A man executes his family because both he and his wife lost their jobs.

Does this tragedy represent how the rest of us may feel about our work and place in life, or is this a very isolated case of extreme psychosis?

Frankly, as hard as things are, there is never a reason to prevent children from having their life, no matter what lack of hope a parent has, being right about destiny is not a parental skill.

Although this incident, a man removing the family he and his wife created, may seem to symbolise the times, it does not. It is the act of a person who lost their sanity.

Lupoe and his wife were employed as medical technicians and appear to have sought out childcare from an outside agency and probably underdeclared their income, so were being investigated.

“… Lupoe and his wife had been under investigation for misrepresenting their employment to an outside agency in order to obtain childcare. He claimed that an administrator told the couple on Dec. 23: “You should not even had bothered to come to work today you should have blown your brains out.”

“The couple complained to the human resources department and eventually were offered an apology but two days later the Lupoes were fired, according to the letter.

“They did nothing to the manager who stated such and did not attempt to assist us in the matter, knowing we have no job and five children under 8 years with no place to go. So here we are,” the note said.

“At the bottom of the note, Lupoe wrote, “Oh lord, my God, is there no hope for a widow’s son?”

In his last statement Lupoe reveals the source of his despair. Being brought up himself with no father – his own social bonding and confidence appears based on external assessment. Therefore his self value was excessively fragile, the rather inappropriate comments from his employer appear to have set the man off in a weird direction – proving just how “adequate” he was.

He took possession of his families lives with a gun. Does this auger well for the rest of us? We use terms like “serial killer” or “mass murderer” to brand such behaviour as evil, not to be emulated. To keep it at a distance.

Lupoe’s insanity is not contagious. The managers inappropriate comments are not a cause, they are evidence of contributors to Lupoe’s insanity but it really did not make much difference.

Our world contains fragile people. When trouble really starts to hit, they will make the news stories. They may serve as warnings to the rest of us, but there is little to be learned from the actions of a fragile personality.