There’s a reason they call it “race wars”:

Gunman targeted hateful, racist, managers

Regard me (emphasis mine):

Relatives say Thornton, 34, finally cracked after suffering racial harassment in a company where he said he was singled out for being black in a predominantly white work force.

“Everybody’s got a breaking point,” said Joanne Hannah, the mother of Thornton’s longtime girlfriend.

After shooting his co-workers, Thornton hid as police moved in. He called his mother, who tried for 10 minutes to talk him out of killing himself, his uncle Will Holliday told reporters.

“He said, ‘I killed the five racists that was there that was bothering me,'” Holliday said. “He said, ‘The cops are going to come in so I am going to take care of myself.'”

What was this egregious racial violation of which he speaks?

Thornton had said he found a picture of a noose and a racial epithet written on a bathroom wall, said Hannah, of Enfield, whose daughter Kristi had dated Thornton for the past eight years.

…and? The article doesn’t mention anything else.

I’m not going to sit here and pretend I know the intimate details of this man’s employment situation, or try and justify the sick mindset that resulted in someone scrawling ignorant garbage all over the inside of a bathroom stall. I’m sure we’ll find out that Thornton had altercations with several of his coworkers, who had conveniently attended a tea party at some point. No, what I’m worried about is this:

“Everybody’s got a breaking point,” said Joanne Hannah, the mother of Thornton’s longtime girlfriend.

Please, somebody scream and flail if I’m wrong, but that smacks of good ol’ justification. It sounds like something you’d say, shaking your head with your eyebrows raised, before going back to tweeting about #JustinBieber’s haircut like it’s no big deal.

No big deal? Can we just step back and consider this for a second? This man, with what I will just go ahead and assume was “malice aforethought” and all that, murdered eight of his coworkers.

He didn’t fire off a nasty e-mail, or get into a slapfight in the coffee room, or cut the heads off of the secretary’s flower bouquet (I’ve seen it happen); he packed heat in his lunchbox and SHOT PEOPLE IN THE HEAD.

By now, we should be used to people playing the race card whenever possible–it’s reared its head in the healthcare debate, the immigration debate, and in the debate over whether or not Tyra picks too many white girls to be America’s Next Top Model. What gives me the willies is that his friends and relatives chose to play the race card instead of offering their condolences to the families of the people that GOT SHOT IN THE HEAD.

The news reports so far have not given any sort of indication that the shooter was seriously harassed by, or had any reason to feel threatened by, his coworkers. He said it himself–they were “bothering” him. Okay, I’ll bite–here’s a list of people that have bothered me the past few days:

1. Jason Allen
2. Justin Bieber
3. The guy who almost totaled my car for me in the parking garage this morning
4. Juan Williams, Shepard Smith, and Keith Olbermann
5. Every man who has ever addressed my chest instead of my face
6. Mormons who won’t go away
7. People who bring strollers to sales at Victoria’s Secret
8. Whoever invented pantyhose
9. Men who find it appropriate to bar-stalk me when I’m just trying to have a quiet drink with the girls
10. People who dress their pets like tiny versions of themselves

Yes, they bothered me, but I didn’t deem it appropriate to SHOOT THEM IN THE HEAD.

Have I made my point?

Call me naive, but ten years ago, I don’t think anyone would have dared suggest that workplace harassment was just cause to bring a gun to work and cap your coworkers; now, it’s easier, more commonplace, and dare I say more acceptable (in MSM circles) to whip out the race card when someone screws up. The race card has been used to justify preferential treatment, entitlement programs, and now–however offhandedly and unofficially–it has been used to justify murder.

How’s that hopey change working out for you, Connecticut?