The school shooting in Red Lake, Minn. yesterday that left 10 dead and 12 wounded is just plain depressing. It’s sad that nearly six years after Columbine these things continue to happen.

What’s most distressing is the description of the shooter from a student. She describes what seem like obvious cries for help that seem to have gone ignored:

[Jeff] Weise was into goth culture, [17-year-old Sondra Hegstrom] said, wore “a big old black trench coat,” drew pictures of skeletons, listened to heavy metal music and “talked about death all the time.”

A couple of his friends had said he was suicidal, she said, and Hegstrom quoted his friends as saying they were watching a movie once when he said, “That would be cool if I shot up the school.”

“They didn’t think anything of it,” Hegstrom said, but “he got terrorized a lot.” He was called names and people thought he was weird. “I’m still trembling,” she said late last night. “I just can’t believe this stuff is happening.”

Who knows how much of that is true. Goth culture, video games and Marilyn Manson were quickly blamed after Columbine, but I don’t think those charges stuck. What does seem to be consistent is teens being “terrorized,” to use Hegstrom’s words. It’s sad that a teen in that position would turn to a bloody rampage to solve their problems. When something like that happens it’s clear society as a whole is dropping the ball on so many fronts.