanting to die or hearing others say it. It's hard when to know what should be taken seriously and when.
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