How Is Dylan Klebold Related To Columbine High School Shooting?

The massacre at Columbine High School in 1999 was, at the time, one of the worst school shootings to have taken place in the United States. In the months and years that followed this tragedy, discussions about public safety, the victims, and, most importantly, the killers ensued in the mass media. Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, best friends and killers in the Columbine massacre, ended the lives of 13 people and changed the lives of countless others. When looking back on this tragedy, it is not difficult for people to realize that Eric Harris was clearly psychopathic. However, his best friend Dylan, his partner in the killings, did not seem to share the same desire to kill. Dylan Klebold did not want to be an active participant in the Columbine

Dylan was less confident than Eric and had issues with self-love and saw the worst version of himself. Dave Cullen writes in his book Columbine “Dylan Klebold was meek, self conscious, and authentically shy. He could barely speak in front of a stranger, especially a girl. He’d follow quietly after Eric on the mall conquests, attempting to appear invisible.” (p. 7). Dylan was quiet and shy and he needed Eric to project into, he felt he needed to act in anger to keep his friendship with Eric. When he was with Eric, his angry side was pronounced, the angry side his parents thought was not an issue. He was a lit fuze, and “On film, he unleashed the anger and he was that crazy man, disintegrating in front of the camera.” (Cullen 10). These videos, however, were filmed whenever Eric was present with Dylan. These videos include the one made for school, the basement tapes, and the shooting practice. The reason this was able to occur is because Eric manipulated Dylan into participating and found another way for him to project his suicidal

With evidence from Sue Klebold, Dylan’s mother, she speaks about Dylan's depression in her book. Allison Parker references this in her blog stating that “Sue would later find out through his journals though that by sophomore year he was battling depression and suicidal thoughts.”. Being depressed, it worsened the symptoms that Dylan was already feeling. It made Dylan rely on the friendship between Eric and him, making him feel like he actually mattered to someone, making him more vulnerable to manipulation. This depression, however, went without treatment. It would only be years later that Klebold would put the pieces of her son's depression together Sue Klebold stated in her book that for kids that are like Dylan it was easy, “to fly under their parents’ radar precisely because they were shiny pennies, hiding the terrible pain they were in from their parents as capably as they did anything else” (Parker). Sue Klebold had no idea what was going on mentally with her son, nor the influence Eric had on him. It was difficult for Sue to see Dylan any other way than happy because he hid it so well, just like he was able to hide his violence with Eric so