We were quite disturbed by news that a song loaded with racist lyrics and sentiment was piped over a public address system at Glen Allen High School as players from the largely white Henrico school and from the largely black John Marshall High School in Richmond were warming up for a homecoming football game.

Like many in the community, we immediately thought this was a sad example of the disease of racism infecting the younger generation.

Our disturbance turned to dismay when a Free Press reporter learned from sources that the student responsible for playing the outrageous song is African-American.

We await an explanation. And we expect disciplinary action from top school officials in Henrico County.

There is no place in a school, at a sporting event or on the airwaves for the offensive song that was played last week at Glen Allen High.

Was the student simply a media troll, as some have suggested? Was he tricked into downloading the song and playing it, as others have speculated? Or does he suffer from an appalling lack of self-respect, regard for others and/or total ignorance that caused him to play such a song? Is this an example of the stealth impact of racism?

Racism is such an insidious evil that even during slavery, enslaved people in the “big house” sometimes believed they were “superior” to those in the fields.

That same sense of superiority and division sometimes exists today between African-Americans living in the suburbs and those living in the city, with a perception of difference linked not only to geography, but economic status.

Without getting into a psychological discourse, we question why an African-American high school student would feel such a song is appropriate to play, particularly in this circumstance.

Clearly, he has missed several critical lessons that his parents and family now need to provide. Coupled with disciplinary action both from home and at school, this may be a lesson he will never forget.

We give a wave of the pom-poms to John Marshall High’s Coach Damon “Redd” Thompson and the players on the Justices’ football team for not letting the situation get under their skin.

They came out winners, not only on the field, but by rising above a challenging, highly offensive situation.